Classical NOW! – Forbidden music from Kyiv (the adventure of the avant-garde)
Pianist and Classical NOW!-artist in residence Antonii Baryshevskyi is internationally known as a leading pianist for 20th-century and new music. At the HaagsPianoHuis, he dedicates two recitals to the 20th-century avant-garde, one of the most exciting movements in our music history.
With violinist Orest Smovzh, he presents a programme around John Cage, including Morton Feldman's 80-minute-long tribute to John Cage, which demands the utmost concentration from both musicians. In a solo recital, he performs works from the 1960s by composers from Valentin Silvestrov's circle. Smuggled to Kyiv, scores of compositions by Boulez and Stockhausen inspired them to develop their very own revolutionary style. A diptych of groundbreaking music from two metropolises: New York and Kyiv.
Breaking out of ‘the closed cathedral of conventional music’
Our artist in residence and multiple competition winner Antonii Baryshevskyi devotes a solo recital to avant-garde music from Kyiv in the 1960s by a group of composers whom Hungarian György Kurtág admiringly praised for their unique individual style.
Valentin Silvestrov and a group of young fellow composers were secretly studying scores and recordings of Western avant-garde music, which was strictly forbidden in the Soviet regime. It spurred them on to develop a revolutionary musical language and write masterpieces, rarely heard today, but which Baryshevskyi is happy to make an ardent case for. A better pianist for this unique repertoire is hard to find.
The compositions, which at the time could only be heard in private circles, represent a crucial moment in Ukrainian music history: the moment when composers, in Silvestrov's words, tried to ‘break out of the closed cathedral of conventional music.’
Performers
Antonii Baryshevskyi piano
Volodymyr Zahortsev
Rhythms
Three Epitaphs
Vitalii Godziackyi
Tweede pianosonate
Fractured surfaces
Valentin Silvestrov
Triad
Tweede pianosonate