24 Jazz Preludes op. 53

Kapustin’s Twenty-Four Preludes op.53 were written in 1988. Clearly influenced by Chopin in their key scheme and brevity, they present us with a great variety of jazz styles: blues (prelude 11), ballad (5 & 9), jazz waltz (18), swing (17 & 19), jazz funk (7 & 12) and even an allusion to Take Five (13). In many of them the composer states a theme and then “improvises” a new melody over the underlying chord structure. The whole set projects an ebullient spontaneity, and it is fast becoming one of Kapustin’s most popular works.

The composer himself performing no. 11: