Hello,
Today's artist might be considered as the main composer of contemporary sacred music. He is strongly influenced by the minimalist movement & Gregorian chant.
In 1958, he entered at the Tallinn Conservatoire & he became famous through USSR with his composition 'Our Garden'. At the beginning of the seventies, he began to use serialism in his works but he stopped. An interest for Gregorian chant & medieval music then brought a new dimension to his music. Mystic, restful & emotional might be some adjectives to describe his compositions. He is one of the most important composers of 'mystical minimalist movement' with John Tavener & Henryk Górecki. exhibitions like documenta X and the 49th and 50th Venice Biennale, Nicolai’s works were shown worldwide in extensive solo and group exhibitions.
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Arvo Pärt is one of the most important living composers of concert music. His first works, dating from the 1950s, showed the influence of Prokofiev and Shostakovich, as heard in his two Sonatinas for piano (1958). But as his musical studies under Heino Eller continued, he was drawn toward serial techniques and turned out a number of works in the 1960s in this vein. His First Symphony (1961), for instance, displays this method and is dedicated to Eller. By the end of that decade, Pärt had become disenchanted by the 12-tone technique and began writing music in varying styles. In 1976, however, Pärt started composing in what he called his tintinnabulation (or tintinnabuli) method, which involves the prominent use of pure triads. This new style resulted in music so radically different from that which had preceded it, that many observed that it seemed to have come from a different hand altogether.
Unlike most composers of major rank, Pärt did not show remarkable talent in his childhood or even in his early adolescence. His first serious study came in 1954 at the Tallinn Music Middle School, but less than a year later he temporarily abandoned it to fulfill military service, playing oboe and percussion in the army band.
In 1957, Pärt enrolled at the Tallinn Conservatory where he studied under Eller. He graduated in 1963, having worked throughout his student years and afterward as a recording engineer for Estonian Radio. He wrote several film scores and other works during this period, among them his two Sonatinas for piano, from 1958, and Nekrolog, a serial work for orchestra, from 1960. He also wrote a number of choral pieces at this time, among which was the ethereal a cappella effort, Solfeggio (1964). Pärt continued to compose music mainly in the serial vein throughout the 1960s, but received little recognition, since that method of composition was generally anathema throughout the Soviet Union. In the late 1960s and early 1970s Pärt studied the music of Renaissance era composers, particularly that of Machaut, Josquin Desprez, and Obrecht. His Symphony No. 3 reflected these influences in its austere, Medieval sound world.
By the mid-1970s, Pärt was working on an altogether new style of composition. In 1976 he unveiled this method, the aforementioned tintinnabulation, with the piano work, Für Alina. A trio of more popular works followed in 1977, Fratres, for string quintet and wind quintet (later given additional arrangements by the composer), Cantus In Memoriam Benjamin Britten (revised 1980) and Tabula Rasa, for two violins, prepared piano, and string orchestra. Owing to the continued political oppression he found in Estonia, Pärt and his wife and two sons emigrated to the West in 1980, settling first in Vienna, then in West Berlin.In the 1980s and 1990s, Pärt, a devout member of the Eastern Orthodox Church, wrote a number of large-scale choral religious works, including the St. John Passion (1982), Magnificat (1989), The Beatitudes (1990), and Litany (1994). He has declared a preference for vocal music in his later years, and continues, like the English composer John Tavener, also an adherent of the Eastern Orthodox religion, to write much religious music.
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Arvo Part's Kanon Pokajanen is a work of starkly radiant beauty, a deeply felt plea for forgiveness so resonant it seems to bear its own expiatory power. The piece is a choral setting of the Russian Orthodox Church's canon of repentance, believed to have been composed by St. Andrew of Crete sometime in the late seventh century. Part had experimented with the canon in earlier works, but when the Cologne Cathedral commissioned him to compose a choral piece for its 750th anniversary, he took the opportunity to immerse himself in it completely. Over two years of intense quality time with the work, Part produced an 80-minute choral setting of the entire canon that mines each word of the original Church Slavonic (a language used exclusively in ecclesiastical texts) for its maximum musicality and meaning. Part believes language to be more important to a choral work than the music. In the liner notes, he explains that he wants each word "to find its own sound, to draw its own melodic line." The result is a piece that moves slowly and deliberately through the canon, making ample use of the silences between the words. The juxtaposition of the deep bass men's voices with the high soprano women's voices, sung in the dissonant harmonic style of medieval chant, parallels the canon's night and day symbolism. Part's version, performed in an immaculate recording by the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir, captures the sunrise feeling of a song that is still sung at the break of day in European monasteries. Marina Bobrik-Fromke's liner notes describe it beautifully: "The canon is heard in the nave, barely illuminated by the flickering candles, while the door to the sanctuary still remains closed. As soon as the canon has come to an end, this entrance...opens. The church is filled with light, signifying the presence of Christ." Asked by an interviewer how best to listen to the piece, Part laughed. "First of all," he said, "Turn off the television." If you're looking for background music, Kanon Pokajanen is not your best choice. This is music to soak in, music to meditate to. Music of searing intensity that finds that part of the soul, so often neglected in today's fast-paced lifestyle, that is starved for reverence, fear, and awe, longing to say "Come out to seek me; lead me up to Thy pasturage and number me among the sheep of Thy chosen flock. Nourish me with them on the grass of Thy Holy Mysteries." 
<a href="https://multiup.org/dfc5da6480c9c82e75fb84b27d9cb1ea"> Arvo Pärt - Kanon Pokajanen .</a> (240 mb)
01 Ode I 7:34
02 Ode III 11:43
03 Ode IV 7:12
04 Ode V 7:59
05 Ode VI 8:18
06 Kondakion 2:23
07 Ikos 2:57
08 Ode VII 7:12
09 Ode VIII 8:44
10 Ode IX 8:14
11 Prayer After The Kanon 11:02
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Arvo Pärt is a living national treasure to Estonia, and this album reveals such intimate access to his faith, sadness, and humility. Structured in five parts, Alina is a simple, chilling invocation of heartfelt desire comprised of only two movements that alternate with subtle variation. The opening lullaby of "Spiegel im Spiegel" is a gentle and melancholy embrace between Sergej Bezrodney on piano and Vladimir Spivakov on violin, where every note steps gracefully forward, as if ascending a fragile staircase. In contrast, the two movements of "Für Alina" leave a little room for structured improvisation, as the top note in each chord is left for the performer to, as Pärt puts it, "explore within themselves." Thus, Alexander Malter deserves special recognition for breathing such mournful sweetness into these passages through every fingertip; every delicate cluster of notes shines like a distant star through a wintery black night. Malter stays on for the middle section of "Spiegel im Spiegel" and, with violoncello from Dietmar Schwalke, adds a more somber deliberateness to the piece that pianist Bezrodney shies away from in his performances (tracks one and five), instead opting for restrained tenderness. The disc closes much in the same way it opens: as if a prayer of deepest longing were just whispered into the still air. Frequent ECM producer Manfred Eicher calls upon his usual strengths, by letting the instruments speak for themselves in the right acoustical settings -- less is certainly more, and the stark beauty of Alina comes partly from what we hear between the notes: such a rich and gorgeous silence. This is perhaps one of Pärt's finest releases on compact disc, though one of his quietest. These are the tears of ghosts.
<a href="http://depositfiles.com/files/n5oj025b0"> Arvo Part - Alina </a> ( flac 123mb)
01 Spiegel Im Spiegel 10:36
02 Für Alina 10:47
03 Spiegel Im Spiegel 9:12
04 Für Alina 10:53
05 Spiegel Im Spiegel 9:48
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This is one of the finest Arvo Part recordings ever to appear, worthy of ECM's release some years back of "Te Deum." That disc closed with the eight-movement "Berliner Messe," and so does this disc, but the original organ accompaniment conceived by the composer has been revised and re-instated, bringing an added 'liturgical' sound to the work. This is sung one-to-a-part by the Theatre of Voices (including Paul Hillier as the bass singer) and is sensitively accompanied by Christopher Bowers-Broadbent. The clarity of sound throughout is unfailingly sharp, a credit to the singers more than anything else, and the music is beautifully enhanced by the acoustics of Ely Cathedral where these last tracks were recorded. Even if you already have the "Berliner Messe" (as recorded by Tonu Kaljuste on the ECM CD), it is worth getting this and listening to the organ version. The notes are the same, but the sound world is very different - and very compelling.The first half of the programme features the unaccompanied Pro Arte Singers, conducted by Hillier, who explore the eponymous "I am the True Vine" (written for a recent celebratory service in Norwich Cathedral) along with some other short works, all dating from within the past ten years. This is some impressive music, a generous slice of Part's acclaimed tintinnabuli style in various forms (despite the disc's running time). A number of the tracks are premiere recordings: of note, "The Woman with the Alabaster Box" and "Tribute to Caesar" are marvellously written settings of passages from the Gospels, showing as did "The Beautitudes" the ways in which Part deals with the English language. A particularly pleasant touch is the opening track, "Bogoroditsye Dyevo," which Part wrote for the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols at King's College, Cambridge, in 1992 - this is a sprightly and joyful number that distills all of Part's hallmarks as a composer whilst managing to be brief and very 'Christmassy'!
It is not hard to see why Paul Hillier and Arvo Part have a successful working relationship. Part has supplied Hillier's various ensembles with some luscious and engrossing works (despite the overall simplicity of his style, some of the tracks on this disc really do keep you listening). In return, Hillier has directed them with aplomb and sensitivity, seeing that justice is done to each and every note. This recording is a wonderful testament to that relationship: the sound is beautifully crafted; indeed, it is hard to imagine it being sung any better.
A gem in many respects.
<a href="https://www.imagenetz.de/Yfjz4"> Arvo Part - I am the True Vine </a> ( flac 219mb)
01 Bogoróditse Djévo 1:14
02 I Am The True Vine 8:15
03 Ode IX, From Kanon Pokajanen (Nýnje K Wam Pribjegáju) 10:40
04 The Woman With The Alabaster Box 6:35
05 Tribute To Caesar 7:24
Berliner Messe (23:28)
06 Kyrie 3:07
07 Gloria 3:25
08 Erster Alleluiavers 1:02
09 Zweiter Alleluiavers 1:22
10 Veni Sancte Spiritus 4:05
11 Credo 4:00
12 Sanctus 3:55
13 Agnus Dei 2:28
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Passio has a very important place in our musical heritage as the Hilliard Ensemble. It was really the defining moment that introduced us fully to Arvo Pärt’s music. And it was performing Passio, coming to know and understand Passio, that sort of sealed our relationship – the realisation that this is really something unique. If you look at the score of Passio and analyse it, it is very, very spartan, very sparse in the sense that there are actually only three keys used. And then at the very end, just for the very end, at the critical moment when Christ is on the cross and is about to die, suddenly, the four Evangelists come together on one unison A-note. And then there’s this silence, this death – he gave up the ghost, we’d say, his spirit isn’t in him, he gave up his spirit. And then there’s this extraordinary moment when the choir and everybody comes in, in D-major. So this chord comes in and it just goes right through your body! It’s an amazing moment – every time, it sends shivers down my spine. It’s like the richest Brahms you’ve ever heard, and you realise that there is life afterwards. This is the most important moment, the death, but it's actually looking forward, it’s for a reason, it’s a positive thing, and I think that this last page is the most stunning page of music you could ever wish to hear.
<a href="https://mir.cr/0MRAUX2G"> Arvo Pärt - Passio </a> ( flac 221mb)
Passio Domini Nostri Jesu Christi Secundum Joannem (1:01:51)
01 Jesus Is Betrayed And Arrested In Gethsemane (Exordium 18:1-12) 9:38
02 Jesus Is Interrogated By The High Priest And Denied By Peter (John 18:13-27) 11:28
03 Jesus Is Judged By Pilate And Reviled By The People (John 18:28-19:15) 26:18
04 Jesus Is Crucified At Golgotha (John 19:16-30; Conclusio) 14:27
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The name of Arvo Pärt has become something of an institution in the consumer culture of classical music. The “New Spiritualism” heralded by such seminal recordings as his Tabula rasa and Te Deum crystallized a sentiment that listeners were craving in the ruins of a postmodern malaise. Yet with this music came a host of expectations: it was supposed to heal us, guide us to an inner light, and provide an inexpensive and convenient means of achieving (temporary) peace. It was something to rely upon, a sonic friend that would never leave us. In believing this, however, we began to lose sight of our own powers and the tremendous dependence we were placing upon recorded media to wrestle with moral dilemmas in our stead. Beautiful and, yes, spiritual though these media are, they can never be a substitute for the enlightenment we read into them.
The frame of Orient & Occident captures the dark side of Pärt’s compositional moon. Stand too close to it, and its darkness overwhelms; too far and it becomes a mere block of shadow. Wallfahrtslied (Pilgrim’s Song), a German setting of Psalm 121, positions us at a median distance and allows us to appreciate the best of both worlds. Composed in 1984 in memory of the composer’s close friend, Estonian director Grigori Kromanov, and since revised for men’s choir and strings, it is a harrowing slice of emotion. The music seems to grit its teeth in a slow, seething discontinuation as voices lay themselves at the orchestral altar. Strings try to remain passive, yet cannot help but break free from their subordinate position with cries of supplication. Before long, they stretch themselves into the thinnest of layers, through which one may see the translucence of the “self” and the “other” and acknowledge that the same light passes through and gives both substance.
The seven-minute title composition, penned in 2000, is for strings only and continues the path that Pärt first began laying with Psalom and Trisagion. It is a grand statement, to be sure, but works its effect through tiny sonic miracles and primes us for the sojourn that awaits us in Como cierva sedienta (1998), a Spanish setting of Psalms 42-43 for women’s choir and orchestra. Exquisite winds recall 1989’s Miserere and rock like a cradle for soprano soloist Helena Olsson’s spiraling invocations. This is music firmly entrenched in its surroundings, while also content to break free from its compulsory resolutions. Strictly choral passages add pastoral unrest. Words tumble out of their own volition, filled with outbursts and infectious proclamations. Like the soul in this final Psalm, downcast even in the light of salvation, I realize that I fall into traps only of my own making. Every time I pull myself out of one, I am reminded that sounds like these are more than incidental to that struggle. Rather, they embody it to the fullest, a collective reminder of the physicality of living experience and the lessons it provides.
The title of Pärt’s eighth ECM album makes me think of colonialism and its feeble justifications for subversion. That being said, I don’t think this is what the music is about. It deals instead with the gap that links these two words and the sacrifices that fill it with song. It is the blood flowing through that emptiness, and we the plunger pulling back to suction out the contagion of enslavement that prevents us all from staring into the face of love......
<a href="https://multiup.org/17cad5683ce99f5d427bd881b1f043f3"> Arvo Pärt - Orient Occident </a> ( flac 183mb)
01 Wallfahrtslied / Pilgrim's Song 8:49
02 Orient & Occident 7:05
Como Cierva Sedienta
03 I 7:16
04 II 4:09
05 III 5:36
06 IV 3:27
07 V 10:53
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