The Eagle and the Snake

Leokadiya Kashperova (1872–1940), hitherto consigned to a footnote in musical history as Stravinsky’s piano teacher, is undergoing rediscovery. A double graduate of the St Petersburg Conservatoire, she emerged as a virtuoso pianist and composer in the romantic tradition. She was associated with some of the great musicians of her day, including Balakirev and Auer. She performed in both Germany and the UK in the 1900s, but her career petered out after 1920.

Following her graduation from the St Petersburg Conservatoire Kashperova became personally acquainted with the poet Yakov Polonsky and often attended his literary gatherings. When he died in 1898 Kashperova responded with this setting of one of his most celebrated ballads, for the benefit of the memorial fund created to support the poet’s widow and family. Here is a vivid musical dramatisation of the old proverb ‘Pride comes before a fall’ – quite literally a fall in the case of the haughty eagle who is deceived by the wily snake into displaying his arrogance once too often. Kashperova’s music is full of vivid musical depiction, from the serpent slithering over the granite-stone to the crashes of thunder and lightning as both bird and reptile fly high above the mountain-tops, with disastrous consequences.