Medieval actors in Rus' are both singers and dancers. Music of ancient Rus'

Old Russian music - performers and main genres

• ritual music, mainly magi,
• folk -.

Old Russian music was closely connected with rituals and beliefs, as well as with agricultural labor. This explains the wide variety of genres. Epics, ritual, dance, labor, game, lullabies and many other songs were performed on squares, in houses, at feasts.

Skomorokhs (they were also called “acts”, since they not only sang and played music, but also staged performances, often improvised) were the first professional musicians in Rus'.

In their work they used such musical instruments as

pipes, bagpipes, psaltery, horns, trumpets, tambourines, flutes.

Many musicians performed at feasts, singing the valor of Russian knights and princes. The image of such a narrator is displayed in the Tale of Igor's Campaign - the famous Bayan.

After the capture of Rus' by the Tatar-Mongols, the free "Mr. Veliky Novgorod" became the center of cultural life. It was there that such a genre as the epic was developed. Epics brought to us the story of the famous performer and gusler Sadko, who conquered even the Sea Tsar with his music.

Bell ringing as a musical genre

Also, on Novgorodian soil, a unique genre, typical only for the music of Ancient Rus', developed - the art of bell ringing. There are three types of ringing:

• blagovest(uniform strikes to the big bell),
• chime(sorting bells from smallest to largest or vice versa)
• and actually myself ringing(this was already a real bell-playing).

A professional bell ringer has studied the art of ringing all his life.

The beginning of professional music - church and spiritual

The origin of professional music is closely connected with the history of the formation of the ancient Russian state - Kievan Rus (IX-XIII centuries). After the Baptism of Rus' (988) and the strengthening of ties with Byzantium, the first church songs appeared - sacred music.

Old Russian musical canon

The musical canon of that time was borrowed by ancient Russian priests straight from Byzantium. Old Russian church music, like all Christian music of that period, was monodic, that is, it was based on monophonic chants. The chants were subject to the system of osmosis. With its help, a strict order of the musical performance of the service was established.

The osmosis system was entirely borrowed from and was called the "Byzantine pillar". In accordance with it, a special voice was sung every week in Orthodox churches (in the system of ancient Russian music, not any one specific tune, but the whole musical system was considered a voice).

There were eight voices in total, and they formed an eight-week cycle (“Byzantine pillar”), which was repeated during the year about six and a half times (with the exception of the days of Great Lent and Holy Easter).

Musicologists and historians consider St. John of Damascus to be the creator of the osmosis system. ( 680-777), author of the Oktoikh.

There were no records of the pitch designation of voices at that time. The melody was recorded using a system of special signs that indicated only the direction of the melody, right below the line of text. The performers had to learn the melody of chants by ear. The art of singing was passed down orally from teacher to student.

A special aesthetic is also associated with the Byzantine musical canon - "angelic singing" Most of all, the pure sound of the voice was appreciated. One of the early Christian writers, Clement of Alexandria (150-215), believed that the human voice is a perfect instrument, and therefore rejected other musical instruments. Therefore, a striking distinguishing feature of the music of Ancient Rus' was the principle a cappella, that is, singing without the accompaniment of musical instruments.

Singing styles in ancient Russian music

In the music of Ancient Rus', two singing styles coexisted - kondakarny(solo) and Znamenny(choral) chant.

The harmonious alternation of tones and semitones, which formed a twelve-step scale, was called ecclesiastical way. It broke up into four accords - simple, gloomy, light and crackly, each had three sounds.

Recording music in ancient Rus'

To record ancient Russian church music, the monks used a special notation, which was called “znamenny” (from the word banner - “sign”). The “znamenny” notation (or “hook” - after the name of one of the main signs of the system - the hook), performed before the 16th century, is difficult to decipher, because for quite objective reasons, science does not have accurate information about how Znamenny chants actually sounded.

It should be noted that Old Russian church and folk music were in a certain opposition. Since the Byzantine canon was borrowed, it came into conflict with folk music, which has deep national roots. Therefore, the authors of ancient Russian chants faced a difficult choice of combining Christian aesthetics and "acquired" national, but pagan methods of music making.

However, not only church and folk old Russian music became widespread throughout the country. From the surviving frescoes, we can get some information about the secular music of that period, which was widespread at the court of the Kievan princes. On one of the frescoes you can see a musician playing a melody on a bowed string instrument like a medieval fidelion (a prototype of the viola). Another fresco depicts a whole group of musicians playing spiritual and plucked instruments surrounded by buffoons - dancers and acrobats. Also on the fresco is an image of an organ and a person playing on it. Old Russian princes were very fond of music in all its manifestations, appreciated talented performers.

Probably, it was not without reason that a group of singers was created under the tsar, who were called "sovereign singing clerks." They received a special salary, which depended on how diligently they glorified the tsar (hence the term “doxology”) at the sovereign’s divine services. In this kind of "singing academy" of ancient Russian music, the succession of chanters was preserved.

• tops,
• travelers,
• nizhniki,

- universal singers who could sing in all three voices were called demestvenniks.

After the weakening of Kyiv, the Vladimir-Suzdal principality rises, taking over the “relay race” for the further development of the ancient Russian singing art. The name of the singer and chanter Luka has been preserved in history. He was the creator of a whole school of ancient Russian performers. The chronicle calls his disciples "lutsyn's child".

Significance of the period of ancient Russian music

The music of Ancient Rus' is a unique phenomenon in the history of the country and its culture:

• The performers of ancient Russian music created original genres (bell ringing, epics, historical, lyrical songs, etc.),
• Has been expanded and enriched Byzantine musical canon, which absorbed the originality of the national character.
• Church music became the prototype of professional academic music and was necessary for the development of the culture of Ancient Rus' as a whole.

buffoons (skomrahi, taunts, goosemen, gamers, dancers, cheerful people) - wandering actors in Ancient Rus', who acted as singers, wits, musicians, performers of scenes, trainers, acrobats. According to the dictionary of V. Dahl, a buffoon is “a musician, a piper, a snorter, a horn player, a piper, a harper; earning this, and dancing, songs, jokes, tricks; a joker, a cracker, a gaer, a jester; bear cub; comedian, actor, etc.

Buffoons were carriers of synthetic forms of folk art, combining singing, playing musical instruments, dancing, bear fun, puppet shows, masked performances, tricks. Buffoons were constant participants in folk festivals, games, festivities, various ceremonies: wedding, maternity, baptism, funeral. “The buffoons combined in their art the skill of performance with a topical repertoire, which included comic songs, dramatic scenes - games, social satire - slander performed in masks and a “buffoon dress” to the accompaniment of domra, sniffles, bagpipes, surnas, tambourines. The buffoons directly communicated with the audience, with the street crowd, involved in the game.

Known since the 11th century. They gained particular popularity in the 15th-17th centuries. They were persecuted by ecclesiastical and civil authorities.

F. N. Riess. Buffoons in the village. 1857

Etymology

There is no exact explanation of the etymology of the word "buffoon". There are various versions of the origin of this word:

• "Skomorokh" - re-registration of the Greek. skōmmarchos "master of a joke", reconstructed from the addition of skōmma "joke, mockery" and archos "chief, leader".
• From Arab. mascara - "joke, jester."

According to N. Ya. Marr, “skomorokh”, according to the historical grammar of the Russian language, is the plural of the word “skomorosi” (komrasi), which goes back to the Proto-Slavic forms. In turn, the Proto-Slavic word has an Indo-European root common to all European languages ​​\u200b\u200b- “scomors-os”, which was originally called a wandering musician, dancer, comedian. From here come the names of folk comic characters: the Italian "scaramuccia" (Italian scaramuccia) and the French "scaramouche" (French scaramouche).

A. P. Vasnetsov. Buffoons. 1904.

Rise, rise and fall

Buffoons arose no later than the middle of the 11th century, we can judge this from the frescoes of St. Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv, 1037. Buffoonery flourished in the 15th-17th centuries. In the 18th century, buffoons began to gradually disappear under pressure from the tsar and the church, leaving some traditions of their art as a legacy to booths and districts.

Buffoons - wandering musicians

Buffoons performed on the streets and squares, constantly communicated with the audience, involved them in their performance.

In the XVI-XVII centuries, buffoons began to unite in "troops". The church and the state accused them of committing robberies: “buffoons, “combining in gangs of up to 60, up to 70 and up to 100 people,” in the villages of the peasants, “they eat and drink heavily and rob their stomachs from the cages and smash people along the roads.” At the same time, in the oral poetry of the Russian people there is no image of a buffoon-robber robbing the common people.

Buffoons in Moscow

In the work of Adam Olearius, secretary of the Holstein embassy, ​​who visited Muscovy three times in the 30s of the 17th century, we find evidence of a wave of general searches in the homes of Muscovites in order to identify "demonic horn vessels" - musical instruments of buffoons - and their destruction.

At home, especially during their feasts, Russians love music. But since they began to abuse it, singing all kinds of shameful songs to music in taverns, taverns and everywhere on the streets, the current patriarch two years ago at first strictly forbade the existence of such tavern musicians and their instruments, which would come across on the streets, ordered to immediately break and destroy, and then generally banned all kinds of instrumental music for Russians, ordering musical instruments to be taken away from houses everywhere, which were taken out ... on five wagons across the Moscow River and burned there.

- A detailed description of the journey of the Holstein embassy to Muscovy ... - M., 1870 - p. 344.

In 1648 and 1657, Archbishop Nikon achieved royal decrees on the complete prohibition of buffoonery, which spoke of beating buffoons and their listeners with batogs, and destroying buffoon equipment. After that, the “professional” buffoons disappeared, but the traditions of buffoonery were preserved in the traditional culture of the Eastern Slavs, influenced the composition of epic plots (Sadko, Dobrynya, disguised as a buffoon at his wife’s wedding, etc.), customs of disguise, folk theater (“Tsar Maximilian”) , wedding and calendar folklore.

Over time, buffoons turned into bear cubs, puppeteers, fair merrymakers and showmen.

Musicians and buffoons. Draw from the fresco of St. Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv. 1037

Repertoire and creativity

The repertoire of buffoons consisted of comic songs, plays, social satires ("glum"), performed in masks and "buffoon dress" to the accompaniment of a beep, gusel, pity, domra, bagpipes, tambourine. Each character was assigned a certain character and mask, which did not change for years.

In their work there was a significant proportion of satire, humor, buffoonery. Buffoons are credited with participating in the composition of the epic "Vavilo and Buffoons", ballads of a satirical and comic nature (for example, "Guest Terentishche"), fairy tales, proverbs. The art of buffoons was associated with ancient paganism, free from church influence, imbued with a "worldly" spirit, cheerful and mischievous, with elements of "obscenity".

During the performance, the buffoon communicated directly with the public and often represented merchants, governors, and representatives of the church as satirical characters.

In addition to public holidays, weddings and homelands, buffoons, as connoisseurs of traditions, were also invited to funerals.

There is no doubt that here the buffoons, despite their comical nature, dared to come to the sad zhalniks from the old memory of some once understandable rite of commemoration with dances and games. There is no doubt that the people allowed them to visit their graves and did not consider it indecent to be carried away by their songs and games, according to the same old memory.

- Belyaev I. About buffoons // Vremennik of the Society of History and Russian Antiquities - M., 1854 Book. 20

Adam Olearius. Puppeteer. 1643

Church attitude

Most of the church, and then, under the influence of the church and state testimonies, are imbued with the spirit of intolerance for folk amusements with songs, dances, jokes, the soul of which was often buffoons. Such holidays were called "stingy", "demonic", "blameless". The teachings were repeated from century to century, borrowed from Byzantium, distributed there from the first centuries of Christianity, censure and prohibition of music, singing, dancing, dressing up in comic, satyr or tragic faces, horse dancing and other folk entertainments, in Byzantium closely associated with pagan traditions, with pagan cults. Byzantine views were transferred to Russian circumstances, only some expressions of Byzantine originals were sometimes altered, omitted or replenished, according to the conditions of Russian life.

Cyril, Metropolitan of Kiev (1243-50) - among the ordeals he calls "dancing in feasts ... and satanic fables whimperingly." In the Word of the Christ-lover (according to a manuscript of the 15th century), demonic games are called at feasts (and weddings), but these games are: dancing, buzzing, songs, snuffles, tambourines. According to the “Charter for the Great Lent” (from the Dubno collection of rules and teachings of the 16th century), “sin is a feast to create with dancing and laughter on fasting days.” The Domostroy (XVI century) speaks of a meal accompanied by the sounds of music, dancing and mockery: as the smoke will drive away the bees, so the angels of God will depart from that meal and stinking demons will appear.

In the royal charter of 1648, it is ordered that buffoons with domras, and with harps, and with bagpipes, and with all sorts of games, “should not be called into the house.” “You will learn ... the worldly people of those buffoons (with harps, domras, surns and bagpipes) and bear leaders with bears to let them into their homes” (read in “In Memory of Metropolitan Jonah”, 1657).

Dancer and buffoon Lubok

Proverbs and sayings

• Everyone will dance, but not like a buffoon.
• Don't teach me how to dance, I'm a buffoon myself.
• Every buffoon has his horns.
• Skomorokhov's wife is always cheerful.
• A buffoon will tune his voice on the whistle, but he will not suit his life.
• And the buffoon sometimes cries.
• Buffoon ass is not a friend.
• God gave the priest, damn buffoon.

Valery Gavrilin. Oratorio "Buffoons" (fragments)

Poems by Vadim Korostylev and folk.
Perform Eduard Khil and symphony orchestras conducted by A. Badkhen and S. Gorkovenko.

Gavrilin: In "Skomorokhi" there are samples that come directly from folk peasant creativity. For me, the people themselves were represented as a huge, cheerful buffoon, who laughed through his tears. Visible laughter through invisible tears. And then all the people who one way or another showed the world some kind of discovery of the truth turn into buffoons. These are portraits of composers Modest Mussorgsky, Dmitri Shostakovich, my teacher and friend Georgy Sviridov.”

Buffoons, wandering actors of Ancient Rus' - singers, wits, musicians, performers of scenes, animal trainers, acrobats. Their detailed description is given by V. Dal: "Buffoon, buffoon, musician, piper, miracle worker, bagpiper, guslar, who trades in dancing with songs, jokes and tricks, actor, comedian, amusing man, teddy bear, cracker, jester". Known since the 11th century, they gained particular popularity in the 15th-17th centuries.

They were persecuted by the church and civil authorities. A popular character in Russian folklore, the protagonist of many folk sayings: “Every buffoon has his own hooters”, “The buffoon’s wife is always cheerful”, “The buffoon will tune his voice to the horns, but he won’t suit his life”, “Don’t teach me to dance, I’m a buffoon myself” , “Buffoons fun, Satan’s joy”, “God gave the priest, the devil of a buffoon”, “Buffoon is not a friend of the priest”, “And the buffoon cries at a different time”, etc. The time of their appearance in Russia is unclear. They are mentioned in the original Russian chronicle as participants in the princely fun. The meaning and origin of the word "buffoon" itself has not yet been clarified. A.N. Veselovsky explained it with the verb "skomati", which meant to make noise, later he suggested a permutation in this name from the Arabic word "mashara", meaning a disguised jester. A.I.Kirpichnikov and Golubinsky believed that the word "buffoon" comes from the Byzantine "skommarkh", in translation - the master of laughter. This point of view was defended by scholars who believed that buffoons in Rus' originally came from Byzantium, where "jokers", "fools" and "laughers" played a prominent role in folk and court life. In 1889 A.S. Famintsyn's book Skomorokhi in Rus' was published. The definition given by Famintsyn to buffoons as professional representatives of secular music in Russia since ancient times, who were often singers, musicians, mimes, dancers, clowns, improvisers, etc., was included in the Small Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron (1909). centuries, at the courts of the first German rulers there were jokers, clowns and fools who wore a variety of Greco-Roman nicknames, they were most often called "jugglers". They began to gather in troupes - "colleges", headed by archimims. Often they were identified with charlatans, magicians, healers, mendicant priests. Usually they were participants in feasts, wedding and funeral rites, and various holidays. A distinctive feature of the Byzantine and Western deceivers was a wandering lifestyle. All of them were people who were passing, wandering from place to place, in connection with which they acquired in the eyes of the people the significance of experienced, knowledgeable, resourceful people. During their wanderings around the wide world, both Byzantine and Western "jolly people" entered Kyiv and other Russian cities. About buffoons as gifted singers, storytellers, a lot of evidence has been preserved in ancient writing. In particular, they are mentioned in the Tale of Bygone Years (1068). In Rus', as in Byzantium and in the West, buffoons formed artels, or squads, and wandered around in “bands” for their trade. “Regardless of whether the art of the buffoons of Russia came from Byzantium or from the West,” Famintsyn emphasized, “it was already in the 11th century. rooted in the everyday life of Russian folk life. From that time on, it can be considered as a phenomenon that has acclimatized and adopted an independent development here, taking into account local conditions and the nature of the Russian people. In addition to wandering buffoons, there were sedentary buffoons, mostly boyars and princes. The folk comedy owes much to the latter. Buffoons also appeared in the form of puppeteers. Performances of puppet comedy, constantly accompanied by showing a bear and a “goat”, which beat the “spoons” all the time, were given in Rus' for a long time. The comedian put on a skirt with a hoop in the hem, then lifted it up, covering his head, and from behind this impromptu curtain showed his performance. Later, the puppeteers staged everyday fairy tales and songs. Thus, the puppet comedy, as well as the performance of household farces by the mummers, was an attempt at an original reworking of various elements of the drama contained in Russian folk poetry or brought in from outside. “We also had our own“ mummers ”-buffoons, our mastersingers -“ passerby kaliks ”, they carried“ acting ”and songs about the events of the“ great turmoil ”, about“ Ivashka Bolotnikov ”, about battles, victories and death throughout the country Stepan Razin" (M. Gorky, On Plays, 1937). Another version of the origin of the term "buffoon" belongs to N.Ya. Marr. He established that, according to the historical grammar of the Russian language, "buffoon" is the plural of the word "skomorosi" (skomrasi), which goes back to the Proto-Slavic forms. Further, he traces the Indo-European root of this word, common to all European languages, namely the word "scomors-os", which was originally called a wandering musician, dancer, comedian. From here come the origins of the independent Russian term "buffoon", which exists in parallel in European languages ​​when designating folk comic characters: the Italian "scaramuccia" ("scaramuccia") and the French "scaramouche". Marr's point of view completely coincides with the position accepted in art history that memes are a phenomenon of an international order. As applied to Russian buffoons, Marr's concept allows us to speak of their original emergence on the basis of the professionalization of participants in the pagan religious rites of the ancient Slavs, invariably accompanied by music, singing, and dancing.

Buffoons are mentioned in various Russian epics. Byzantine historian of the 7th century. Theophylact writes about the love of the northern Slavs (Vendi) for music, mentioning the citharas invented by them, i.e. harp. The harp as an indispensable accessory of buffoons is mentioned in old Russian songs and epics of the Vladimir cycle. In the historical aspect, buffoons are known primarily as representatives of folk musical art. They become regular participants in village holidays, city fairs, perform in boyar mansions and even penetrate into church rituals. As evidenced by the resolution of the Stoglavy Cathedral directed against buffoons in 1551, their gangs reach "up to 60-70 and up to 100 people." Princely fun is depicted in the frescoes of St. Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv (1037). On one of the frescoes there are three dancing buffoons, one solo, two others in pairs, and one of them either parodies a female dance, or performs something similar to a “kinto” dance with a handkerchief in his hand. On the other, three musicians - two play the horns, and one - the harp. There are also two equilibrist acrobats: an adult standing up supports a pole along which a boy climbs. Nearby is a musician with a stringed instrument. The fresco depicts the baiting of a bear and squirrels or hunting for them, the fight of a man with a costumed beast, equestrian competitions; in addition, the hippodrome - the prince and princess and their retinue, the audience in the boxes. In Kyiv, apparently, there was no hippodrome, but there were equestrian competitions and baiting of animals. The artist depicted the Hippodrome, wishing to give his fresco greater pomp and solemnity. Thus, the performances of buffoons united different types of arts - both dramatic and circus. It is known that back in 1571 they recruited "merry people" for state entertainment, and at the beginning of the 17th century the troupe of the troupe was at the Amusement Chamber, built in Moscow by Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich. Then at the beginning of the 17th century. buffoon troupes were with the princes Ivan Shuisky, Dmitry Pozharsky and others. The buffoons of Prince Pozharsky often went around the villages "for their trade." As medieval jugglers were divided into feudal jugglers and folk jugglers, Russian buffoons were also differentiated. But the circle of "court" buffoons in Russia remained limited, in the end their functions were reduced to the role of domestic jesters. Their appearance spoke of engaging in "demonic" craft, they dressed in short-brimmed caftans, and wearing short-brimmed clothes in Rus' was considered a sin. Also, in their speeches, they often resorted to masks, although back in the 9th century. the disguise was strongly condemned by the church, and they used foul language in their speeches. With all their everyday behavior, buffoons opposed themselves to the generally accepted way of old Rus', in their work they were conductors of opposition sentiments. Guselnik-buffoons not only played their instruments, but at the same time "said" works of Russian folk poetry. Acting as singers and dancers, they at the same time amused the crowd with their antics and gained a reputation as witty jesters. In the course of their speeches, they also introduced "colloquial" numbers and became popular satirists. In this capacity, buffoons played a huge role in the formation of Russian folk drama. The German traveler Adam Olearius, who visited Russia in the 1630s, in his famous Description of a Journey to Muscovy ... talks about buffoonish amusements: “Shameful deeds are sung by street violinists in the streets, while other comedians show them in their puppet shows for the money of common youth and even children, and the leaders of the bears have with them such comedians who, by the way, can immediately present some kind of joke or prank, like ... the Dutch with the help of dolls. To do this, they tie a sheet around the body, lift its free side up and arrange something like a stage above their heads, from which they walk the streets and show various performances from dolls on it. Attached to the story of Olearius is a picture depicting one of such performances of puppet comedians, in which one can recognize the scene “how a gypsy sold a horse to Petrushka”. Buffoons as actors appear in many epics of the North. The epic Vavilo and buffoons are known, the plot of which is that the buffoons invite the plowman Vavila to buffalo with them and put him in the kingdom. Researchers of epics ascribe to buffoons a significant share in the composition of epics and attribute many, especially amusing buffoon stories, to their work. It should be noted that, along with buffoons-players by profession, amateur singers from among noble persons of princely and boyar families are also mentioned in epics. Such singers were Dobrynya Nikitich, Stavr Godinovich, Nightingale Budimirovich, Sadko mentioned in the epics. Playing musical instruments, songs and dances were linked with the customs of the folk masquerade. Ritual dressing of men into women and vice versa has been known since antiquity. The people did not give up their habits, their favorite Christmas entertainments, the ringleaders of which were buffoons. Tsar Ivan the Terrible, during his feasts, liked to disguise himself and dance with buffoons. During the 16-17 centuries. organs, violins and trumpets appeared at the court, the performance on them was also mastered by buffoons. Around the middle of the 17th century. wandering gangs are gradually leaving the stage, and sedentary buffoons are more or less retraining as musicians and stage figures in a Western European way. From that time on, the buffoon becomes an obsolete figure, although certain types of his creative activity continued to live among the people for a very long time. So, the buffoon-singer, performer of folk poetry, gives way to representatives of the emerging from the end of the 16th century. poetry; a living memory of him was preserved among the people - in the person of the storytellers of epics in the North, in the form of a singer or bandura player in the South. The buffoon-gudets (guselnik, domrachi, bagpiper, surnachi), a dance player turned into an instrumental musician. Among the people, his successors are folk musicians, without whom not a single folk festival can do. The buffoon-dancer turns into a dancer, leaving in turn traces of his art in folk daring dances. The buffoon-laugher turned into an artist, but the memory of him survived in the form of Christmas fun and jokes. Famintsyn concludes his book of Skomorokhs in Rus' with the words: “No matter how crude and elementary the art of buffoons may be, one should not lose sight of the fact that it represented the only form of entertainment and joy that corresponded to the tastes of the people for many centuries, replacing completely the latest literature, the latest stage shows. Buffoons ... were the oldest representatives of the folk epic, the folk scene in Russia; at the same time they were the only representatives of secular music in Russia…”

"Music of the 20th century" - Nocturne No. 1, op.5. Romance. (1955). The Beatles. Pop music. Album Wish you were here. (1975). Bulat Okudzhava. "Forgive the infantry." Dodecaphonic music New Viennese school. Rhapsody in blues for piano and orchestra. 1924. Rock opera "Jesus Christ Superstar" (fragment). Bartók paid much attention to the development of folk traditions in music.

"Impressionism in Music" - Festivities. Song about pictures Music by Grigory Gladkov Words by Alexander Kushner. Claude Debussy. French Impressionist painters. A mute is a device used to change the timbre of a musical instrument. Maurice Ravel. Impressionism. Habanera. Draw an illustration for a piece of music (“Celebrations”, “Habanera” - to choose from).

"Music of Ancient Rus'" - Music of Ancient Rus'. A large number of songs were performed: lyrical, laudatory, comic, lamentations, lamentations. Russian music was originally associated with the culture and life of the ancient Slavs. On Yegoriev's day, cows were driven out into the field and a song spell-amulet was sung. Make a project. In the days of May, trees and flowers were honored.

"A mighty bunch of composers" - Alexander Porfiryevich Boorodin. Nikolai Andreevich Rimsky-Korsakov. where they performed with their works. They promoted Russian art abroad, created the Russian Musical Society - the prototype of the modern philharmonic society. Mily Alekseevich Balakirev, Caesar Antonovich Cui, Commonwealth of Composers of the 60s of the 19th century.

"Musical culture" - "Daphne". Purpose and tasks of the work. Italian composer Jacopo Peri. Temple art. I. Gluck. Ancient images in musical culture. Denis Sidorov - vocals (diploma winner) Anna Grigorieva - visual arts (3rd place). The images reflect the following themes. Conclusion: ancient musical art was of a spectacular and entertaining nature.

"Great works of music" - Osip Mandelstam. The birth of music. Appassionata. Vasily Fedorov. Music. The art of poetry. Yakov Khaletsky. Piano. Chamber music. Johann Sebastian Bach. Nicholas Brown. Mozart. Yuri Levitansky. Concert in d-moll. Chopin. Harmony. Mikhail Plyatskovsky. The transformative power of music. Viktor Bokov. Vladimir Lazarev.

In total there are 24 presentations in the topic

Songwriters-storytellers once lived in Great Rus'. They composed and sang and told epics about Russian heroes and about the life of the people: about Prince Vladimir of Kiev Krasno Solnyshko and Princess Apraksia, their mighty squad, about battles with fierce enemies, about foreign kingdoms-states. They sang about unseen miracles: the Serpent-Gorynchishche, the sea king Vodyanik with the queen Vodyanitsa, the giant Idolische ... And an uncountable number of these epics were composed, and an infinite number of them walked around Rus'. And often the first information about their native land, about its heroes and enemies, children received from the lips of singer-storytellers.

The most famous singer of the Russian land is remembered by the people to this day - his name is Bayan.
Bayan, brothers,
not ten falcons let loose on a flock of swans,
but their prophetic fingers
he laid on living strings;
They themselves rumbled glory to the princes.
This is how the famous Tale of Igor's Campaign tells about Bayan. The storyteller was skillful, and the strings on his miraculous instrument were "alive" - ​​they themselves sang the glory of the Great Rulers.

And that instrument was very ancient - its history has more than 14 centuries. Its name comes from the ancient Slavic word "thick" - to buzz, and a string was buzzing in it, which was called "gusla". So the buzzing, talking strings got their name - "harp".
The strings were stretched on a special box, similar to a small trough. In order for the strings to sound louder, louder, “violently”, the box was covered with a special lid-deck made of leather or wood.

“I’ll take a sonorous, yarovchaty harp and set the harp in the old way, start the old times, the old story about the deeds of the Slavic Russian hero Dobrynya Nikitich. Silence to the blue sea, and obedience to people ”- this is how the famous epic about Dobryn Nikitich begins. And they sang and told that epic to the accompaniment of the sonorous harp.

The sonorous harp is similar to the wing of a bird, or to a geometric figure - a trapezoid. The singers put the harp on their knees, tilting them to the left. The strings were plucked either with both hands, or only with the right hand, while the left at that moment gently muffled the strings. Later, the sound began to be extracted with a plectrum, or pick, which made the sound brighter. The sonorous harp was played both with rattling, like on a balalaika, and in “waves”, like on a harp. Several gusli playing wonderful music together were never called an ensemble, but they spoke of them as people who sing in unison, they said so - a harp choir.

Slowly the epic about Dobryn Nikitich affects: “And for twelve years he played the harp. He played the harp, composed songs "...

The sonorous harp has glorious descendants - plucked and keyboard harps. The plucked harp combine elements of the harp, ancient Slavic harp and cymbals. From the latter, they adopted a body on four legs, similar to a table. Metal strings of different lengths and thicknesses give the musician a huge creative scope: any sounds - from the lowest to the highest - easily come out from under the magic fingers of the harpman, who pluck the strings with both hands.

Keyboard harp is akin to a piano, and they appeared quite recently - less than a century ago. In appearance and structure, they look like plucked harps, but the strings are strictly horizontal, and on the left is a piano keyboard of just one octave. Most often, these harps are played with chords: the keys are pressed with the left hand, and the opened strings are sorted with the right hand with the help of a plectrum.

Gusli is considered the main decoration of the orchestra of Russian folk instruments. Thanks to the harp, folk music sounds as loud and voluminous as it did many centuries ago. And the harp players always sit right in the center, as if leading an orchestra, showing respect to such an ancient and so respected instrument in Rus'.