About this edition
Aleksandr Borodin's Prince Igor stands among the great monuments of Russian nationalist opera, a sprawling epic drawn from the medieval "Lay of Igor's Campaign" that occupied the composer, on and off, for nearly eighteen years. Left unfinished at his death in 1887, the opera was completed and orchestrated by his friends and colleagues Alexander Glazunov and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, whose devoted editorial work brought Borodin's vision to the stage. Its second act contains the "Polovtsian Dances," one of the most exhilarating and frequently performed orchestral showpieces in the entire repertoire, celebrated for its sweeping melodies and vivid orchestral color.
This full score reproduces the first edition, engraved and published in Leipzig by M.P. Belaieff in 1888 under plate number 115. Belaieff, the publishing house founded by the timber merchant and passionate patron Mitrofan Belyayev, was the principal publisher of the Russian nationalist school, issuing works by Borodin, Rimsky-Korsakov, Glazunov, and their circle with the exceptional engraving quality for which the firm became renowned throughout Europe. Because this first edition was prepared under the direct supervision of Glazunov and Rimsky-Korsakov as they completed Borodin's unfinished manuscript, it remains the authoritative source for the opera's orchestration and the edition from which its performance tradition descends. Purple 4R Publishing's reprint is sourced from the New York: Edition Musicus printing (circa 1930), a firm that brought important Belaieff-published Russian scores to American musicians and libraries in the twentieth century.
About this edition:
- Full orchestral score
- Page size: 8.27 x 11.69 in (A4)
- Reproduced from a public domain historical edition
- Published by Purple 4R Publishing
Because this historical score has passed into the public domain, we're delighted to bring it back into print — making Borodin's Prince Igor freely accessible to conductors, orchestras, students, and scholars who want to study or perform this landmark of Russian opera.