Analysis
The cantata opens with a sighing motif on trumpets, after which the strings play an expansive, flowing melody in C major. The choir suddenly intrudes (singing loudly There never was such joy - the entire village is full of it), and the music picks up speed. The choir slips cheekily into distant keys now and then. Faster staccato sections continue to alternate with slower flowing sections.
Of special interest is the last section, where the choir races up and down a C major scale (spanning more than two octaves), rather like a child practising piano scales: the British journalist, Alexander Werth (author of Musical Uproar in Moscow), "wondered whether hadn't just the tip of his tongue in his cheek as he made the good simple kolhozniks sing a plain C-major scale, up and down, up and down, and up and down again...". The orchestra provides alternating G and A-flat pedal notes. The cantata ends in a blazing C major, a favourite key of Prokofiev (cf. Piano Concerto No. 3, Russian Overture, and Symphony No. 4 (revised version)).
Read more about this topic: Zdravitsa (Prokofiev)
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