And then there is Avro Pärt
And you thought you weren’t into classical music!
We love it, endure it and use it to accompany us in our way. But music rarely stops us in our tracks, reaching through to lift our spirit, thump our heartstrings while barreling through to the bottom of our soul. Do you remember the songs, pieces, and artists that do that to you? Those pieces remind us of what we lived through years later and often provide strength for darker days.
Being a woman of eclectic tastes, I enjoy a plethora of styles from Renaissance to the gaming music soundtracks of Jeremy Soule, country-western classics to gospel music. The Moody Blues too, but that is one for another day.
One composer in the contemporary classical realm never ceases to move me. His work is accessible for almost anyone, even if classical music is not your thing. I dare you to have a listen if you’ve never ventured this far outside your personal comfort zone for music!
For most of us diehard Classical Music fans, a lot of these compositions got lost on their journey to our modern times. Few noteworthies strum our inner strings until this one Estonian. Estonia, you ask? Think next-door mini neighbor of the old USSR for all you geography flunkies. They were long under their larger, more aggressive neighbor’s heel, officially until 1991.
Avro Pärt grew up in those trying days of old, beginning work under the Soviet system but it did not hold his spirit down for long. In his musical journey, his faith and study of early music revolutionalized not only his own output but stamped a whole generation both east and west with its beauty.
He found a new musical inspiration within Gregorian chant in the 1970s then molded his style into the evolving minimalist movement. He made restraint into an exalted art form. My first case in point is Fratres (Brothers in Latin) on YouTube (you’ll have to find the link if unsupported):
This recording is for violin, orchestra and percussion in this version. He wrote it without fixed instrumentation (daring indeed!) so compare any of the other versions in Youtube with cello for a different take on his variations on a theme. This exemplifies his new style using minimal material and yet bringing both energy and peace blasting out of the variations.
And then there is his piece, Tabula Rasa. The Latin phrase means a ‘clean slate,’ the theory that we are born needing nurturing since nature did not supply us from birth. Within this philosophical piece, the listener can make a ‘spiritual’ headway by comparing the conflicting musical voices to those in his own life. Ups and downs in our lives meld with the melodic ones to become a voice crying out for something beyond. The tumbling of life may crash in but Arvo Pärt makes sense of it.
This piece was one of the first to break through to western audiences and plaster his name upon the classic world map, by the way. This was no mean task in the often unpalatable modern atonal music world. He has, in my humble opinion, brought contemporary classical composition back to the masses.
This haunting instrumental piece is my personal favorite. Pärt’s inner search led him to more contemplative music, which featured such religious content that he was summarily banned by the Soviet authorities. That clash heard in Tabula Rasa was a reality for the composer in more than one way it seems.
He is a master of vocal and choral religious music as you can expect. There are several of note to be savored online. The last piece, of this type, is De Profundis, the choral Latin version of Psalm 130.
The longing put into his interpretation of Biblical text is moving in the least. Out of the depths indeed! The use of the bass voice is a staple of Russian orthodox music and is beautifully explored in several of the composer’s oeuvre. The text is best enjoyed in English in the earlier terse King James version. You can follow the lines and feel how he interpreted the wrenching cry of this timeless Psalm.
Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O LORD.
Lord, hear my voice: let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications.
If thou, LORD, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?
But there is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest be feared.
I wait for the LORD, my soul doth wait, and in his word do I hope.
My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning: I say, more than they that watch for the morning.
Let Israel hope in the LORD: for with the LORD there is mercy, and with him is plenteous redemption.
And he shall redeem Israel from all his iniquities.
Feel free to delve into the Youtube collection to find your own favorites. I’ll be there as well, exploring the new entries of the throbbing heart of eastern Europe.
Long live Avro Pärt.
