In ‘Moments Of Silvertones’, Evgeny Gromov performs piano works of the contemporary Ukrainian composer Valentin Silvestrov who fled to Berlin in 2022 aged 85 following Russia's full-scale invasion. This enforced exit meant abandoning his home studio in Kyiv.
Gromov – pianist, researcher and curator – realised that this could mean Silvestrov’s music was lost forever given that in many cases his work had not been recorded but existed only as scores and by reputation. As he explains: “A great deal of Silvestrov’s music simply does not exist in sound.[…] There is still no real tradition of its performance.”
The double album spans a period from Silvestrov’s early avant-garde period in the 1960s to four Bagatelles composed between 2005 and 2006. It is released through Kyiv Dispatch; a record label which was founded in 2022 and specialises in contemporary classical, improvised or experimental music.
The modernist and introspective thrust of the early works are represented by Five Pieces (1961), Triad (1962) and Elegy (1967).
A turning point is marked by the more lyrical Piano Sonata No. 2 (1975), a transitional work which anticipates the gentler and ‘simpler’ pieces on the second disc .
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More recent works reflect the composer’s shift from bold modernism and mark a period when he was influenced by the Orthodox Church, following the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Silvestrov gradually navigated towards what he would call ‘meta-music’: lyrical music that served as modest acts of memory rather than as bowing to the need for more insistent or defiant gestures.
The ‘Moments’ and ‘Bagatelles’ are described as “music that remembers” and the beauty, accessibility and romanticism of the melodies are at odds with the bleak circumstances surrounding the composition.
These precious recordings are no less than acts of cultural resilience and a reminder that despite the relentless bombing and senseless loss of life in Ukraine, something fundamental in the human spirit remains unbreakable.
Bandcamp link
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