Dating from Glazunov's highly productive early period of composition, The Kremlin is a tone poem evoking the grandeur, pomp and circumstance surrounding those most recognizable of Russian symbols, the Kremlin and the cathedral of St. Basil. Consequently it is full of instantly familiar Russian themes and sonorities, echoing the nationalist fervor espoused by the Kuchka—the so-called 'Mighty Handful' of composers promoting a national identity in Russian music in the closing decades of the nineteenth century. Conceived in three contrasting sections, the central movement contains some of Glazunov's most meditative writing. Overall, the work is retrospective in its melodic and compositional structure, but there are occasional elements which look forward to the changes which will be wrought in Russian music by, for instance, Stravinsky's ballets.

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