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Russian Church Singing, Volume II
The history of church singing in Russia constitutes an essential aspect of that nation's culture and musical history. For the first 650 years, from the Christianization of Rus' in the year 988, liturgical chant was the only documentable art music in that vast territory that eventually became the modern nations of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Indeed, in Russia before the revolution of 1917, "liturgical musicology" was a bona fide scholarly discipline, taught in conservatories, universities, and theological seminaries. All activity in the field came to a halt, however, during the 75-year "Soviet era," when the study and practice of sacred music was severely repressed for ideological reasons, with a resulting lack of published research and secondary material. Consequently, Russian and Western music historians, church musicians, and liturgical scholars (as well as ordinary church-goers), whose interest in Orthodox Christianity and its art has been increasing of late, have been deprived of reference works that would impart even a general knowledge of the history and development of liturgical singing in the Russian Orthodox Church.

The present Volume, Russian Church Singing: Volume 2 is the second installment of Professor Johann von Gardner's monumental work to appear in English translation. The 396-page volume, translated and edited by Dr. Vladimir Morosan, considers the development and practice of liturgical chant in the Russian lands from a variety of aspects: its origins and the various cultural influences upon its formation; extant manuscripts; the evolution of the notation and the problematics of deciphering it into modern-day notes; the forces involved in its performance; its stylistic evolution from exclusively monodic forms to improvised and, eventually, notated polyphony; its earliest known composers and performing ensembles; its aesthetics in relation to liturgy, the language, and the various problems that arose over the centuries, resulting in the adoption of Westernized stylistic models around the year 1650, which marks the approximate end of the time period covered in this volume. Much of this information is made accessible for the first time to the English reader, and will be of interest both to the specialist and to the general reader, generating a healthy demand for further research and exploration into this fascinating and hitherto unknown field.

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Russian Church Singing, Volume II
The history of church singing in Russia constitutes an essential aspect of that nation's culture and musical history. For the first 650 years, from the Christianization of Rus' in the year 988, liturgical chant was the only documentable art music in that vast territory that eventually became the modern nations of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Indeed, in Russia before the revolution of 1917, "liturgical musicology" was a bona fide scholarly discipline, taught in conservatories, universities, and theological seminaries. All activity in the field came to a halt, however, during the 75-year "Soviet era," when the study and practice of sacred music was severely repressed for ideological reasons, with a resulting lack of published research and secondary material. Consequently, Russian and Western music historians, church musicians, and liturgical scholars (as well as ordinary church-goers), whose interest in Orthodox Christianity and its art has been increasing of late, have been deprived of reference works that would impart even a general knowledge of the history and development of liturgical singing in the Russian Orthodox Church.

The present Volume, Russian Church Singing: Volume 2 is the second installment of Professor Johann von Gardner's monumental work to appear in English translation. The 396-page volume, translated and edited by Dr. Vladimir Morosan, considers the development and practice of liturgical chant in the Russian lands from a variety of aspects: its origins and the various cultural influences upon its formation; extant manuscripts; the evolution of the notation and the problematics of deciphering it into modern-day notes; the forces involved in its performance; its stylistic evolution from exclusively monodic forms to improvised and, eventually, notated polyphony; its earliest known composers and performing ensembles; its aesthetics in relation to liturgy, the language, and the various problems that arose over the centuries, resulting in the adoption of Westernized stylistic models around the year 1650, which marks the approximate end of the time period covered in this volume. Much of this information is made accessible for the first time to the English reader, and will be of interest both to the specialist and to the general reader, generating a healthy demand for further research and exploration into this fascinating and hitherto unknown field.

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Russian Church Singing, Volume II

Russian Church Singing, Volume II

Russian Church Singing, Volume II

Russian Church Singing, Volume II

Overview

The history of church singing in Russia constitutes an essential aspect of that nation's culture and musical history. For the first 650 years, from the Christianization of Rus' in the year 988, liturgical chant was the only documentable art music in that vast territory that eventually became the modern nations of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. Indeed, in Russia before the revolution of 1917, "liturgical musicology" was a bona fide scholarly discipline, taught in conservatories, universities, and theological seminaries. All activity in the field came to a halt, however, during the 75-year "Soviet era," when the study and practice of sacred music was severely repressed for ideological reasons, with a resulting lack of published research and secondary material. Consequently, Russian and Western music historians, church musicians, and liturgical scholars (as well as ordinary church-goers), whose interest in Orthodox Christianity and its art has been increasing of late, have been deprived of reference works that would impart even a general knowledge of the history and development of liturgical singing in the Russian Orthodox Church.

The present Volume, Russian Church Singing: Volume 2 is the second installment of Professor Johann von Gardner's monumental work to appear in English translation. The 396-page volume, translated and edited by Dr. Vladimir Morosan, considers the development and practice of liturgical chant in the Russian lands from a variety of aspects: its origins and the various cultural influences upon its formation; extant manuscripts; the evolution of the notation and the problematics of deciphering it into modern-day notes; the forces involved in its performance; its stylistic evolution from exclusively monodic forms to improvised and, eventually, notated polyphony; its earliest known composers and performing ensembles; its aesthetics in relation to liturgy, the language, and the various problems that arose over the centuries, resulting in the adoption of Westernized stylistic models around the year 1650, which marks the approximate end of the time period covered in this volume. Much of this information is made accessible for the first time to the English reader, and will be of interest both to the specialist and to the general reader, generating a healthy demand for further research and exploration into this fascinating and hitherto unknown field.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780881410464
Publisher: St. Vladimir's Seminary Press
Publication date: 09/28/2003
Pages: 400
Product dimensions: 5.20(w) x 8.40(h) x 1.20(d)

Table of Contents

Table of Examplesvii
Translator's Prefaceix
Ivan Alekseevich Gardner (1898-1984)xiii
Chapter IThe Period of Origins1
Introduction3
The First Part of the Period of Origins5
The Second Part of the Period of Origins13
Summary38
Chapter IIThe Period of Kondakarian Singing53
The Second Period: An Overview55
Political Conditions during the Second Period56
Contacts with the Orthodox East and with the Latin West59
Written Monuments of Early Russian Liturgical Singing63
Major Centers of Liturgical Singing71
Singers and Ensembles72
Evidence of Congregational Participation76
Church Architecture77
The Cathedral Rite79
Liturgical Practices in Monasteries87
Ekphonetic Reading90
Stolp or Znamenny Chant96
Pronunciation102
Notation104
Melodic Structure116
Cheironomy, Pedagogy, Liturgical Composition118
Kondakarian Singing129
Chapter IIIThe Period Dominated by Znamenny Chant177
Introduction179
Historical and Political Conditions179
The Metropolitans181
Novgorod183
The Weakening of Contacts with the West185
Musical Monuments185
Heirmologia and the Spread of Monasteries188
Vestiges of Kondakarian Singing190
Prominent Singers and Musical Training193
The Tsar's Singing Clerics203
The Independence (Autocephaly) of the Russian Church205
Changes in Pronunciation: Khomoniia208
Notation211
Put' and Demestvo230
Chapter IVThe Period of Early Russian Polyphony249
General Characteristics of the Period251
Political and Historical Conditions252
Written Monuments254
The Stoglav Council. "Mnogoglasie" and Polyphony255
Outstanding Singers and Singing Masters261
The Tsar's Singing Clerics and the Patriarchal Singing Clerics271
Khomoniia275
Anenaiki and Khabuvy281
Demestvenny Notation292
Put' Notation305
Kazan' Notation309
"Tripartite Sweet-Singing"313
Strochny (Linear) Singing314
The Invention of Cinnabar Marks317
Liturgical Drama324
Musical Pedagogy328
A Period of Transition339
Summary341
Index361
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