Tucson duo goes all Russian to close out concert series

Pianist Rie Tanaka and bassist Philip Alejo, colleagues at the University of Arizona School of Music, will bookend their program with works by lesser-known 20th-century Russian composers Reinhold Glière, who wrote a series of works for various paired instruments; and Sophia Gubaidulina, who was a prolific composer of modernist sacred music. Works by Shostakovich and Scriabin fill the middle.

The pair will open the concert with the fiery, late Romantic-period " Four Pieces” for piano and bass by Glière, whose embrace of and focus on nationalist idioms earned him favor with the early 20th-century Soviet regime. The four movements in “Four Pieces” go from contemplative to lighthearted to warmly calm before bursting into an energetic dance.

The adagio from Shostakovich’s 1935 comic ballet “The Limpid Stream” will continue the mood set by the Glière. Shostakovich’s music here is bright and tuneful in contrast to the darker shades of some of the composer’s symphonies and quartets.

Tanaka and Alejo will slip into a more introspective mood with Scriabin’s “Six Early Pieces,” a deeply romantic work that’s heavily inspired by Chopin. Instead of the wild dissonance of his later works, “Six Early Pieces” has rich harmonies and flowing melodies.

Wednesday’s recital closes with Gubaidulina’s Sonata for Double Bass and Piano, which plays out like a terse conversation between the two instruments. The music moves between sudden bursts of aggression to eerie quiet, with the piano going to its low register to match the deep growl from the bass.

The concert at Rincon Congregational United Church of Christ, 122 N. Craycroft Road, starts at 7 p.m. Tickets are $45, or $12 for students, through arizonachambermusic.org.