Countries of the World/COUNTRYS.BIN/dp/0391/03917.txt

Text File | 1991-06-25 | 32KB | 522 lines

$Unique_ID{COW03917}
$Pretitle{295}
$Title{Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
Chapter 9B.   Music}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Thomas D. Roberts}
$Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army}
$Subject{soviet
russian
music
ballet
war
film
century
world
first
films}
$Date{1972}
$Log{}
Country:     Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
Book:        Soviet Union, A Country Study
Author:      Thomas D. Roberts
Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army
Date:        1972

Chapter 9B.   Music

     Despite restrictions, Russian musical composition in the Soviet era has
kept a high standard and maintained its place in the world. The antecedents of
Soviet composition reside in prerevolutionary musical tradition. As a result
of the revolution, Glazunov and Stravinsky did not return to their homeland,
but Prokofiev did so in 1936.

     Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953), a student of Rimsky-Korsakov, had a very
individualistic and colorful style, neoclassical in its clarity of form and
structure. His music is characteristically witty and humorous. Prokofiev's
compositions include operas-Love for Three Oranges (1919), film music for
Alexander Nevsky (1938) and Ivan the Terrible (2 parts, 1944-46), in addition
to vocal-orchestral pieces, concertos, and sonatas.

     Dmitri Shostakovich (1906- ) claims first place in popularity among
Soviet composers. His style is said to generally reflect the Soviet point of
view in music with its stress on clear motifs drawn from popular sources. His
highly individualistic approach, however, has at times subjected him to severe
criticism from the Party apparatus.

     Shostakovich's work is characterized by directness and clarity, use of
current subjects, and a gift for satirical treatment. Best known for his
symphonies, he has delved into nearly all media. Among his best-known operas
are the avant-garde Nose (1929), taken from Gogol; The Age of Gold (1930), a
satire on the capitalist world; and Lady MacBeth of the Mzensk District
(1934), a last foray into modernism. He also wrote a suite for jazz orchestra
before abandoning his audacious technique in the late forties.

     Aram Khachaturyan (1903- ) has composed rousing music to pedestrian
ballets Gayane (1942) with its "Sabre Dance," and Spartak (1952). He has
orchestrated Lermontov's play Masquerade (1941) and scored a number of films,
including Othello (1955). His piano and violin concertos are very popular.

     The most celebrated Soviet opera was composed in 1927. The Red Poppy,
renamed The Red Flower in 1957, dealt with the exploitation of the Far
Eastern peoples by Western commercial interests. It was put together by
Reinhold Gliere (1875-1956), who had delved into Russian folksongs with his
third "Ilya Muromets" symphony in 1911. He also utilized the famous Repin
painting of the Zaporog Cossacks drafting their insulting letter to the sultan
for The Zaporogs in 1921. With his ballet The Bronze Horseman (1949), he
returned to Pushkin for inspiration.

     The Red Poppy typifies the didactic direction of Soviet musical
composition. In 1946 Andrei Zhdanov, Stalin's agent for artistic control,
advised simply conceived, clearly defined melodies, preferably of Russian folk
origin, that were likely to please the widest possible audience. The story
itself had to be current or popular, in some way abetting the Soviet cause,
either by condemning Western practices or revealing the positive aspects of
Communist achievement at home or abroad.

     Especially during the last years of Stalin's rule, composers were
admonished and even punished to keep them true to the Party line. Shostakovich
himself had to resign from the faculty of the Moscow Conservatory for a time.
To redeem himself, the composer had to admit his ideological failings publicly
and write some approved music to show contrition.

     The very composite nature of modern Russian music, drawn as it is from
Italian, Austrian, German, French, Spanish, Near Eastern, and Oriental models,
suffered from Soviet-enforced isolation. Its mosaic richness and variety
traditionally drew sustenance from religious inspiration. The song of devotion
and mystical celebration had permeated much of pre-Soviet music. It has since
become unacceptable, and Soviet music, as a consequence, lost one of its major
dimensions.

     Soviet conservatories have, on the other hand, continued to produce
outstanding musical performers. The violinists David Oistrakh (1908-  ) and
Leonid Kogan (1924-  ) and the pianists Sviatoslav Richter (1914-  ) and
Emile Gilels (1916-  ) are living proof of this, as is the cellist Mstislav
Rostropovich (1927-  ). The Russian musical tradition has continued to
thrive. There are indications that the full legacy of Russian
prerevolutionary music is being reconsidered with pride and hope for the
future by the current promising composers despite the maintenance of de facto
state censorship. Modern trends are reflected in the works of the recently
established composers. Boris Tishchenko (1939- ) composed a Cello Concerto in
1963, which he wrote in the modern idiom. Rostropovich made a recording of it
with the Leningrad symphony orchestra

     Despite official Party opposition to jazz and other modern styles and
forms of musical composition originating in the West, the progressive-minded
young Soviet public has kept abreast of their development.

     Two sources of musical inspiration provided the main elements of Russian
musical composition. The first dates back to the conversion of Kievan Russia
to Orthodox Christianity when the Byzantine chant of the Eastern Church came
to the East Slavs. The Byzantine Greeks sought to convey the impression of
splendor through the use of a very rich liturgy. They attempted to set to
music the poetry of the Bible. Their chant was entirely vocal, unaccompanied
by instruments, and followed only one melodic line (monophonic). To heighten
the dramatic effect, antiphony was employed by the use of a choir divided into
two groups that sang alternately. By the fourteenth century, the chant, known
as the "znamenny," had become wholly Russian. Like its model it remained
entirely vocal and unaccompanied by musical instruments.

     The second great source of Russian musical composition arose in the
folksongs of the East Slavs. Pagan in origin and basically European in
character, rhythmic, and polyphonic, the music was played on a variety of
stringed, wind, and percussion instruments. The music itself was maintained
and transmitted by amateur musicians who would gather to sing and play at
rural festivities.

     By the seventeenth century, the postmedieval harmonized music of the West
began to penetrate into Russia. Late in the century the patriarch Nikon
officially did away with the "znamenny" chant. Russian liturgic music as a
consequence lost its native vitality and began to slavishly imitate the music
of western Europe, specifically Italy. This trend continued throughout the
eighteenth and into the middle of the nineteenth century when a return to the
sources of Russian liturgic music took place

     The first major Western impact on Russian music came from the Italian
opera of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Mikhail Glinka
(1803-57), founder of modern Russian music, was a friend of Hector Berlioz and
studied in Berlin. He blended folk themes of Russian song with the great
traditions of European music, particularly those of Germany and Italy. His
first great opera, A Life for the Tsar (1836), told the tale of a Russian
peasant who sacrificed his life to lead astray Polish troops bent on killing
the tsar. Glinka also made an opera of Ruslan and Ludmilla (1842), Pushkin's
delightful fairytale of young love. Alexander Dargomijski (1813-69) also set
fairytales to music: Russalka and The Stone Guest.

     The "Five," a group of composers founded by M. Balakirev (1837-1910),
included Caesar Cui (1835-1918), Modest Moussorgsky (1849-81), Alexander
Borodin (1833-87), and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908). Its members,
ardent nationalis