{"id":770,"date":"2015-06-06T22:45:17","date_gmt":"2015-06-06T22:45:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.candelalearning.com\/musicx15xmaster\/?post_type=chapter&p=770"},"modified":"2015-10-10T07:11:26","modified_gmt":"2015-10-10T07:11:26","slug":"avro-part","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/odessa-musicapp-medievaltomodern\/chapter\/avro-part\/","title":{"raw":"Avro P\u00e4rt","rendered":"Avro P\u00e4rt"},"content":{"raw":"Arvo P\u00e4rt\u00a0enjoys enormous popularity for a \"classical\" composer. His works are often categorized as holy minimalism though he does not use that term when speaking of his own music. Notice the impact and influence in his personal history of composers and styles we have already studied: early 20th century techniques (including twelve-tone), Soviet artistic repression, minimalism, Medieval chant, and Renaissance polyphony.\r\n

Introduction<\/h2>\r\nArvo P\u00e4rt<\/b> (born 11 September 1935) is an Estonian composer of classical and sacred music.\u00a0Since the late 1970s, P\u00e4rt has worked in a minimalist style that employs his self-invented compositional technique, tintinnabuli. His music is in part inspired by\u00a0Gregorian chant.\r\n

Compositions<\/h2>\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_885\" align=\"alignright\" width=\"250\"]\"Figure<\/a> Figure 1. Arvo P\u00e4rt in 2011[\/caption]\r\n\r\nP\u00e4rt's works are generally divided into two periods. He composed his early works using a range of neo-classical<\/a> styles influenced by\u00a0Shostakovich, Prokofiev, and Bart\u00f3k. He then began to compose using Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique and serialism. This, however, not only earned the ire of the Soviet establishment, but also proved to be a creative dead-end. When early works were banned by Soviet censors, P\u00e4rt entered the first of several periods of contemplative silence, during which he studied choral music from the 14th to 16th centuries.\u00a0In this context, P\u00e4rt's biographer, Paul Hillier, observed that \"He had reached a position of complete despair in which the composition of music appeared to be the most futile of gestures, and he lacked the musical faith and willpower to write even a single note.\"\r\n\r\nThe spirit of early European polyphony informed the composition of P\u00e4rt's transitional Third Symphony (1971); thereafter he immersed himself in early music, reinvestigating the roots of Western music. He studied plainsong, Gregorian chant and the emergence of polyphony in the European Renaissance.\r\n\r\nThe music that began to emerge after this period was radically different. This period of new compositions included Fratres<\/i>, Cantus In Memoriam Benjamin Britten<\/i> and Tabula Rasa.<\/i>\u00a0P\u00e4rt describes the music of this period as tintinnabuli\u2014like the ringing of bells. Spiegel im Spiegel<\/i> (1978) is a well-known example which has been used in many films. The music is characterised by simple harmonies, often single unadorned notes, or triads, which form the basis of Western harmony. These are reminiscent of ringing bells. Tintinnabuli works are rhythmically simple and do not change tempo. Another characteristic of P\u00e4rt's later works is that they are frequently settings for sacred texts, although he mostly chooses Latin or the Church Slavonic language used in Orthodox liturgy instead of his native Estonian language. Large-scale works inspired by religious texts include St. John Passion<\/i>, Te Deum<\/i>, and Litany<\/i>. Choral works from this period include Magnificat<\/i><\/i> and The Beatitudes<\/i>.\r\n\r\nOf P\u00e4rt's popularity, Steve Reich has written: \"Even in Estonia, Arvo was getting the same feeling that we were all getting. . . . I love his music, and I love the fact that he is such a brave, talented man. . . . He's completely out of step with the zeitgeist and yet he's enormously popular, which is so inspiring. His music fulfills a deep human need that has nothing to do with fashion.\"\u00a0P\u00e4rt's music came to public attention in the West largely thanks to Manfred Eicher who recorded several of P\u00e4rt's compositions for ECM Records starting in 1984.\r\n\r\nInvited by Walter Fink, P\u00e4rt was the 15th composer featured in the annual Komponistenportr\u00e4t of the Rheingau Musik Festival in 2005 in four concerts. Chamber music included F\u00fcr Alina<\/i> for piano, played by himself, Spiegel im Spiegel<\/i> and Psalom<\/i> for string quartet. The chamber orchestra of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra played his Trisagion<\/i>, Fratres<\/i>and Cantus<\/i> along with works of J.S. Bach. The Windsbach Boys Choir and soloists Sibylla Rubens, Ingeborg Danz, Markus Sch\u00e4fer and Klaus Mertens performed Magnificat<\/i> andCollage \u00fcber B-A-C-H<\/i> together with two cantatas of Bach and one of Mendelssohn. The Hilliard Ensemble, organist Christopher Bowers-Broadbent, the Rostock Motet Choir and the Hilliard instrumental ensemble, conducted by Markus Johannes Langer, performed a program of P\u00e4rt's organ music and works for voices (some a cappella<\/i>), including Pari Intervallo<\/i>, De profundis<\/i>, and Miserere<\/i>.\r\n\r\nA new composition, F\u00fcr Lennart<\/i>, written for the memory of the Estonian President, Lennart Meri, was played at Meri's funeral service on 2 April 2006.\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_886\" align=\"alignright\" width=\"250\"]\"Figure Figure 2. Arvo P\u00e4rt and Nora P\u00e4rt in 2012[\/caption]\r\n\r\nIn response to the murder of the Russian investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya in Moscow on 7 October 2006, P\u00e4rt declared that all of his works performed in 2006 and 2007 would be in honour of her death, issuing the following statement: \"Anna Politkovskaya staked her entire talent, energy and\u2014in the end\u2014even her life on saving people who had become victims of the abuses prevailing in Russia.\"\r\n\r\nP\u00e4rt was honoured as the featured composer of the 2008 RT\u00c9 Living Music Festival\u00a0in Dublin, Ireland. He was also commissioned by Louth Contemporary Music Society\u00a0to compose a new choral work based on \"St. Patrick's Breastplate,\" which premiered in 2008 in Louth, Ireland. The new work is called The Deers Cry<\/i>. This is his first Irish commission, having its debut in Drogheda and Dundalk in February 2008.\r\n\r\nP\u00e4rt's 2008 Symphony No. 4<\/i> is named \"Los Angeles\" and was dedicated to Mikhail Khodorkovsky. It was P\u00e4rt's first symphony written since hisSymphony No. 3<\/i> written in 1971. It premiered in Los Angeles, California, at the Walt Disney Concert Hall on 10 January 2009,\u00a0and has been nominated for a GRAMMY for Best Classical Contemporary Composition.\r\n\r\nOn 10 December 2011, P\u00e4rt was appointed a member of the Pontifical Council for Culture for a five-year renewable term by Pope Benedict XVI.\r\n\r\nOn 26 January 2014, P\u00e4rt's Adam's Lament<\/i> won a Grammy for Best Choral Performance.","rendered":"

Arvo P\u00e4rt\u00a0enjoys enormous popularity for a “classical” composer. His works are often categorized as holy minimalism though he does not use that term when speaking of his own music. Notice the impact and influence in his personal history of composers and styles we have already studied: early 20th century techniques (including twelve-tone), Soviet artistic repression, minimalism, Medieval chant, and Renaissance polyphony.<\/p>\n

Introduction<\/h2>\n

Arvo P\u00e4rt<\/b> (born 11 September 1935) is an Estonian composer of classical and sacred music.\u00a0Since the late 1970s, P\u00e4rt has worked in a minimalist style that employs his self-invented compositional technique, tintinnabuli. His music is in part inspired by\u00a0Gregorian chant.<\/p>\n

Compositions<\/h2>\n
\"Figure<\/a><\/p>\n

Figure 1. Arvo P\u00e4rt in 2011<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

P\u00e4rt’s works are generally divided into two periods. He composed his early works using a range of neo-classical<\/a> styles influenced by\u00a0Shostakovich, Prokofiev, and Bart\u00f3k. He then began to compose using Schoenberg’s twelve-tone technique and serialism. This, however, not only earned the ire of the Soviet establishment, but also proved to be a creative dead-end. When early works were banned by Soviet censors, P\u00e4rt entered the first of several periods of contemplative silence, during which he studied choral music from the 14th to 16th centuries.\u00a0In this context, P\u00e4rt’s biographer, Paul Hillier, observed that “He had reached a position of complete despair in which the composition of music appeared to be the most futile of gestures, and he lacked the musical faith and willpower to write even a single note.”<\/p>\n

The spirit of early European polyphony informed the composition of P\u00e4rt’s transitional Third Symphony (1971); thereafter he immersed himself in early music, reinvestigating the roots of Western music. He studied plainsong, Gregorian chant and the emergence of polyphony in the European Renaissance.<\/p>\n

The music that began to emerge after this period was radically different. This period of new compositions included Fratres<\/i>, Cantus In Memoriam Benjamin Britten<\/i> and Tabula Rasa.<\/i>\u00a0P\u00e4rt describes the music of this period as tintinnabuli\u2014like the ringing of bells. Spiegel im Spiegel<\/i> (1978) is a well-known example which has been used in many films. The music is characterised by simple harmonies, often single unadorned notes, or triads, which form the basis of Western harmony. These are reminiscent of ringing bells. Tintinnabuli works are rhythmically simple and do not change tempo. Another characteristic of P\u00e4rt’s later works is that they are frequently settings for sacred texts, although he mostly chooses Latin or the Church Slavonic language used in Orthodox liturgy instead of his native Estonian language. Large-scale works inspired by religious texts include St. John Passion<\/i>, Te Deum<\/i>, and Litany<\/i>. Choral works from this period include Magnificat<\/i><\/i> and The Beatitudes<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Of P\u00e4rt’s popularity, Steve Reich has written: “Even in Estonia, Arvo was getting the same feeling that we were all getting. . . . I love his music, and I love the fact that he is such a brave, talented man. . . . He’s completely out of step with the zeitgeist and yet he’s enormously popular, which is so inspiring. His music fulfills a deep human need that has nothing to do with fashion.”\u00a0P\u00e4rt’s music came to public attention in the West largely thanks to Manfred Eicher who recorded several of P\u00e4rt’s compositions for ECM Records starting in 1984.<\/p>\n

Invited by Walter Fink, P\u00e4rt was the 15th composer featured in the annual Komponistenportr\u00e4t of the Rheingau Musik Festival in 2005 in four concerts. Chamber music included F\u00fcr Alina<\/i> for piano, played by himself, Spiegel im Spiegel<\/i> and Psalom<\/i> for string quartet. The chamber orchestra of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra played his Trisagion<\/i>, Fratres<\/i>and Cantus<\/i> along with works of J.S. Bach. The Windsbach Boys Choir and soloists Sibylla Rubens, Ingeborg Danz, Markus Sch\u00e4fer and Klaus Mertens performed Magnificat<\/i> andCollage \u00fcber B-A-C-H<\/i> together with two cantatas of Bach and one of Mendelssohn. The Hilliard Ensemble, organist Christopher Bowers-Broadbent, the Rostock Motet Choir and the Hilliard instrumental ensemble, conducted by Markus Johannes Langer, performed a program of P\u00e4rt’s organ music and works for voices (some a cappella<\/i>), including Pari Intervallo<\/i>, De profundis<\/i>, and Miserere<\/i>.<\/p>\n

A new composition, F\u00fcr Lennart<\/i>, written for the memory of the Estonian President, Lennart Meri, was played at Meri’s funeral service on 2 April 2006.<\/p>\n

\"Figure<\/p>\n

Figure 2. Arvo P\u00e4rt and Nora P\u00e4rt in 2012<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

In response to the murder of the Russian investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya in Moscow on 7 October 2006, P\u00e4rt declared that all of his works performed in 2006 and 2007 would be in honour of her death, issuing the following statement: “Anna Politkovskaya staked her entire talent, energy and\u2014in the end\u2014even her life on saving people who had become victims of the abuses prevailing in Russia.”<\/p>\n

P\u00e4rt was honoured as the featured composer of the 2008 RT\u00c9 Living Music Festival\u00a0in Dublin, Ireland. He was also commissioned by Louth Contemporary Music Society\u00a0to compose a new choral work based on “St. Patrick’s Breastplate,” which premiered in 2008 in Louth, Ireland. The new work is called The Deers Cry<\/i>. This is his first Irish commission, having its debut in Drogheda and Dundalk in February 2008.<\/p>\n

P\u00e4rt’s 2008 Symphony No. 4<\/i> is named “Los Angeles” and was dedicated to Mikhail Khodorkovsky. It was P\u00e4rt’s first symphony written since hisSymphony No. 3<\/i> written in 1971. It premiered in Los Angeles, California, at the Walt Disney Concert Hall on 10 January 2009,\u00a0and has been nominated for a GRAMMY for Best Classical Contemporary Composition.<\/p>\n

On 10 December 2011, P\u00e4rt was appointed a member of the Pontifical Council for Culture for a five-year renewable term by Pope Benedict XVI.<\/p>\n

On 26 January 2014, P\u00e4rt’s Adam’s Lament<\/i> won a Grammy for Best Choral Performance.<\/p>\n\n\t\t\t

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Candela Citations<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t
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