I don't know if anyone still looks at this thread, but I just wanted to say that for next season, for me the Zhulin Jewish Melody/Hava Nagila program is already wonderful! It's a totally new image, completely different from what one might "normally" expect of Plushy. From what we've seen so far, I also really like the way Evgeni is adding more transitions, to have them contribute to the expression, instead of just being there for the sake of getting higher scores. In the past, there were some simple, lyrical pieces I wanted in seeing Evgeni trying, but now I wonder, it may be a lot harder to create programs in this style that is both artistic and also fitting the kind of showy, transition-filled skating style, which the ISU seems to be promoting now....
But now, something a little crazy: I was learning to use some audio-editing programs recently, so as an exercise for myself, and also just for fun, I tried to cut together a very rough idea of an imaginary program, using some parts of one of my favorite works of music, Beethoven's last piano sonata, op. 111:
http://www.divshare.com/download/15146643-4d8Sorry I don't know how to embed, so here's the link with the player on it. It's obviously very unskillfully edited, and the length is not exactly right. For the whole sonata, here's Maria Yudina's version, faster and very dramatic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDfbjXVawNYhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95vO59SsrfUhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJivG3mjw3sI know Plushy has done Moonlight and 5th Symphony before, but this is late Beethoven, which is very different. It's classical, but extremely modern-sounding, even shocking. It has huge contrasts in mood and rhythm. There are parts that even sound like ragtime or jazz, but (in my opinion) are more intense and substantial than most real jazz pieces. It has big tension-building chords (for jumps?), fast powerful parts that could go with footwork, and a famous long trill at the end, which I think may possibly work well for a combination spin. There are a lot of showy "tricks" of form, so I think it can sustain lots of transition and other frills that judges like, but the music itself transcends these things to achieve a kind of stark power. It seems this is something that may fit Plushy's skating.
Artistically, people tend to "go crazy" when talking about this piece. (For example, the great German writer Thomas Mann spent about five pages in his novel Doktor Faustus describing it, in a very poetic way.) Many say it expresses Beenthoven's own life and spiritual experiences. There is a very pure and beautiful theme, but then there is conflict, pain, struggle with fate, and finally calm after the storm and transcendence. It's very complex and weighty music, but still intimate enough for one man. Not just any man though: I am absolutely certain no other skater will possibly be able to handle this, not even close, and in fact I would not have imagined this for a younger Plushy, either. But in skating, Plushy is now in a unique position, and it is possible that this late period music of a great master may find something in common with him.
LOL sorry, it appears that I ended up babbling at length.
I actually also wanted to mention another, completely unrelated, thought, which is that if Plushy ever wanted to go back to a Russian theme, one possibility is War and Peace, either the Prokofiev opera or the sixties film score, because I suspect Evgeni would make a great Prince Andrei Bolkonsky...