Review: The article considers one of the most important topics of Russian discourse - the issue of St.Petersburg, particularly the understanding of the phenomenon of Petersburg in the works of composers. The purpose of the research is to trace back the process of formation of Russian musical “Petersburgiana”. The main task is to reconstruct segmentary materials related to the aspects of manifestation of Petersburg in the works of Russian composers. The research methods are determined by the interdisciplinary nature which synthesizes the approaches of comparative history, culturology, and music theory. As the key works, the author chooses the works related to the “Petersburg text”, particularly the work by V.Toporov who was the first to introduce this term into the literature studies. It serves as a basis for the understanding of the phenomenon of Petersburg in other forms of art. The scientific novelty of the research consists in the fact that it is the first to study the evolution of Russian musical “Petersburgiana”, which started in the 18th century and during its 300-year history produced more than 800 opuses. The author outlines the key topics and images of Petersburg embodiment using the examples of the works of the composers of the 18th - 21st centuries, organized according to their genre and chronologically. These materials are the result of the research work; they outline promising concepts and aspects for the further comprehensive analysis of Petersburg in Russian music culture in terms of the works of its creators.

Keywords: composers of St. Petersburg, Petersburg and music, history of Russia, russian music culture, the myth of St. Petersburg, text about St. Petersburg, musical peterburgiana, St. Petersburg, history of St. Petersburg, russian music

Review: The subject of this study is the interpretation of Boris Godunov's part in the opera of the same name by M.P. Mussorgsky by two Bulgarian opera stars: B. Hristov and N. Giaurov, as well as their approach to working on this role. Aiming to reveal the main semantic accents of the interpretation of the title part of the opera "Boris Godunov", the author analyzed reviews and essays of opera critics, biographical works of researchers of the singers' creativity, as well as memoirs of their contemporaries and interviews with the artists themselves as research material. The relevance of the presented work is seen in the need to carefully study the world performing heritage of the opera scene, which will create the basis for new, worthy interpretations. According to the results of the research, the author came to the conclusion that Christ's main semantic emphasis in the interpretation of the party is placed on the lofty, worthy aspirations of the tsar, who, being a dreamer and a knight, sought to exalt and strengthen his state, but fell victim to boyar resistance and the inexorable course of Russian history. Giaurov does not justify Godunov at all, although he forms the image of an awe-inspiring and admiring sovereign - monumental, domineering and proud. If Hristov, following Mussorgsky, saw in Tsar Boris a man crushed by power, then for Giaurov, as for Pushkin, the image of a tsar who subordinated everything human in himself to his main goal - power is closer.

Keywords: artistic image, bulgarian bass, interpretation of the party, interpretation of the party, Mussorgsky 's opera, Nikolay Giaurov, Boris Hristov, Boris Godunov, Chaliapin, opera

Review: The article considers the problem of textual borrowings from his own compositions as a way of author’s self-understanding and self-interpreting, in the style formation of the latest period of Tchaikovsky’s work (1890-1893). The research is based on the last vocal cycle of the composer - Six Romances, op. 73 (1893). The problem field of the research also covers a range of compositions related to the last four years of the composer’s life: “The Queen of Spades” opera, Sixth Symphony, “The Nutcracker” ballet, and an opera “Iolanta”. Special attention is given to the integral stylistic substantiation of such specific techniques of “self-hermeneutics” as anagrammatizing, self-citing, tonal reminiscences, and composition-drama correlations. The author considers the declared problem in the intertextual context, classifying it as “self-intertextuality”, and uses the intertext methodology of the French structuralist school (F. Saussure, Ju. Kristeva), and the Russian researchers of the phenomenon of self-intertextuality (V. Toporov, T. Fateeva). An additional methodological direction is a mythopoetic substantiation of anagrammatizing (the detection of an author’s monogram), for which the author uses the instruments of onomastic concepts of myth (A. Losev, Yu. Lotman). As a result of such an integrative (intertextual and mythopoetic) approach, very “unexpected” (at least at first sight) manifestations of self-intertextuality (the presence of a monogram “SNA”, citations from various compositions, non-conventional tone plan and “anti-final” cyclic composition in the music cycle) are comprehensively semantically substantiated by the author’s myth about “Name acquisition”. Thus, the discovered methodological strategy can be used for studying particular opuses and corpus-based text forms.   

Keywords: Name text, onomatology, autocitation, anagram, autointertextuality, Daniel Rathaus, the last song cycle, Tchaikovsky, mythopoeia, anti-finality

Review: The article focuses on the problem of transformation of a musical language, the correlation between an esthetic guideline, an invention, a composition technique and a language. The author describes the two strategies of life and work of Pierre Boulez which allowed him to gain significant cultural authority, and enumerates the persons who had influenced Boulez’s esthetics. In a broad esthetic and philosophical context, the author shows the turn from the technique to the language in esthetical and theoretical texts of Pierre Boulez; describes the three concepts of the language, the period of synthesis following the period of rejection, and Boulez’s concerns about the problems of music perception. In the context of Boulez’s thesis about the unity of an invention, a technique and a language, the author considers the piece for viola “Trema” (1981) by Heinz Holliger, Boulez’s adherent. The author uses a comprehensive approach as a combination of elements of comparative analysis, musical phenomenology (focusing of mind on music structures), and hermeneutics (the process of understanding, interpreting). The research material is of a methodical importance for modern educational courses of theory and history of music. The author arrives at the conclusion that Boulez, as well as Kant, directs the concept of art towards Aristotle's category of “poiesis” as “craft and creation”; focuses on the overcoming of the esthetics of rejection (preceding the classic-romantic tradition) in Boulez’s turn to the period of “synthesis” which includes not only the turn from a technique to a language, but also electroacoustic “sound manufacturing”.  The following aspects of Hollinger’s “Trema” are considered for the first time: the idea, the principles of new solo music, the new technique. The author arrives at the conclusion about “Trema” belonging to the “multilayered music epoch” and that radical rethinking of a musical language sharpens communication.   

Keywords: specific techniques of the game, piece for viola, Hans Holliger, three concepts of language, turn to universality, texts by Pierre Boulez, music as a language, idea of the piece, new solo music, different time levels

Review: The article analyzes the music-dance interaction in Emilio de' Cavalieri’s ballo “O che nuovo miracolo” (“Oh what a new miracle”, Florence, 1589). The topicality of the research is determined by the interest in the epoch of generation and formation of the theatre ballet show genre. The purpose of the research is to study the music-plastic ties manifesting themselves at different levels of a form implemented in a complex multi-sided interaction. The author reveals traditional techniques of adjustment based on the commonness of measured length of syllables/motives/steps, and innovative forms of interaction manifesting themselves in the correlation between the plastic properties of a dance with metrics, rhythm, texture and timbres of the music fabric. The analysis of the peculiarities of musical creative work is based on the historical, historical-typological and intertextual research methods. The author analyzes the multilayered structure of the piece of music consisting in the rotation of complex visual and music-intonation transformations and in the explication of contrasting and symmentrically consistent entities of dance and music. The author concludes about a special dramatic meaning gained by the form of music-choreography explication, found by Cavalieri, symbolizing the process of acquiring “the gift of Harmony”. Multilayered intertextual crossings formed a complex composition that can be referred to as one of unique artistic findings of the epoch.   

Keywords: ballet music, Aria di Fiorenza, La Pellegrina, che nuovo miracolo, Emilio de' Cavalieri, theory of music, musical art, ballet music composing, musical score, intertext interaction

Review: The research subject is the musical by the composer Richard Rodgers and the book writer Oscar Hammerstein II “The Sound of Music” - one of the bright examples of classic Broadway musicals. The author describes the main genre and style and dramatic peculiarities of the musical and attempts to solve the following research tasks: to analyze the narrative and genre components of the piece, the intonation complexes of the main characters and the most significant groups of characters and vocal techniques, and to trace back the influence of Austrian national genres on the music fabric of the musical. The author uses the following methods: cultural-historical, comparative analysis, and the methods of music-style and music-history analysis. Despite the obvious significance of this piece of music and its thumping success, the musical “The Sound of Music” hasn’t been studied thoroughly enough in the scientific literature. The author arrives at the conclusion that the special dramatism, the bright plot, the developed music drama, and the multifaceted genre and style alligation are the peculiarity of the musical and form that unique quality that brought success in the past and still makes the musical successful.   

Keywords: Oscar Hammerstein II, Richard Rogers, Maria von Trapp, The Sound of Music, Broadway musical, musical analysis, Robert Wise, genre, style, jazz vocals

Review: The research object is Russia’s repertory heritage including compositions for viola by the composers of the 20th century. The works are considered from the viewpoint of a direct impact on their appearance of the brightest representatives of the Russian viola school V.V.Borisovsky, F.S. Druzhinin and Yu.A. Bashmet. The analysis is based on pieces devoted to V.V. Borisovsky (Sonata for viola and Piano by V. Kryukov and S. Vasilenko, “Songs of the Dead” and Rhapsody for viola and piano by A. Veprik, A suite for viola and piano by V. Gaigerova) and to Yu.A. Bashmet (A liturgy for a large orchestra and a solo viola “Bemoaned by the Wind” and “Styx” for viola, choir and orchestra by G. Kancheli), and the works by F.S. Druzhinin (Sonata for solo viola and Variations for solo viola). The works are considered from the position of a player’s influence on the composers’ interest in the solo manifestation of viola and its gradual development. The author defines the term “character-performer” corresponding with the image of a violist of the 20th century. The author denotes the new features of solo viola repertory as a result of the work of the above mentioned violists: the acknowledgement of a uniqueness of a viola voice, the establishment of a viola as a bright concert instrument, the expansion of a used range of a viola, the revelation of a mystic component of a viola timbre, the definition of a unique unifying ability of a viola timbre, a full technical liberation of an instrument, and the need for a co-author thinking of a player.   

Keywords: domestic composers, viola repertoire, hero-performer, Bashmet, Druzhinin, Borisovsky, viola, timbre, technical emancipation, coauthor

Review: The research subject is Beethoven’s view of life of the late period - the topical issue for a performing musician: without understanding of the fundamental changes in his style, it is impossible to adequately interpret the late piano sonatas. The last of them - Sonata op.111 - has been an object of discussion not only among musicians, but also among writers for almost two centuries. The author detects the following types of dialogue in Sonate op.111: a) a dialogue with Beethoven’s previous compositions; b) a dialogue - within the latest period - with Ninth Symphony op.25 and Missa Solemnis op.123; c) a dialogue with the music of predecessors; d) an imaginary dialogue of Beethoven and Goethe (of the period of “Faust” completion); e) a dialogue op.111 with the world culture. The author arrives at the following conclusions: whilst the formation of the concept of interpretation is usually related to the performance activities of romanticists - Paganini and List, the prerequisites of the phenomenon of interpretation can be found already in the works and ideas of Beethoven - he is a precursor of romanticists of the 19th century. Each of his works is individualized, and doesn’t contain patterns or cliches. To play his compositions outside of the concept means to be not able to adequately convey the spirit of Beethoven’s music. With all their strict architectonics, Beethoven’s works appeal to spontaneity of self-expression - a pianist, as an actor, should experience this music “in the here and now”.   

Keywords: Íidden program, method of integrating the concept, types of dialogue, concept of interpretation, The Last Sonata, late work, Beethoven's style, Beethoven and Romanticism, Beethoven and Goethe, Sergey Rackmaninoff