February 17 / Sunday 19.00
Sergei Rachmaninoff. "All-Night Vigil"
State Academic Moscow Regional Choir. A. D. Kozhevnikova
Artistic director and conductor - Mykola Azarov
Soloists: Ekaterina Balina (mezzo-soprano), Vasily Gurylev (tenor)
Rachmaninoff's "All-Night Vigil" is one of the main masterpieces of Russian choral sacred music.Georgy Sviridov spoke of him as "the last flash of Christianity in Russian music, which for a long time after that plunged into darkness." The essay, created at the beginning of the last century, has become an integral part of the church life of a whole generation of Russians Orthodox people, and entered the Russian Orthodox art.
The All-Night Vigil is an inspirational composition, Rachmaninoff wrote it in less than two weeks. Even as a child, the composer was captivated by the melodies of Orthodox everyday life, and now he has found a way to create his own musical work based on them. Genuine melodies are woven into a complex, diverse musical fabric. It reveals Rachmaninov's bright composer's individuality, as well as his deep religiosity and originality of the national choral tradition.
The church service, called the All-Night Vigil, consists of Vespers and Matins, and was originally performed throughout the night. But an abbreviated version has become entrenched in parish practice: Vespers and Matins, which are performed from the evening before the Divine Liturgy. Vespers - symbolically depicts the events of the Old Testament history: the creation of the world, the expulsion of Adam and Eve from paradise, the coming of Christ the Savior into the world. The second part - Matins, which begins with the angelic doxology "Glory to God in the highest", continues with a story about the miracle of the Resurrection and leads to a grandiose rejoicing finale.
Rachmaninoff worked on The All-Night Vigil in the atmosphere of the beginning of the First World War, the maturing revolution of 1917 and the eschatological moods of the era. Nevertheless, the Vespers (unlike a number of other works by Rachmaninov and his contemporaries of this period) is filled with holy faith in salvation, its main idea-movement from darkness to light, through the darkness of earthly life to the light of the Kingdom of God.
State Academic Moscow Regional Choir named after A.D. Kozhevnikova - Oone of the oldest ensembles in Russia, organized in 1956. The choir has many premiere works Russian composers, many of them were included in the State Television and Radio Fund, recorded by the Melodiya company. The team is an indispensable participant in the celebrations of the City Day and other celebrations. Success accompanies the choir's tours around the country and abroad (in Austria, Sweden, the Netherlands, Germany, France, Finland, Poland, Romania, Greece, Korea, Japan). Artistic director and conductor - Mykola Azarov.
Mykola Azarov Graduated with honors from the Moscow Conservatory. Since 1990 he has taught at the Moscow Choir School named after A.V. Sveshnikov, with the formation of the Academy of Choral Art, he began to combine teaching with administrative leadership choirs AHI. Since 2010 - Rector of the Academy of Choral Art named after V.S. Popov. Since 2014 - Artistic Director of the State Academic Moscow Regional Choir named after A.D. Kozhevnikova, as well as artistic director and chief conductor Academic Choir of the Apparatus State Duma RF.
In a programme: S. Rachmaninov. "All-Night Vigil" for mixed choir and soloists
“All-Night Vigil”, op. 37 consists of 15 chants, nine of which are magnificent adaptations of Greek (No. 2, 15), Kievan (No. 4,5) and Znamenny chants (No. 8,9,12,13, 14). It is impossible not to see in them the influence of the composer's contemporary, the master of harmonization of ancient chants in the style of A. Kastalsky's folk under-voiced polyphony. Rachmaninoff's All-Night Vigil is also dominated by an overtone-polyphonic structure of texture, often used contrast polyphony in the simultaneous combination of different melodies. At the same time, we will not find anywhere the forms of fugue, fugato or canon, so beloved by composers who wrote choral music for the church, since the time of Berezovsky and Bortnyansky.
Of particular note is the composer's careful attitude to the word, which is the most important thing in sacred music. With the most complex compositional and textural constructions, it sounds clear and distinct, which undoubtedly meets the requirements that the church makes to the compositions of liturgical music.
The Divine Liturgy of the All-Night Vigil is performed in the evening hours of the day and consists of three sections: Great Vespers, Matins and the First Hour (usually read). The initial hymn of Vespers Come let's bow down” (№1 ) - sample solemn anthem lyrical character with a pronounced national flavor. His theme, composed by Rachmaninoff, according to repeated statements by researchers of the composer's work, is very akin to the thematics of the Third Piano Concerto. Melodic d minor, the singing of the choir in parallel thirds, octave doublings, the predominance of soft three-part sounding with six parts - all this creates a bright enriched folk song image in the form of a varied couplet.
Note example #1 "Come let us worship":
Followed by № 2 “Bless my soul”, Greek chant, the so-called initiatory Psalm 103. The verses of the psalm are usually first read by the canonarch, and then repeated in chorus with refrains. In parish churches, this psalm is sung in abbreviated form. Rachmaninoff takes for his processing precisely those verses that, according to the church charter, the priest burns the temple, a kind of lyric-epic story about the creation of the world, about its majestic beauty, about the “wonderful deeds of the Lord” is revealed to the parishioners. The form, reminiscent of a verse, is built from a soulful viola solo against the background of a male choir and chorus (“ Blessed are you, Lord”, “Wonderful are thy works, Lord”), performed by an incomplete choir - female voices and tenors (in the first case), or only female ones, The timbre contrast between the “heavenly voices” of the female choir and the deep, juicy chords of the male composition, with a clear and transparent texture, paints a picture of the immense primordial nature of the Universe:
№3 . “Blessed is the husband”, the Greek chant - the first antiphon of the 1st kathisma, implements the tradition of antiphonal singing, where the chorus is entrusted to the warm timbre of altos and tenors, and the refrains are performed by the whole choir, as in the first number, here there is a couplet- variational form. Chamber in sound and pacified in nature, the music of the chant resembles the lullaby genre, especially with its refrain “ Hallelujah”, from time to time becoming more and more saturated in sound and texture, passing from the sphere of tonic contemplation into the sphere of subdominant light ( g minor):
№4 . “Quiet light”, Kyiv chant, c-moll. From the descending tenor melody, leading the main theme, overgrown with undertones of the female parts of the choir, the main leitinttonation of the chant crystallizes - a small second. His " cradling” in a chant, she, moving from voice to voice, like the melody of the Kyiv chant, creates a picture of the coming evening, and with it comes a feeling of gratitude to the Creator and his Son for the day lived. As in the second number (viola solo), Rachmaninoff introduces a tenor solo praising the Holy Trinity. This unusually touching episode is highlighted by the composer with a special tonal paint - E major"om:
The soft sound glow finds its culminating embodiment in the reprise of the chant, in its main words: “ Thou art not worthy to be the voice of the reverend”, expressed in tonality Es major.
The next fifth cycle number ( №5 )“Now let go” - the prayer of St. Simeon the God-bearer. The Gospel of Luke says: Elder Simeon was promised by God that he would not die until he saw the Savior. And so, on the 40th day after Christmas, when the Virgin Mary with the righteous Joseph brought the Christ Child to the temple for consecration to God (as the law demanded), then Simeon came there - by the inspiration of God. Seeing the Baby, he took Him in his arms and, to the surprise of all those present, said: “ Now you release Your servant, Lord, as you once promised, in peace, because my eyes have seen the One through whom You have prepared salvation for all people: He is the light for the enlightenment of the Gentiles and the glory of Your people Israel". Word " let go” in this context means - “ now I can die, calmly leave earthly life”.
Through the melody of the chant, perhaps the most lyrical of Russian chants, the beloved Rachmaninov image appears again “ lulling comfort", full warmth and caresses. Accompanied " lullabies” harmonies of altos and tenors of the choir, the tenor soloist leads his story:.
The solo part reigns supreme from beginning to end of the chant. The chamber sound of the extreme sections contrasts with the stretto middle episode, and the final move of the bass-octavists into the depth of the lower register and the fading of sonority symbolize reconciliation with life before leaving it. It is no coincidence that the composer expressed his wish that this music should be played during his burial. As A. Kandinsky writes, on the days of Rachmaninoff's birth and death, his Vespers are performed in the Moscow church "Joy of All Who Sorrow".
Vespers ends with a beautiful hymn to the Virgin Mary (№6 Virgin Mother of God Rejoice.), the content of which is composed of the words of the Archangel Gabriel to the Most Holy Theotokos, the mother of Jesus Christ at the annunciation; “ Virgin Mother of God, rejoice, Blessed Mary, the Lord is with you; Blessed are you in women and blessed is the fruit of your womb, as if the Savior gave birth to our souls”.
In the first part, the chant is the music of harmonic presentation in F major"e. As in " Blessed is the husband”, the composer uses the technique of stylization of the Znamenny melody. Rachmaninoff's monody implements the stylistic features of Znamenny chant through a narrow range of melody within a major third, smooth movement and symmetry of constructions.
The diatonic and chanting of the steps of the main mode, with the relative calmness of the rhythm, make the author's theme almost identical to the ancient Znamenny one:
In the second part of the chorus (“ Blessed are you in women”), up to its climax, there is a polyphonic presentation: the main theme is carried by the altos in parallel thirds, surrounded by octaves of a wide-flowing chant in the part of soprano and tenor. Music grows to be a symbol of maternal humble trust in the annunciation of God's messenger.
Matins differs from Vespers in a different circle of events that are reminiscent of those praying during the world, the blessed state of the first people in paradise, repentance after the fall and exile, people waiting for the Savior, then Matins recalls the birth of Christ, His appearance into the world, suffering and death on the Resurrection Cross from the dead.
Note example. №6 "Our Lady of the Virgin Rejoice".
Matins begins Six Psalms(Rakhmaninov has this №7 -oy) - a small doxology, composed of six selected psalms, forming the central section of the composition. These are numbers from the 7th to the 12th inclusive. The music of the second section of the Vespers is more complex in terms of the structure of the numbers and the scale of their forms. Rachmaninov's colors become more juicy. Chamber sound gives way to monumental, akin to opera and choral scenes by Russian composers. It expresses one of the brightest features of the composer's choral style - the bells.
In his memoirs, Sergei Vasilievich singles out one of the strongest and deepest impressions of his childhood - bell ringing. Therefore, it is natural that in his youth he made recordings of ringing, and then used in his early works.
Bell traditions are not new in Russian choral music. Even in the scores of partes composers of the 17th-18th centuries. they have found their implementation, and earlier the elements of bells are seen in urgent singing. Rachmaninov's innovation lies in the fact that the chimes of the All-Night Vigil are recreated by means of choral sonority (remember, starting with “ Life for the king” M.I. Glinka, bell ringing in its natural form or orchestral imitation was observed in most Russian classical composers). Rachmaninov's chimes are “identical in their sound composition, i.e. these are sound complexes resulting from sound layers ... bell ringing has three phases: the beginning of the ringing - uniform beats, the ringing itself - a progressive sound increase, accompanied by a fragmentation of the rhythm, and the end of the ringing - a simultaneous strike on all bells ... texture, in which "more often only three polyphonic layers: low bass “ vote” - large bells, alto - medium and high - small, ringing. These three lines make up a single shaping complex of ringing. Such a structure “ votes” in bell ringing vividly resembles the polyphonic warehouse of developed forms of Russian folk songs. From this we can conclude that polyphony developed in parallel - in folk song art, in professional choral music and in the art of bell ringing.”
The music of the Six Psalmia is based on the repeated repetition of the Znamenny chant melody, timbre-colored by the altos, and then by the second sopranos and altos. In the third conduction, they are joined by the first tenor, which in conduction is joined by the first tenor, which, in unison with the alto, creates an unusually light and flying image, soaring “in the higher” spheres of the sound space (recall that the first who found the use of this choral paint, was M. I. Glinka, who combined tenor and alto in unison in the choir of rowers in the opera “Life for the Tsar”). A measured chime sways around this theme. Imitation of it creates a mood of joyful jubilation.
The beginning of the ringing, its uniform strikes, are a sequence of four chords c-moll "and, repeated four times: T - d - VI - VII. The discrepancy between the sonorous melody and the tonic harmony on the strong beat creates the impression of two independent musical layers, complementing one “bell” chord based on the terts vertical of the eight-voice choir, which is a tonic tertsdecimaccord without thirds and sevenths. “The introduction of bell sounds into this hymn was dictated by the requirements of the church service - before reading the six psalms of David, they ring the bells”
Ending " Six Psalms” - quiet, reverent music in mood (“ Lord, open my mouth”) of a homophonic-harmonic presentation in a parallel Es major"e with a plagal cadence, in which, like an overtone echo of a silent bell chime, a chord of a tonic quinsex chord with a lowered seventh ("praise") is heard.
Note example. №7 "Six Psalms".
№8 “ Praise the name of the Lord ”, Znamenny chant, As major. This bright hymn to the emerging new day is accompanied by the full illumination of the temple, and therefore this part worship is called polyelea”.
The couplet-variation form of chanting is manifested by S.V. Rachmaninov in the musical update of both the first and second (that is, the refrain “Hallelujah”). The texture of the choir is a pronounced duality. The somewhat harsh theme of the Znamenny chant in the octave presentation of altos and basses is combined contrapuntally, like the sound of a second choir, with the bell-like modulations of high voices. The composer, thanks to the chased rhythm and elastic sonority, unusually convincingly managed to create a truly epic image. The soft sound glow finds its culminating embodiment in the reprise of the chant, in its main words “ You are worthy to be the voice of the reverend”, expressed in tonality Es-dur.
No less bright and the next 9th choir" Blessed are you, Lord”, Znamenny chant in d minor"e, one of the central ones in matins, called according to the charter" Sunday troparia, tone 5". Its content goes back to the gospel story about the miracle of Christ's resurrection, so it has more plot action than in the previous numbers of the Vespers. The rondo-shaped form from episode to episode varies in texture, timbre, register and dynamically, reflecting the emotional state of the experienced miraculous event. As plot development Rachmaninov varies Znamenny chant, bringing it to a vivid figurative generalization. First chant (B) - “ Cathedral of the Angels” - a solemnly narrative character is entrusted to the timbre of altos, surrounded by sonorous chords of sopranos and tenors, relying on the 6th step of the fret (B-flat). The second episode (B) tells about the Angel who told the women who came to the Holy Sepulcher: “ Saved Bo resurrected from the tomb". The Znamenny chant theme already sounds a tone higher than the previous one in the tenor part, softened by the unison of the first altos and second sopranos:
The third episode (B), depicting the images of the myrrh-bearing women mourning at the Tomb, is placed by Rakhmaninov in even more high sphere keys g minor, and in the sound of the women's choir it is endowed with the imagery of soft sorrow (“ Very early”).
“Myrrh-bearing wife” (episode B) - a kind of culmination of a rondo-shaped form, sounding in a chordal four-voice texture of the main key (“ Like God is risen from the tomb”). Simultaneous bewilderment, surprise, and at the same time joy are heard in the remaining sound “re” in the part of the first violas:
The 9th number ends with a detailed “glory, and now” (original temp. Almost in a whisper.) - this is the culmination of the whole chant. From the barely audible sound of male voices, through the bright dynamic “bell-ringing”, covering a range of two and a half octaves, to attenuation - this is the result of expressing joy from the accomplished miracle of resurrection. Creation of various shades emotional state contributes to the abundance of tonalities that were not present before: B - F - a -C - d. As we can see, there is a sphere of major constructions. The content of the text and its musical embodiment make this number “a poem of resurrection and victory over death”.
The principle of antiphonal singing underlies the hymn “ Seeing the Resurrection of Christ ” (№10), famous chant, d minor. This Sunday hymn is usually sung at Matins after the reading of the Gospel, it belongs to the category of stichera of the 6th tone. According to the charter, the singing of the stichera is preceded by the pronouncement of a verse - a completed phrase from a psalm or the beginning of the stichera itself. The proclamation is usually performed by the canonarch, after whom the choir continues to sing. S. V. Rachmaninov gives the role of the proclamation to the octave unison of the male choir, and the female voices take over, as if the second choir of the left kliros had entered. Music of an epic nature is sustained in the spirit crowd scenes operas by Russian composers on historical subjects.
Two constructions, like two waves, come to the main climax - “ Blessing always, let us sing of His resurrection”: d minor - B major:
№11 My soul commands the Lord(note 124). The Evangelist Luke, in his account of the life of Christ, says that when the Virgin Mary received from the archangel Gabriel the news of the impending birth of her Son, she hurried to her relative Elizabeth, the future mother of John the Baptist, with this joyful news. By revelation of the Holy Spirit, Elizabeth greeted Mary, calling her “Mother of the Lord,” although she knew that at that time at that time Christ had not yet been born. In response, the Virgin Mary meekly said: “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God, my Savior ... For from now on all generations will please me ... He deposed the strong from the thrones and exalted the humble; He filled the hungry with good things, and let the rich go with nothing .... He took Israel, His servant, remembering the mercy, as He spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and his family until the age.”
This song, dedicated to the Virgin Mary, is performed before the 9th ode of the canon and is often called “The Most Honorable”, because after each verse the refrain is sung - “ The most honest Cherubim and the most glorious without comparison Seraphim, without the corruption of God the Word gave birth to the real Mother of God, We magnify Thee”.
The “Magnificent Song” to the Theotokos was created by S.V. Rachmaninov on his own theme, observing the main features of the Znamenny monody (similarly in Nos. 3,6, 10) and presents a monumental couplet-variation composition. Both the verses and all the choruses to them undergo intense variation. The range of selected keys is based on parallel - g minor(poetry B major(chorus).
Before us appears a multifaceted image of the Mother of God: this is the joy of the Virgin Mary from the proximity of God, and Her brevity, and the prophecy about the Son of God, whom She should give birth to, and praise to God's mercy.
Note example. №11 "My soul commands the Lord."
No. 12. Doxology Great, znamenny chant. Es major - c-moll, in content and composition is the second culminating center Matins and the entire Vespers (the first culminating center of Matins and the entire Vespers (the first fell on No. 9 " Blessed be the Lord”). This church hymn concludes Matins. During the time when the service lasted all night, just at the moment when the first rays of the sun appeared, the voice of the priest was heard: “ Glory to Thee, Who showed us the Light!". This light symbolized the Light that leads us out of sinful darkness, out of the darkness of spiritual ignorance, their darkness of sorrows, sorrow of suffering. In response, a song praising God the Trinity sounds. It contains praise and thanksgiving, a plea for forgiveness of sins and a petition for help for the coming day, so that, while living it, we do not deviate from the Creator and the Lord: “Glory to God in heaven and on earth, peace to people of good will. We praise You, we bless You, we worship You, we glorify and thank You…”.
The Doxology is based on the ancient Znamenny chant of Novgorod origin. The melody in the volume of a quart begins in the alto part against the background of the “swinging” harmonic intervals of the tenor: prima - fifth - third. As in the Six Psalms (No. 7), the presence of two musically figurative layers is clearly felt here: the archaic theme of the melody and the accompanying bells. In the process of further development, the theme of the melody, passing in different voices of the choir, modulating in major keys(tenor conduction in G-dur "e, soprano in B-dur "e, bass in Mixolydian E-dur "e), is colored with a new modal color, changes intonation and rhythm. So, for example, in the example below, the reception of an expressive rhythmic increase in melody in high female voices, doubled by tenors, with the main theme of altos, is indicative:
Despite the length of variation in the main melody, one can easily see the boundaries of the three-part form in the chant. The second part is notable for its tonal instability, rather frequent tonal shifts and tempo changes, as well as imitations between choral parts. Es-dur - c-moll.
The last section of the Doxology is “Holy God, Mighty Holy, Holy Immortal, have mercy on us” - in the general form of the chant is a coda. Its significance is reflected by the composer's introduction of relatively new musical material, although it also has an intonational relationship with the main tune.
The unhurried flow of music by S.V. Rachmaninov is expressed by the abolition of squareness in the construction of measures, which exactly corresponds to the metrical essence of church melody; hence the organic use of long bar lengths.
“Doxology Great” , undoubtedly, can be considered as the brightest example of the masterful use of the expressive possibilities of a mixed choir. Next to the general choral constructions, reaching up to nine voices, there is often the use of an incomplete composition of voices in the combination C + A + T, or A + T + B. A special combination of timbres of altos and tenors in unison is interspersed with the methods of switching on and off from the singing of individual parts or groups of the choir (relatively short-term).
It is impossible to get around the fact of a careful attitude to the church text, which is so accurately reflected by S.V. Rachmaninov in the author's remarks concerning articulation, the nature of the performance and the method of sound science.
In the general composition of the Vespers, its last three numbers can be considered as the finale of the cycle. All of them glorify the might of the Creator. No. 13 - Today is salvation, is a Sunday troparion sung in the week of 1, 3, 5, 7 voices. Sunday troparion and No. 14 - Resurrected from the grave. It is usually sung to tones 2,4,6 and 8, on the days of the week corresponding to these tones. S.V. Rachmaninov uses Znamenny chant melodies in both troparia:
Name: Rachmaninov - Excerpts from Vespers "All-Night Vigil", Op. 37; poem "The Bells", Op. 35
Original name: Rachmaninov - Les Vigiles nocturnes Op. 37, Les Cloches Op. 35
Year: 2012
Genre: Classical music concert
Composer: Sergei Rachmaninov
Choir: Ural Symphony Choir (Ural Symphonic Choir)
Artistic director: Vera Davydova
Orchestra: Ural State Academic Philharmonic Orchestra (Ural Philharmonic Orchestra)
Conductor: Dmitry Liss
TV director: Frederic Le Clair
Released: France, ARTE
Language: Russian
Artists:
Pavel Baransky - baritone,
Stanislas Leontiev - tenor,
Yana Ivanilova - soprano.
Information about music festival France "Crazy Days of Nantes-2012" - "Holy Rus': from Rimsky-Korsakov to Shostakovich" I posted in the topic "Verdi - Opera" Aida "(Giuseppe Verdi-Aida-Opernhaus Zürich) Zurich Opera - 2006 (HDTVRip)"
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Sergei Rachmaninoff. "All-Night Vigil", Op. 37
Vespers, Op. 37
Op. 37. "All-Night Vigil" for unaccompanied mixed choir. 1915. In memory of S. V. Smolensky.
"Come, Let's Bow"
"Bless my soul" (Greek chant)
"Blessed is the husband"
"Quiet light" (Kyiv chant)
“Now let go” (Kyiv chant)
"Virgin Mary, rejoice"
Six Psalms - (Originally "Small Doxology")
"Praise the Name of the Lord"
“Blessed be Thou, Lord” (Znamenny chant) - (The material was later used in the III part of the “Symphonic Dances”)
"Seeing the Resurrection of Christ"
"My soul magnifies the Lord"
Doxology great
Troparion "Today is salvation" (Znamenny chant)
Troparion "Rising from the grave" (Znamenny chant)
"To the Chosen Governor" (Greek chant)
- "From the Gospel of John" (ch. XV, verse 13) for voice and piano. 1915.
History of creation
With the outbreak of the First World War, all the plans of Rachmaninoff, already a European-recognized composer in the prime of his talent, changed. Foreign tours stopped, and trips around the country were sharply reduced. He also composes little: he begins work on the Fourth Piano Concerto, but postpones it; conceives a ballet, but also leaves it in several sketches. The events taking place in the world, anxiety for the fate of the motherland prompt him to turn to the roots of the Russian musical culture- old church tunes, znamenny singing. Inspired by the deepest and most poetic part of the New Testament, he creates the vocal composition "From the Gospel of John", and then turns to church life. At the end of the first year of the war, not without the influence of the most prominent figures of the "revival movement" in church singing, the composer A. Kastalsky and the paleographer, director of the Synodal School S. Smolensky, who read a course in Russian history at the Moscow Conservatory church music, Rachmaninoff writes the All-Night Vigil, op. 37, which he completed in early 1915.
While working on this work, Smolensky died, and Rachmaninov dedicated the finished score to his memory. In this work, the composer proceeded from canonical traditions and relied on the znamenny melodies that came into church use. But his work was by no means limited to their harmonization. Focusing on the style of the old Znamenny singing, Rachmaninoff created his own original themes. “In my Vespers, everything that fit the second occasion (my own original tunes. - L. M.) was deliberately faked for use,” the composer wrote. At the same time, his music does not bear the features of stylization, museum dryness or artificiality. She lives and breathes like a profoundly contemporary work. This was reflected in the peculiarities of the creative personality of Rachmaninov, who always gravitated towards ancient Russian melodies, using their intonations in compositions of various genres from piano miniatures to symphonic canvases. “In the fusion of epic, lyricism and drama (as a kind of art), Rachmaninov focuses on the epic beginning,” writes the musicologist A. Kandinsky. - It acts on the basis of legendary and historical themes, manifests itself in the pictorial and graphic warehouse of the numbers that make up the cycle and the multifaceted choral dramaturgy and imagery of chants, and finally, in similarities and roll calls with Russian opera classics XIX century (especially with its folk epic branch), with the genres of oratorio, spiritual drama or mystery. The dominant significance of the epic is already expressed in Rachmaninov's decision to open his cycle with an invocative oratorical prologue-address "Come, let us bow", which is absent, for example, in the cycles of Tchaikovsky, Grechaninov, Chesnokov. Such a prologue was necessary for the composer as an epic beginning.
The first performance of the All-Night Vigil took place on March 10 (23) in Moscow by the Synodal Choir conducted by N. Danilin. The impression was huge. Noted Critic Florestan (V. Derzhanovsky) wrote: “Perhaps never before has Rachmaninoff come so close to the people, their style, their soul, as in this work. Or maybe it is this work that speaks of the expansion of his creative flight, of the capture of new areas of the spirit by him and, consequently, of the true evolution of his strong talent. In the following months, the work was repeated several times with the same success. However, after the October Revolution of 1917 in Russia, which was struggling with all religious manifestations, the All-Night Vigil was banned for a long time. Only at the end of the 20th century did this beautiful music take its rightful place in concert life.
Music
The All-Night Vigil is a two-part composition consisting of Vespers (Nos. 2-6) and Matins (Nos. 7-15), preceded by a prologue. The chants are based on authentic themes of everyday life, harsh, ascetic znamenny chants, which the composer enriched with all modern means. The use of the choir is rich and varied: Rachmaninoff resorts to splitting parts, singing with closed mouth, creates a kind of timbre effects. The general calm epic tone is combined with a wealth of colors - lyrical, gentle melodies, loud exclamations, bell overflows.
No. 1, "Come, let us worship," begins with two quiet chords proclaiming "Amen." This is a majestic choir portal that opens the composition. In number 3, "Blessed is the husband", the intonations of a lullaby are heard. Its echoes spread further, in the “Quiet Light of the Holy Glory of the Immortal Father in Heaven” and “Now you release Thy servant, Master, according to Thy word” of Kiev chant, and in the latter they are manifested only in quiet chords accompanying the singing of the tenor soloist. Both of these numbers are distinguished by the finest sound writing. The part ends with a calm and tender prayer, “Virgin Mother of God, rejoice, Blessed Mary, the Lord is with you.” "The Six Psalms" "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will towards men" opens the second part of the Vespers. No. 8, "Praise the name of the Lord", a znamenny chant, is based on the juxtaposition of the procession theme in the lower voices and the imitation of the silver bell ringing in the upper ones. No. 9 - “Blessed be Thou, Lord, teach me Thy justification”, based on the Znamenny chant, is one of the semantic centers of the work. This story about the miracle of the Resurrection is sustained in solemn tones with colossal intensity and fullness of sound. The chord choral refrain "Blessed are you" creates the effect of the presence of the community, its involvement in what is happening. No. 11, “My soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in my Savior,” is a monumental hymn of the Virgin, marked by a truly symphonic development. The next number, "Great Doxology" of the znamenny chant "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace and good will towards men", is the second compositional center of Matins, a monumental choral fresco. The last three numbers are the troparia “Today there is salvation for the world, we sing to the Risen One from the grave and found the Head of life” and “He is risen from the grave and torn the bonds of hell” (both znamenny chant) and “To the victorious voivode, as if having got rid of the evil ones, we will write Ti rabbi Yours, Mother of God" - the finale of a grandiose cycle. It contains echoes of the Second and Third Symphonies, the Third Concerto for Piano and Orchestra.
Sergei Rachmaninoff. Poem "The Bells", Op. 35
The Bells, Op. 35
Poem for soloists (soprano, tenor, baritone), choir and orchestra. 1913. Words by E. Poe, translated by K. D. Balmont. Dedication: "To my friend Willem Mengelberg and his Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam."
Allegro ma non tanto (“Do you hear the sleigh rushing in a row ...”)
Lento (“Hear, the call of the saint to the wedding ...”)
Presto ("Do you hear the howling alarm...")
Lento lugubre ("A funeral ringing is heard...")
History of creation
1912 turned out to be a very eventful year for Rachmaninov. He, one of the most popular musicians in Russia, performs at numerous evenings, brilliantly conducts the season of symphony concerts of the Moscow Philharmonic Society, conducts The Queen of Spades at the Bolshoi Theater and, of course, composes a lot. New romances appear, including the famous Vocalise. In autumn, his operas Francesca da Rimini and Miserly knight"," Aleko "is put in the People's House.
At the end of the year, due to deteriorating health, Rachmaninoff refuses the planned concerts and leaves with his family abroad - first to Switzerland and then to Rome. There he receives an unsigned letter in which he is invited to write music for a poem by the American poet Edgar Allan Poe (1809 -1849) "The Bells" (1849) translated by K. Balmont. As it turned out later, this letter was sent by the young cellist M. Danilova. Rachmaninoff was interested in the poem. From an early age, carried away by the bell ringing and conveying it more than once in his works, he began to compose, defining its genre as a vocal-symphonic poem.
Soon they have to leave Rome: the children fall ill, and the family moves to Berlin, and then to Russia, to the estate of his wife Ivanovka. There the composer ends the poem, in four parts of which the whole life path of a person is shown from a bright youth full of joyful hopes to death. At the same time, the symbolism, so significant in Poe and Balmont, goes into the background. According to one of the researchers of Rachmaninov's work, the images of the poem "acquired Russian" flesh "and" blood ", while retaining their generalized philosophical and poetic meaning."
"The Bells", defined as a poem for soloists, choir and symphony orchestra, were first performed on November 30 (December 13), 1913 in St. Petersburg by the choir, soloists and orchestra Mariinsky Theater under the direction of the author. On February 8 (21), 1914, the Moscow premiere took place, in which soloists and a choir took part. Bolshoi Theater. The success in both capitals was huge, although the voices of criticism were divided. Some found that the composer "began to look for new moods, new manner expressing your thoughts." The Bells later received a dedication: "To my friend Willem Mengelberg and his Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam."
Music
"Bells" belong to the outstanding Russian musical works eve of the First World War. In this poem, as in Scriabin's Prometheus, the anxious, tense moods of the beginning of the century were reflected. As academician Asafiev wrote, the music of "The Bells" is determined by "the merging of disturbing stages in Rachmaninoff's feelings... with his intuitive comprehension of deep anxieties in the depths of Russian society." The four parts of the poem are united by a common nighttime coloring, colorfulness, and most importantly - a leitmotif, intonationally close to Old Russian parables and the medieval Dies Irae sequence.
The 1st part paints an image of a serene youth, a picture of a winter sledge track with the silvery ringing of bells. Everything subdues the rapid rhythm of running. Fine orchestration with harp harmonics, gentle celesta sounding, which are replaced by inviting fanfares of trumpets and trombones, create a fantastic flavor. The exclamation of the tenor "Hear!" taken up in chorus. In the middle section, the coloring darkens, orchestral colors thicken, the choir performs an archaic melody with its mouth closed - as if everything is plunging into oblivion, and a magical dream arises, a numbness of a dream. But the rapid run is restored again. Part 2 is permeated with wedding bells. Her mood is determined by the lines that sound from the choir: "Do you hear the call of the saint, golden, for the wedding." They are a kind of refrain that repeatedly pops up throughout the movement, in which tender lyrics are combined with solemnity and trembling expectation. The soloist soprano intones a wide, smooth, Rachmaninoff-like generous melody. This is the lyrical center of the work. The third movement is analogous to a symphonic scherzo saturated with tragedy. If in the 1st part a silvery ringing was heard, and in the 2nd - golden, then the “copper” ringing of an alarm alarm, an ominous rumble dominates here, an image of a raging, all-consuming flame arises (“Meanwhile, the fire is insane”). This is the triumph of evil forces, an apocalyptic picture of a general catastrophe. The finale is a mournful epilogue of the life path. The funeral bell hums monotonously. The baritone soloist's "Tombstone" is echoed by the choir with brief psalmodic phrases. The English horn is the soloist, the chorale from Tchaikovsky's The Queen of Spades sounds. Gradually, the monologue of the baritone, interrupted by sobs, becomes more and more dramatized. The middle section is filled with horror. It seems that someone black is swinging the funeral bell more and more. One hears a mockery of everything that was dear - the archaic melody of the first part sounds distorted, broken, the image of a magical dream is outraged. The coda of the poem is peaceful. The expressive melody of the strings seems to rise up.
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A source of information:
"All-Night Vigil" - one of the main works of Sergei Rachmaninov - appeared as a reaction of the composer to the events of the First World War. The pinnacle of Russian sacred music; choral work, able to stand on a par with the masterpieces of Monteverdi, Pergolesi and Bach.
Cultural expert Victor Simakov spoke about how the Vigil was created and what is hidden inside the great work of Rachmaninoff.
Genre of the work
All-night vigil (all-night service) is an Orthodox service that takes place on the eve of Sundays (on Saturday evening), as well as on the eve of the twelfth and some other church holidays. The service originated in Byzantium in the first centuries of Christianity and included prayers intended for reading and singing.
The All-Night Vigil consists of three services: Vespers, Matins, and the First Hour. Vespers is thematically connected with the main milestones of the Old Testament history - the creation of the world, the fall of the first people and the hope for future salvation. Matins means the onset of the New Testament time - the appearance of the Lord into the world and His future resurrection. Following the last blessing of the priest, the first hour is read, the service of a humble, repentant aspiration to God. In the parish practice of the Russian Church, matins and the first hour are celebrated not in the early morning, but immediately after vespers, so the very phrase “all-night vigil” (i.e., night vigil) is rather a tribute to tradition.
In the all-night vigil there is an unchanging part, which consists of hymns and psalms, and a variable part dedicated to certain holidays. Known are Byzantine texts of the Vespers belonging to John Chrysostom, John of Damascus, Theodore the Studite.
In Rus', the all-night vigil appeared in the 11th century. Its musical arrangement corresponded to the general church traditions: at first it was monophonic (znamenny, demestvenny, travel) chants; from the 16th century monophony was replaced by polyphony. In the future, the style of the performance of the All-Night Vigil corresponded to the general church, consistently reflecting all current musical fashions. Today in churches one can hear variants of the Vespers, different in style, including the ancient Znamenny chant (for example, in the Valaam Monastery).
On turn of XIX-XX century, Russian composers - Alexander Arkhangelsky, Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Sergei Rachmaninov and others - created several original scores for the All-Night Vigil. Most of these works, including those of Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff, are rarely heard in churches: it is believed that this is more concert than liturgical music.
In the 20th century, under the influence of Russian church culture, the original Vespers were created by Finn Einoyuhani Rautavaara (Vigilia, 1972, text in Finnish translation) and Briton John Tavener (Vigil Service, 1984, in English).
Dictated by the World War?
Sergei Rachmaninov's Vespers appeared during the First World War, the events of which traumatized many artists not only in Russia, but throughout the world. Russia at that time was captured by violent patriotic propaganda and an accentuated hatred of everything German. For Rachmaninoff, the possibility of foreign tours was closed. He finds some outlet in the series charity concerts, the income from which is transferred in favor of the wounded at the front.
Rachmaninoff's Vespers grows out of his pain and anxiety; this is the answer to sharp questions time, an individual search for a spiritual and moral basis for creativity. The work is not created by order, without any formal reason.
Rachmaninov wrote a huge work very quickly - in two weeks. He dedicated the score to the memory of Stepan Smolensky, a connoisseur of the ancient church singing, the ideologist of the “new direction” in church music at the turn of the 19th–20th centuries (we will talk about him ahead). The premiere was prepared by the Moscow Synodal Choir (choir of the Assumption Cathedral in the Kremlin) under the direction of Nikolai Danilin.
Rachmaninov recalled: “In the“ Vespers ”I loved one piece most of all - from the fifth hymn“ Now release your servant, Vladyka, in peace. At the end there is a place where the basses sing - a scale descending down to the lower B-flat in a slow pianissimo (very quiet performance - Approx. ed.). When I played this place, Danilin said: “Where in the world do you find such basses? They are as rare as asparagus at Christmas.”
Nevertheless, he managed to find them:
“I knew the voices of my peasants and was absolutely sure that I could make any demands on Russian basses! The audience always listened with bated breath as the choir descended…”(i.e., peasants who lived near the Rachmaninov estate - in Ivanovka (Tambov province) .
The premiere took place in the huge hall of the Noble Assembly in Moscow - it was full. The grandiose success of the work led to five more performances, also sold out. Vespers becomes the main musical event of 1915. Sergei Taneyev, an expert on polyphony and a strict music critic, greeted the work with delight. Alexander Kastalsky, the recognized leader of church music of that time, called "Vespers" - "the crown of the Moscow school."
Soon, in the same 1915, Alexander Scriabin and Sergei Taneyev died one of the others. Rachmaninov experiences their death very acutely. In the winter of 1915-1916, he tours Russia with Scriabin's piano compositions.
It is possible that the general tension caused by these events, and then by the October Revolution, became the reason that after the Vespers, Rachmaninoff left large form. In 1916-1917, he created six poems for voice and piano based on poems by contemporary poets and nine etudes-pictures for piano, and in 1917 he left Russia forever and fell silent as a composer for a long ten years - until the completion of the Fourth Piano Concerto (1927 ), started before the revolution.
One can also assume something else: “The All-Night Vigil” became for him, in a sense, the final composition, after which a long creative pause was necessary. In any case, the style of all the compositions of the 1920s and 1940s differs sharply from what was created by the composer before the revolution.
What guided and relied on Rachmaninoff?
The source of the musical language of the Vespers is the ancient monophonic chants of the Russian Church, which were the only type of church singing until the 16th century.
The fate of this tradition was not easy. In the 16th century, monophony began to be replaced by polyphony, and under Patriarch Nikon and Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, the Russian church singing style was replaced by a style of Western European origin - polyphonic partes singing. Up to late XIX century, church music as a whole depended on current Western musical traditions.
But the ancient chants, of course, were not completely forgotten, in the 19th century they were periodically processed for a polyphonic choir - either in a modern European way (melody with chord accompaniment), or imitating, as far as possible, Renaissance polyphony " strict style” with its prayerful harmony and attraction to the seven-step scale (do-re-mi-fa-sol-la-si without any other notes). Mikhail Glinka, Mily Balakirev, Sergei Taneyev tended to a strict style in their church music.
The formation of a new style in church music is gradually planned. Pyotr Tchaikovsky creates two wonderful church cycles - "Liturgy" and "All-Night Vigil". Starting from the principles of strict style, he intuitively tried to find that musical language, which at the same time will allow to preserve the national flavor of Orthodox worship.
The movement from a strict style to new forms is quite noticeable in the work of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. In some church compositions, he goes further than Tchaikovsky: he organizes polyphony according to the laws of folk singing (accompanying the main melody with undertones; dialogues-roll calls between groups of the choir; constant variation of repetitive musical elements; alternation of unison and polyphonic fragments, etc.).
Stepan Smolensky, a connoisseur of ancient church singing and director of the Moscow Synodal School, became the founder and ideologist of the "new trend in church music". He advocated for the application to church singing of the techniques of Russian folk polyphony and the experience of national composer school, for strict adherence to the church charter, the release of choral writing from strict forms and the search for new musical means that correspond to the national character of Orthodox chants. His ideas were picked up by famous regents and composers of that time. It was on this basis that Rachmaninov's work developed.
The search traditions of the “new direction” are already visible in his “Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom" (1910) - a free composition based on a church text, in which the composer obviously did not pass by the operatic style of Modest Mussorgsky ("Boris Godunov", "Khovanshchina") and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov ("The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh"). Subsequently, the composer noted that the problem of Russian church music was solved by him in the "Liturgy" unsatisfactorily.
In the Vespers written five years later, Rachmaninov uses authentic melodies of Znamenny, Greek, Kievan chants. Creatively perceiving the traditions of folk polyphony, mass scenes from Mussorgsky's operas, church hymns of Alexander Kastalsky, Rachmaninov finds the perfect balance between quiet contemplation and passionate expression, rigor of form and whimsical variability musical themes, the Orthodox canon and absolute creative freedom.
There is no stylistic contrast between the fragments of the Vespers, based on the melodies of old church chants, and those parts where all the music is completely composed by Rachmaninov himself. A listener who does not know the specific Znamenny chant melodies used by the composer will never distinguish them by ear from other musical material.
The culture of Znamenny chant was not at all something foreign to the composer's work. Turnovers close to Znamenny chant are heard in his compositions starting from the First Symphony (for example, the main themes of the Second and Third piano concertos). The introduction of genuine ecclesiastical themes into Vespers is a logical outcome of Rachmaninov's creative search in this direction. It is also logical that in the last bars of his last work - "Symphonic Dances" - Rachmaninoff quotes his "Vespers" (namely, the end of the chant "Blessed be the Lord").
What does the All-Night Vigil consist of?
The All-Night Vigil consists of Vespers (Nos. 2–6) and Matins (Nos. 7–15), preceded by a prologue (No. 1); compositionally, Nos. 13–15 look like the final, final part of the work.
Prologue (No. 1, "Come Let Us Bow") begins with two quiet chords on the words "Amen". This is a musical portal that introduces us to the world of all further composition. The further music of this number is a threefold inspiring call to common prayer.
No. 2, "Bless My Soul", to the text of 102 psalms and a Greek chant melody, is one of several numbers of the Vespers with a solo voice, in this case a mezzo-soprano. This is a glorification of God, which, in particular, tells about the creation of the world. The mezzo-soprano sings along with the male part of the choir, while the female voices are entrusted with antiphonal “answers”, that is, an imitation of the roll call of two vocal ensembles occurs.
No. 3, 4, 5: “Blessed is the husband”, “Quiet Light”, “Now you are lowering”. In the next three numbers, echoes of folk lullabies are heard. In this part of the score, the composer concentrates one after the other three compositions on various texts, close to each other in lyrical intimacy and the finest sound writing. Thus, a special mood of evening prayer is created. No. 3, "Blessed is the man", written on the text of Psalm 1 and tells about righteousness and wickedness. No. 4 - early Christian hymn "Light Quiet" with a melody of Kyiv chant. This is the gratitude of those who pray for the opportunity to see Christ, the non-evening Light and the Sun of truth, at a time when the world around us is plunging into night darkness. In the most exalted fragment of the number ("Let's sing the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, God"), the solo tenor occasionally enters. No. 5 - “Now you let go”, also with the melody of the Kyiv chant - a thanksgiving song of the righteous Simeon the God-Receiver from the Gospel of Luke. Simeon “was foretold that he would not see death until he saw the Christ of the Lord,” and, recognizing the promised Messiah in the baby Jesus, he could die in peace. The tenor is the soloist in this number. In the finale of “Now Let You Go,” the basses have a unique for the entire world of choral literature, the descent of several vocalists to a very low note - the salt of the counteroctave.
No. 6, "Virgin Mary, Rejoice." This calm and clear prayer concludes Vespers. Rachmaninoff gradually builds up sonority to place special emphasis on the words "blessed is the Fruit of thy womb."
If Vespers is dominated by calmly contemplative intonations, then the chants of Matins acquire real epic power, and sometimes almost operatic drama.
No. 7, "Glory to God in the highest." The Matins and the Six Psalms included in it begin with this hymn. In general, the Church Six Psalms consists of six psalms read one after another; the time of the Six Psalms symbolically depicts the state of mankind, immersed in spiritual darkness before the Savior's coming into the world, and is preceded by an angelic hymn that the shepherds heard on the night of Bethlehem ("Glory to God in the highest," the Gospel of Luke). So Rachmaninov's Six Psalms is not the Six Psalms proper, but its prelude.
In No. 8, "Praise the Name of the Lord"(Psalm 134, Znamenny chant), the theme-procession in the lower voices and the imitation of the silver bell ringing in the upper voices are connected - as if two crowds are moving towards each other.
No. 9, "Blessed be the Lord"(psalm 118, znamenny chant), is one of the semantic centers of the work. This story about the miracle of the Resurrection, in which Rachmaninoff very sensitively - sometimes quite expressively - follows all the twists and turns and nuances of a relatively long text. The narration proceeds in a recitative manner; in contrast to the recitative is the unchanging choral refrain ( home musical theme constantly repeating - Approx. ed.). Solo voices reappear: a tenor as a narrator, a solo soprano as the voice of an angel. The last bars of this number, as already mentioned, will later appear in the finale of Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances.
No. 10, "Seeing the Resurrection of Christ." In terms of intonation, number 9 is directly adjacent to the next number - to the text of an early Christian hymn. After the powerful exclamations of the choir, Rachmaninoff, with a sudden decline in sonority, highlights the final phrase “destroy death with death”, emphasizing the meanings that were especially important during the First World War.
No. 11, "My soul magnifies the Lord". This is a large-scale number based on the text of the eulogy of the Mother of God from the Gospel of Luke with the addition of a refrain (“To the most honest cherub”) by Kosma Mayumsky. In the Catholic Church, a similar chant is known as the Magnificat. The words of the Mother of God are conveyed by the thick, harsh sounds of male voices; the light refrain is given to women - in terms of intonation, it is a bit like folk laudatory songs. It is interesting to watch how Rachmaninoff varies this refrain, each time repeating it in a slightly new way.
No. 12, "Great Doxology" ("Glory to God in the highest", Znamenny chant)- another large-scale chant, completes the main part of Matins. Let us note that the great doxology, in contrast to the daily doxology, is included only in the festive matins. The text of the doxology was compiled in early Christian times on the basis of an angelic song sung during the gospel to the shepherds about the birth of Christ. A simple, archaic motif first passes through the violas, and then repeats many times in other voices in various intonational, rhythmic and tempo variants.
Nos. 13, 14, 15: “Salvation is here”, “He is risen from the grave” (both Znamenny chant) and the chant “To the Chosen Governor” (text of the 7th century, Greek chant). These last three numbers - Sunday troparia - Rakhmaninov thinks as the finale of a grandiose cycle. Note that in the traditional service, either “Salvation is today” or “He is risen from the grave” is performed - they never sound together. As for the Chosen Governor, this is the only hymn from the service of the first hour included by Rachmaninov in the score. As we can see, the composer quite freely combines liturgical texts; the logic of selection seems to be dictated not so much by liturgical tradition as by their meaning and purely musical reasons. Two Sunday troparions return to the contemplative mood of Vespers, and the final chorus serves as a short solemn finale.
Performances and recordings
1. In Soviet times, Rachmaninov's "All-Night Vigil" was rarely performed for obvious reasons. All the more interesting is the recording made by the State Russian Choir under the direction of Alexander Sveshnikov in the 1960s. The work was recorded in stages, according to rumors - for seven (!) Years. The tempos in the recording can seem rather slow, and some fragments can be overly affected. Even though Sveshnikov's interpretation is far from religious tradition, its significance cannot be overestimated.
2. There was one remarkable exception in the history of the performance of Rachmaninoff's Vigil, connected with the name of the famous opera singer Ivan Kozlovsky. For twelve years, many of which fell on Khrushchev's persecution of the Church, he sought permission to publicly perform Rachmaninov's Vespers: "Why is Mozart's Requiem possible, but Rachmaninov's not?!"
Despite all the difficulties, he nevertheless achieved his goal, and in March 1965 several fragments of the Vespers were openly performed in the Great Hall of the Conservatory. Together with Kozlovsky, the Republican Academic Russian Choir sang under the direction of Alexander Yurlov.
3. In Soviet times, Vespers could also be heard once a year in the Moscow Church of All Who Sorrow Joy on Ordynka, which was especially famous in those days thanks to the choir conducted by Nikolai Matveev. Vespers was performed under his direction for thirty years, beginning in the 1960s. Someone came to these services solely for the sake of music, but there is evidence that sometimes this became the first step towards God.
4. A wonderful recording of "Vespers" was made in 1986 by the Chamber Choir of the Ministry of Culture under the direction of Valery Polyansky. Polyansky's interpretation - surprisingly harmonious, contemplative, with bewitching pauses - was recorded in the Assumption Cathedral with the participation great Irina Arkhipova (“Bless my soul”). This is a wonderful monument to the beginning of the religious revival in Russia.
5. In the same year, a beautiful St. Petersburg recording of "The Vigil" appeared, carried out by the Leningrad State Capella under the direction of Vladislav Chernushenko.
6. From the Russian recordings, we also single out the one that is as close as possible to the church tradition - the choir of the Moscow church of St. Nicholas in Tolmachi, conducted by Alexei Puzakov (1997).
7. The power and beauty of Rachmaninoff's Vespers is so great that for its sake, musicians far from this profession became choral conductors for a while. Evgeniy Svetlanov recorded Vespers in 1983 with the Svyatoslav Obretenov Bulgarian Choir at the Musikverein in Vienna. Mstislav Rostropovich recorded it in 1987 with the Washington Choir Society for the Arts.
8. Also interesting from Western recordings - even with the inevitable language difficulties - are the interpretations of Robert Shaw (with The Robert Shaw Festival Singers, 1989), Matthew Best (Corydon Singers, 1990), Tõnu Kaljuste (Swedish Radio Choir, 1994).
(According to: https://foma.ru/)
All-night vigil is latest work written by the composer in Russia during the First World War and before the outbreak of the terrible revolutionary elements, which resulted in the disappearance of Russian Orthodox practice for almost a century.
I think that in most cases the phrase “Russian sacred music” will evoke associations with Sergei Rachmaninoff’s “all-night vigil”. In any case, one of the first is for sure (along with his own “Liturgy” and similar cycles by P. I. Tchaikovsky). Of course, it can be objected that “the most famous” does not automatically mean “the best”: after all, the fact that Rachmaninoff is a secular composer of the first magnitude, whose name is known to the whole world, is important here, and because of this, any of his works is simply doomed to be more famous than a similar one, but belonging to a pen not so popular. But, on the other hand, A. D. Kastalsky, the brightest and most authoritative representative of the “new Moscow school” of church music, called Rachmaninov’s Vespers “the crown of the Moscow school”! This is a very serious confession that cannot be ignored.
Our goal in this work is to get to know the cycle of S.V. Rachmaninov; form, “palette of the choir”, the main means of musical expression, the prerequisites for creation, the all-night service, reliance on church dogmas - all these tasks will be considered and dealt with in this work.
S.V. Rachmaninov, shocked by the sound of his own composition, admitted: "I did not think that I had written such a work."
“Music for the Liturgy and the All-Night Vigil, created by Rachmaninoff at the beginning of the last century, became an integral part of the church life of a whole generation of Russian Orthodox people, entered Russian Orthodox art along with the very primary source of Russian musical art - Znamenny chant.”
A person's personality, including the creative one, is laid down in childhood. Vivid childhood impressions of folklore and culture often became fundamental motifs in the work of Russian composers. Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninov was born into a musical family. His mother, Lyubov Petrovna, was a student of Anton Rubinstein and played beautifully; father, Vasily Arkadyevich, possessed the gift of musical improvisation. “For other strongest musical impressions, I have to thank my grandmother,” Sergei Rachmaninov recalled. It was thanks to his grandmother Sofya Alexandrovna that the future master was imbued with the beauty of sacred music. Sofia Alexandrovna Butakova was a deeply religious woman. She regularly attended church services and when Sergei remained in her care, she always took him with her. As his godmother, she was strict about everything that concerned spiritual development grandson. Grandmother played a big role in the life of Sergei Rachmaninov. It is no coincidence that in March 1897, immediately after the failure of his first symphony in St. Petersburg, he went to Novgorod, to his grandmother. S.A. Butakova died at the age of 82, in 1904, when the fate of Rachmaninov was already completely determined. Sergey especially remembered the chime of the distant Novgorod Sophia Cathedral. “The bell ringers were artists,” he wrote later, “four notes formed a repeating theme again and again, four weeping silver notes surrounded by an incessantly changing accompaniment ... A few years later I composed a suite for two pianos ... - the bell sang again to me Sophia Cathedral". The ancient Novgorod znamenny chant remained in the memory of the composer for the rest of his life.
In addition to the warm impressions left by Sofya Butakova, the idea of writing sacred music was influenced by the opinion of contemporaries-musicians: when Rakhmaninov studied at the Moscow Conservatory, Smolensky Stepan Vasilievich, who was a great connoisseur and researcher of church singing, musicologist, paleographer, choral conductor, read a course on the history of Russian church music there. , and teacher, musical public figure; collected and studied monuments of ancient Russian music. Back in 1897, he filed S.V. Rachmaninoff the idea of the Liturgy, in turn S.V. Rachmaninoff dedicated to him " All-night vigil
He also made attempts to persuade C.V. Rachmaninov to create a work in the field of sacred music and another major authority in the field of church music, A.D. Kastalsky, who, in 1903, presented him with one of his spiritual works with the inscription: “To my dear Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninoff from A.D. Kastalsky as a token of a reminder to him that there is a region in the world where they patiently but persistently wait for the inspirations of Rachmaninoff ... "It was to A.D. Kastalsky that S.V. Rachmaninov turned for advice during the period of work on the Liturgy.
“In February 1915, at one of the next rehearsals of the Synodal Choir, a new score appeared on the consoles in a blue cover. Having opened the notes, we saw the inscription: “S.V. Rakhmaninov. "All-Night Vigil". The score, like all the notes of the synodal choir in general, was reproduced by lithographic method and has not yet passed through any publishing house. We were to be the first to perform this work on the concert stage,” recalled Alexander Smirnov, one of the singers of the Moscow Synodal Choir.
The work on the "Liturgy" and the Vespers by S. V. Rachmaninov also evoked a feeling of joy among the musicians. Rehearsals began with excitement. Usually, before learning, conductor Nikolai Danilin played a new work once, but now he did it twice, accompanying the performance with short remarks: “Listen again”, “It just seems difficult. It is difficult to perform on the piano, but it is easy in the choir.” All preparations for the concerts took place in an atmosphere of great creative upsurge.
Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninov himself attended the rehearsals, although, according to tradition, almost no one was allowed to rehearse the synodal choir.
“Once during a rehearsal, the glass door suddenly flew open, and a man of unusually tall; he went through the middle aisle to the front rows of chairs, sat down and, opening exactly the same score as ours, began to listen. The conductor did not stop the choir, but everyone guessed that it was Sergei Rachmaninov. From that day on, Sergei Vasilievich also appeared neatly at the beginning of the rehearsal, sat down in the same place, carefully followed the performance, turned the pages at the same time as everyone else and ... was silent. Only once instead of S.V. Rachmaninov's wife came, listened to the entire rehearsal, and read a book during the break,” A. Smirnov recalls about the rehearsals of Vespers.
"Liturgy of John Chrysostom" S.V. Rachmaninoff was first performed in 1910, in the hall of the Synodal School. Repeated performances took place in the Great Hall of the Conservatory.
The first performance of the Vespers took place on March 23, 1915 in the Hall of Columns of the Noble Assembly in Moscow by the choir of the Synodal School. Since 1910, the director of the Synodal Choir, Nikolai Danilin, raised the choir's skills to the highest level. He first met Sergei Rachmaninov while still a student at the school, and this meeting later grew into a close friendship. The play of the young Rachmaninov made an indelible impression on Nikolai Danilin. It was with Nikolai Danilin that Rachmaninov collaborated in creating the choral score of Vespers.
Within a month, this work was performed four times (the collection from two concerts was donated to the victims of the First World War). Despite the rule that forbade applause during the performance of sacred music, the listeners, after the final chord of “All-Night,” each time began to applaud vigorously.
The last time "Vespers" was performed by the Synodal Choir at the end of 1916, in the concert hall of the Synodal School - where all the rehearsals took place.
After 1917, this work was not performed for many years. She was one of the first to include forbidden Russian sacred music in her concert performances chapel under the direction of Yurlov. On March 2, 1965, fragments of the All-Night Vigil were performed, soloist Ivan Semenovich Kozlovsky. Then this work began to be performed annually in full in the Moscow Church of All Who Sorrow Joy on Bolshaya Ordynka, by the right choir under the direction of the famous choir director Nikolai Matveev. On April 1, on the eve of the composer's birthday, many Muscovites came to the temple to hear S.V. Rakhmaninov's "All-Night Vigil". ”
“I am a Russian composer,” S.V. Rakhmaninov wrote, “and my Motherland has left an imprint on my character and my views. My music is a product of my character, and therefore Russian music: the only thing I try to do when I compose is to make it directly and simply express what is in my heart.”
Today Liturgy and Vespers S.V. Rachmaninov are performed in concert halls all over the world, and excerpts are heard during divine services in Russian Orthodox churches: “We sing to you”, “O Mother of God, Virgin, rejoice”. The full Liturgy and All-Night Vigil of Sergei Rachmaninoff is performed by the choir under the direction of the conductor Alexei Puzakov in the church of St. Nicholas in Tolmachi.
The performance of the Liturgy of Sergei Rachmaninoff in the church on Bolshaya Ordynka in the mid-1980s was an amazing event in the church and cultural life of those years. Twice a year, the Moscow intelligentsia gathered here for the performance of the Liturgy by the choir under the direction of Nikolai Matveev, the famous regent. Professor of Moscow State University A. Kozarzhevsky constantly came here. In this church, for the first time during the years of Soviet power, they began to perform the Liturgy of Rachmaninoff. Archbishop Cyprian (Zernov), who was rector here, was a connoisseur of music, in his youth he was an actor. Therefore, it is no coincidence that it was he who decided to revive this work by Rachmaninoff to the church sound.
