“Sasha and Dinu”
(composed and performed by reynold d. philipsek 2017 copyright. Zino-Rephi Music BMI)
I have been working on my solo acoustic guitar repertoire in order to prepare a recital program. I will probably film this recital at some point in the next year to be posted on Youtube or at my site.
My recent interest in the work of the great Slavic pianist/composers like Prokofiev, Chopin, Scriabin and Rachmaninoff have inspired this move.
“Sasha and Dinu” is a piece I first wrote a few years ago but only recently worked up this current version. The tonal center of C Sharp Minor is ever present and comes directly from the influence of Scriabin, Chopin and Rachmaninoff who all used this tonality to great effect in creating what I call a mood of “Slavic Melancholia.”
“Slavic Melancholia” could be described as a state of being in which sadness, nostalgia, longing, despair, joy and hope are mixed together into a sort of psycho-romantic goulash. You find this mood in most Slavic art to some degree and being of that general persuasion myself I feel quite at home in this modality.
My theory is that years of oppression, poverty, cold winter nights, copious droughts of vodka and a soulful poetic nature all greatly contribute to the origins of “SM.”