20 Pieces in the First Position

Oleg Kiselev writes in an accessible and imaginative musical style and this cycle of 20 pieces explores first position with a wide variety of melodic, rhythmic and textural ideas. Each piece has an imaginative title and maintains a particular mood throughout. There is a fairly wide range of difficulty here, from Song of the Spring Birds, a single melodic line in C major, up to complexities of three and four part chords with accidentals in the capricious Small Fidget. Care is taken to make everything easily playable, however. Melody lines are attractive, if predictable, and a range of keys are used - Dream Waltz moves from E major to E minor; Cowboy and Girl from C major to E flat major. Aquarium Fishes is effective in G major with unsettling accidentals. A range of time Signatures and rhythmic ideas are explored - Song About Russia is in 6/8 with a melody punctuated by pedal bass notes; Steppe Breeze switches between semiquavers and quavers in repeated patterns over held bass notes. Hasty Etude requires chromatic semiquaver passages and staccato. The quirkily titled incorrigible Shirker of Lessons requires playful alternation of pizzicato and golpe with swung quavers; Dancing Solar patches of Light has a simple waltz rhythm; Warm Summer Rain has mostly continuous quaver movement throughout, requiring good right hand control. Clearly set out, easy to read with no fingering and few extraneous markings, this volume is useful for aiding the development of a sense of character and mood in performance. Its carefully restricted technical means makes it particularly suitable for capable young players in the grade two to four range. Recommended.

Linda Kelsoll-Barnett (Classical Guitar Magazine)