Pianist Yevgeny Sudbin has recorded over 25 albums, including Beethoven Concertos with Osmo Vanska and the Minnesota Orchestra. He's recorded beloved masterpieces from Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff and lesser known gems by Nikolai Medtner. Yevgeny discusses with Jim Cunningham about his newest CD releasing on May 9th. "Scriabin: Vers La Flamme" features work by Alexander Scriabin. Yevgeny describes "Vers la Flamme" as drawing the audience toward a flame, increasingly getting hotter until the cosmos blows up. He describes the Fourth Sonata as so hot and erotic you can't easily describe the action on the radio. Yevgeny talks about Scriabin's influences, such as Chopin. Was Scriabin Russian? Not really even though the Soviets claimed him as their own sending cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin into space with a recording of the Poem of Ecstasy in the cockpit. Yevgeny Sudbin has never been to Pittsburgh, as he likes to be close to home in London. He's on his way to serve as a judge at the Van Cliburn Competition and he shares some of the thoughts learned from his teachers Murray Perahia, Leon Fleisher, Stephen Hough, Claude Frank and Stephen Kovacevich. You can find Yevgeny's "Scriabin: Vers La Flamme" on the BIS label online.