The overture to the opera "Russlan and Ludmilla" is a very popular piece for symphonic orchestra. Even if you don't know much about orchestral music, you've probably heard this piece before- perhaps on TV or in a movie. Mikhail Glinka's operas Russlan and Ludmilla, and A Life for the Czar laid the foundations of Russian national opera.
With everyone's mind on the end of the school year and graduations, I think that this music is a good fit for this time of year since it is so triumphant. This piece is already quite fast, but this recording I found is really fast. The first few seconds of the recording I was thinking "Wow this is much faster than the last recording I listened to... I'm not sure if I like this..." But after the first ten seconds, I was sold.
Here is Yevgeny Mravinsky conducting the Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra in a brilliant, rambunctious, and wonderfully energetic recording of The Overture to Russlan and Ludmilla.
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