Nikolai Sokolov - Prelude for Piano in E flat Major

Viktor Nikolayev - Piano Nikolai Sokolov (1859-1922) was a Russian composer and a member of the circle that grew around the publisher Mitrofan Belyayev. He was a student of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, and later he taught Alexander Tcherepnin, Dmitri Shostakovich and Yuri Shaporin at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory. He was the posthumous dedicatee of Shostakovich’s Theme and Variations in B-flat major for orchestra, Op. 3. Other works (which are largely neglected) include a Quintet, Op. 3, also arranged for string orchestra as a serenade; final chorus from Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy’s Don Juan, Op. 5; choruses for women’s voices, Op. 12 (published 1892); piano variations, Op. 25; Variations on a popular Russian theme for string quartet (published 1899). There are also three string quartets, in F major, A major and D minor, and a string trio in D minor, his Op. 45 (published in 1916). All of these were published by Belyayev’s firm. It is possible that, when Sergei Diaghilev was looking for a composer for T