Orthodoxy, Music , Politics and Art in Contemporary Russia and Eastern Europe was a conference and festival organized by the
Centre for Russian Music and the
Department of History,
Goldsmiths, University of London, and the Department of Orthodox Theology,
University of Eastern Finland in the Great Hall, Goldsmiths, University of London during March 2013.
The abstracts from the conference programme give an indication of the range of engagements which exist between Orthodoxy and modern or contemporary music.
Elena Artamonova spoke about the relationship between
Sergei Vasilenko and the
Old Believers:
‘Vasilenko has been perceived as a conformist and inconsequential Soviet composer in post-Soviet Russia. The recent discoveries of unpublished documents reveal Vasilenko to be a talented musician whose search for a niche within the culture of Soviet music forced him to keep his true musical writings secret from the public in the drawer of his desk.
Chant as an element of musical vocabulary and as a symbolic depiction of faith played an important role in his artistic expression. Vasilenko undertook a diligent practical and scholarly research on the Old Believers’ chant, znamennyi raspev, studied the kriuki notation and attended the Old Believers’ liturgies in Moscow, which were forbidden for outsiders and kept in strict confidence in spite of severe persecution. Vasilenko’s first major composition, a cantata the Legend of the Great City of Kitezh and the Quiet Lake Svetoyar op. 5 written in 1902, was composed using the authentic tunes of the Old Believers and schismatic legends from the Volga region. This work anticipated
Nikolai Rimskii-Korsakov’s opera on the same subject.
Vasilenko strongly linked the ascetic simplicity and plainness of the monodic tunes of the Old Believers with the ancient icons and the paintings of a devout Russian Orthodox artist,
Mikhail Nesterov. The visual and narrative aspects of his work depicted an irrational mystic world that was in harmony with Vasilenko’s musical aspirations.’
Boris Belge highlighted religious expression in the work of
Sofia Gubaidulina:
‘Sofia Gubaidulina (*1932) is widely considered one of the most "religious" composers of the former Soviet Union. In fact, she believed in God since her youth. Due to this religiosity, she could not but include religious material and ideas in to her musical work. Socialized in the days of Khrushchev’s antireligious campaigns and a widespread disinterest in religion in Soviet society, her religious conviction seems to be something exceptional.’
Belge discussed Gubaidulina’s musical spirituality by analysing some of her works written in Soviet times (
Offertorium,
Seven Words) and by discussing questions of continuity or discontinuity in Gubaidulina’s spirituality in the Brezhnev era, as well as Perestroika, and postcommunist times.
Predrag Djokovic explored
Sacred Music In The Musical Life Of Serbia In The Time Of Communism:
‘In order to understand the status of sacred music in communist Serbia, it is necessary to explain the attitude of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia towards religion between 1945 and 1990. This country treated religion as "the opium for the people" and had a negative approach to the different Christian denominations, especially to the Serbian Orthodox Church. Since the religious communities were, as well as all their activities in that period, on the margins of social, and particularly public life, sacred music was very little, if at all, present in the concert halls. Although this attitude was common throughout the communist Yugoslavia, in predominantly Roman Catholic Croatia and Slovenia situation was different to some extent. In the Orthodox Serbia, the communists completely abandoned traditional cultural values. In the course of almost 50 years, spiritual, a cappella choir music, which was a significant part of the cultural identity of the Orthodox Serbs, could not be heard publicly at all. Many pre-WW2 church choirs transformed under the influence of the militant atheism, while new, city choirs performed partisan songs glorifying the communist sacrifices and their struggle in creating the new society. However, contrary to the lack of the Orthodox Church music, in the same period in Serbia, the Catholic and Protestant church music was performed from time to time. This deliberate neglect of the Orthodox music in the musical life of Serbia lasted until 1980s. As a consequence of the weakening of the communist regime and its ideology, the status of the sacred music improved in public. One of the turning points was the celebration of the 125 years of
Mokranjac’s birth. In 1981, the Radio Television Belgrade Choir performed and recorded the greatest Serbian composer Stevan Mokranjac’s most important spiritual works – The Liturgy and The Funeral Service (Requiem).’
Rachel Jeremiah-Foulds spoke about
Galina Ustvolskaya’s unexpected avenue to the
Znamenny tradition through the works of
Igor Stravinsky:
‘As one of the most important composers to arise in Soviet Russia, Ustvolskaya (1919-2006) opened new dimensions for Russian music by cultivating an original style in the midst of cultural and political calamity. Her indignant protests that she was ‘in isolation by choice and by geopolitical circumstance’ were reinforced by her vigorous rejection of many conventional genres and traditions and the development of her own, uncompromising voice. This paper will begin with a review of the conspicuous inclusion of characteristics of the Russian Orthodox Church’s Znamenny Raspev in her work, an approach that provided a route through which her extreme musical language could progress, and her spirituality could be explored, amidst the restrictions imposed in twentieth-century Russia.
Yet Ustvolskaya was not the first composer to be fascinated by the spiritual and cultural implications of this Orthodox chant, and to spot the possibilities its musical vocabulary presented. The thriving folk tradition of the chant, its reference to an ancient - more spiritual - Russia, along with its Modernist potential, had also made it a very attractive musical vocabulary to Stravinsky (1882-1971) half a century beforehand in an entirely different political context.’
Julija Jonane discussed the appearance of Russian Orthodox genres and composers in the revival of Latvian Sacred Music:
‘Latvia is a multi-religious country where the most prevalent are three Christian Confessions:
- Evangelical Lutheran
- Roman Catholic
- Russian Orthodox.
Although Russian Orthodoxy in Latvia has an old and rich history, Orthodox traditions in musical compositions of the Latvian music history became incorporated much later, only at the end of 20th century. As Latvia regained independence (1980s and 1990s), the traditional churches also re-established themselves. At the same time, Latvian music culture was hit by the wave of the spirituality and religious music become even fashionable. Composers became interested in music genres of the old and established religions (Roman Catholic and Russian Orthodox), such as masses, liturgies, hymns, vespers, sacred concerts, etc.
Nowadays, at the beginning of 21st, century, we have composers who are truly dedicated to sacred music and consider it to be their calling. Among them the following three are of the particular importance:
1)
Jurijs Glagolevs’s/Yuriy Glagolyev’s (born in 1926) predecessors were known Orthodox priests and church choir conductors. He created sacred compositions for performance mainly in church ceremonies.
2) Musical settings by
Andrejs Selickis/Andrey Selickiy (born in 1960) are also inspired by his work as a singer and choir conductor of various Russian Orthodox churches in Riga. However, often the composer’s sacred oeuvre rises above the traditions and canons of his religious denomination – towards Christian ideas in a more general sense.
3) The third composer who writes music according to the Russian Orthodox traditions is
Georgs Pelecis/Georg Pelecis (born in 1926). Although he is not directly involved in church activities, his compositions are inspired by his faith. Five oratorios by him are considered to be an important contribution to Latvian sacred music history as well as intersecting with Russian Orthodox genres. The oratorio
God is Love (2001) was specially composed as a dedication to Russian Orthodoxy in Latvia within the framework of the 800th Jubilee of Riga. This work, described by the author himself as "an ecumenical concert", combines the Latvian and Russian languages, thus symbolically reflecting the interaction of two different cultures.’
Ivana Medic highlighted Serbian piano music inspired by the Orthodox tradition:
‘One of the most interesting strands of Serbian musical modernism that emerged in the decades after the World War Two was an idiosyncratic intertwining of the various neo- styles (neoclassicism, neoexpressionism etc.) with Orthodox tradition. This trend was distinguished by the nostalgic/poeticised relation towards the distant past (in particular, the idealised Middle Ages), and the aim to revive the "archaic" by using contemporary (including avant-garde) artistic means. This style has proved to be extremely vital and, with some modifications, it has survived to this day.’
She discussed piano music by several Serbian composers (
Vasilije Mokranjac,
Svetislav Božic,
Miroslav Savic, et al.) who found inspiration in the Orthodox tradition. ‘While some of them use verbatim quotations of church chants and work them into the pieces, others opt for a less direct approach, where the church music is only simulated (and often supported by the onomatopoeia of ubiquitous bells).’
Gregory Myers shared thoughts on
Nikolai Korndorf’s 1978 Setting of the Orthodox Divine Liturgy:
‘A work that has only recently appeared on the composer’s work list, and a composition best defined as written for the drawer, Nikolai Korndorf’s setting of the Orthodox Liturgy is an early work dating from 1978; this is music composed at the pre-dawn of a new era. The decade of the 1970s marked the beginning of Russia’s spiritual awakening; the allure of the Russian Orthodoxy crossed generations drawing many to and back into its fold, as if they were saying ‘this was once ours and let us reclaim it to make us whole’. Korndorf’s compositional approach appears to draw on earlier traditions that antedate and therefore bypass traditional 19th-century Russian sacred music trends. The composer recasts, reconnects and succeeds in re-establishing that long lost organic relationship between canonical texts and music.’
Tara Wilson argued that for
Vladimir Martynov Russian Orthodoxy was a cultural and compositional aesthetic:
‘Vladimir Martynov (b. 1946) is one of Russia’s leading contemporary composers, noted for his long-term employment of minimalist techniques, as well as for his cultural and compositional manifesto, entitled ‘The End of the Composers’ Time’ (1996). Regarded as a polymath, with specialisms in Russian Orthodoxy, sacred choral music, Eastern and Western Philosophy and post-structural theory, Martynov advocates that contemporary compositional language should function as a form of ‘bricolage’; as a commentary on past cultures and musics, both secular and sacred, while connecting these to the present day. Directly influenced by Russian Orthodoxy as a doctrine, as form of ritual and as a source of archaic musical vocabulary, Martynov makes the connections between chant and Minimalism, while constructing what he terms a ‘New Sacral Space: a new type of performance ritual that aims to engender meditative contemplation within a postmodernist context.’
Tatiana Soloviova considered
Stepan Smolensky and the Renaissance of Sacred Music in Russia:
‘To understand Russian sacred music, it is crucial to investigate its history. One of the most important in the history of sacred music in Russia was its renaissance, which took place at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. After a long period of being a marginalized area subdued by foreign domination, Russian sacred music was at that time returning to its roots, ancient chants becoming an element of the vanguard of music creativity in Russia, and the subject of admiration for foreigners. This renaissance included several simultaneous trends: historical research, composing, performing, educational issues and also public debates. For the first time in Russian history, sacred music was being discussed in leading newspapers!
A remarkable role in this renaissance was played by Stepan Smolensky (1848-1909), little known to Russians, let alone the English public. His pioneering research into medieval sacred chants, his teaching and composing were not only germane to the renaissance, but also its essential ingredient. During this directorship the Moscow Synodal School became a first class educational institution and its Choir was hailed by Europeans as an outstanding phenomenon. Smolensk greatly influenced
Kastalsky,
Rachmaninoff,
Grechaninov and others: thanks to his guidance many masterpieces were created (it is to him that Rachmaninoff dedicated his "All-Night Vigil"). The so called New Direction in sacred music started and led by Smolensky represents one of the most glorious pages in cultural history of Russia. Discussions of that time are both relevant and enlightening for those interested in sacred music nowadays.’
Tanya Sirotina discussed the poetic theatre of
Vladimir Rubin:
‘Born in 1924, Rubin served in the Red Army during the Second World War. Since the 1950s he has been active as a composer, living his philosophical and religious convictions in the medium of art. He survived the fall of the Soviet empire and the emotional turmoil, and witnessed the ensuing disruption of human souls that arose within this period.
A patriarch of the contemporary Russian compositional school who continues the line of Russian musical tradition, he took lessons from Vakhrameyev as a child, and was later a student of Goldenveyzer (1949, piano, Moscow conservatoire). Personally acquainted with Shostakovich and Sviridov, in his art he pursued the idea of poetic theatre and maintained the revival of the sacred word in his operas, choral and film music.’
In an interesting deviation from the main theme Arnold McMillin explored the reflection of religion in Modern Belarusian Literature:
‘Belarus was dominated by its neighbours from the mid-17th century onwards, and its history has taught it to be tolerant to the point of passivity, albeit not in religion where for centuries Belarusians have striven to retain their religious identity, despite opposition from within and without the country.
Poland and Russia attempted to impose Catholicism and Orthodoxy, respectively, but Uniate beliefs remained, and have been adopted by many contemporary writers.
In the 1920s in Western Belarus several clerical poets, whilst preaching the Catholic faith, defied the government by espousing nationalist ideas. Many such ‘bourgeois priests’ were to suffer murder and exile.
During most of Stalin’s time religion was banned in Belarus. Since the collapse of Communism, however, it became a prominent theme in literature, especially poetry. In the 1910s and following decades, a number of writers had written about the pull of Russia on the one hand and Poland on the other, leaving Belarus in the middle, trying to remain politically and spiritually independent. This theme has was taken up again by several prominent contemporary poets
Religious controversy, never far away, also entered scholarship, through falsification of the name of the enlightenment figure of
Francis Skaryna.
Contemporary Belarusian literature contains myriad responses to God, from pious verses to angry challenges, particularly following the Chernobyl disaster. Notable are many lively dialogues with the Deity, who often seems to be rural and local, offering protection from the world around.’
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