Креативный Проект о Катюше (Извените за ужасное произношение. . .)
Here is a "creative project" I was assigned for my intensive 3rd year Russian class. I had been working on a theme and variations on a famous Soviet song from the 1930's, called Katyusha. For the project, I talk about the original song and show an abridged version of my theme and variations. Since I speak no English in the video, here is the translation of what I say:
"Hello friends, I will be talking about a song called "Katyusha," information regarding it, and about the variations that I composed on its theme.
Katyusha is a song written in 1938 by Matvey Blanter, who was a very famous composer in the Soviet Union. Katyusha is a sort of propaganda song, wherein a young woman sets out for a river bank, singing about her lover, who is a soldier fighting for the safety of the country.
The song has also been translated into many different languages, including English, Spanish, Chinese, Icelandic, and many others. In fact, schoolchildren in China and Iceland learn to sing the song, though the version in Iceland is about farming, rather than war.
With respect to my variations, I love the song's melody, and ever since I first heard it, I knew I wanted to compose a set of variations on its theme. Besides that, I was also inspired by the compositions, named "Le Festin d'Esope" by Alkan and "The People United Will Never Be Defeated!" by Rzewski, which are also both sets of variations. I was also heavily influenced by the emotions in the song, with a sense of heroism, but also anxiety due to the potential danger that exists in the situation portrayed by the song.
I will now play some of my variations for you, though I won't actually play them on the piano because the piece is very difficult to play. I will also not sing the song because I don't really like singing. Besides that, please enjoy!"
My speech isn't the greatest, but I left mistakes in so it wouldn't seem as if I were just reading off a paper. My accent could've been a lot better too. If you're a Russian speaker, please be gentle. . .