#arvo part

[cronenburger]

[alesario]

Arvo...

photo Kaupo Kikkas

[shihlun]

The sketch of Für Alina in Arvo Pärt’s musical diary.

[nofatclips]

Arvo Pärt's Spiegel im Spiegel performed by cellist Silvia Chiesa and pianist Maurizio Baglini at the Fazioli Concert Hall

[zoneway2076]

WAYLAND ANDERSON

[dk-thrive]

The most sensitive musical instrument is the human soul. The next is the human voice. One must purify the soul until it begins to sound.

— Arvo Pärt, Read from his musical diaries while speaking at St. Vladimir’s Seminar (via Thoughts)

[mikrokosmos]

Arvo Pärt - Da Pacem Domine (2004)

At the risk of sounding too sentimental or hokey, I'll say that in times like these when world news is so distressing, music helps ground me and forget about myself for a while. This is probably part of the appeal for "Holy Minimalism" which despite its name is less of an art movement and more of a marketing tool to categorize the music of some religious composers who work in a neo-tonal style - that is, revisiting traditional tonality and triadic harmonies but through influence from medieval and renaissance traditions as opposed to the classical era. Or that's how I'm using the term "neo-tonal". Regardless, composers like Arvo Pärt have developed their own unique compositional style through this avenue of revisiting the old to create something that is not just individual, but also timeless. It is why this style of spiritual music is attractive to people who are not religious but yearn for the kind of transcendence that religions promise. Maybe it is too cynical to point out the goal of record companies creating a product to fill this void, like every other void in our lives becoming commodified. Especially since that comes from the distributors, not the creators, the composers, musicians, artists, who write or learn or perform this music. They do understand this connection to something real and human, or the intangible transcendence that words can fail to describe and can only be experienced to be understood. Da pace Domine is a setting of a Latin prayer for Peace, and despite having very little harmonic momentum and a steady rhythm, it does not sound or feel like something from the past or something bland and simply put together. It creates its own unique sound world of subtlety that, to me, feels like a snippet of something that could go on forever, that could have started before the first note, and keep going after the last, a glimpse into the infinite that gives me hope for a better more peaceful world.

Da pacem Domine in diebus nostris quia non est alius qui pugnet pro nobis nisi tu Deus noster. Give peace, O Lord in our time because there is no one else who will fight for us if not You, our God.

[musicollage]

Arvo Part; LAPO, Salonen — Symphony No 4. 2010 : ECM.