Pavel Grigorievich Chesnokov

Pavel (Paul) Grigorievich Tchesnokov (Russian: Павел Григорьевич Чесноков) (1877–1944), also transliterated "Tschesnokoff", was a Russian composer, conductor and teacher. He composed over five hundred choral works, over four hundred of which are sacred. Today, he is most known for his piece "Salvation is Created" as well as works such as Do Not Reject Me in Old Age (solo for Basso Profondo).

Life

Pavel Tchesnokov was born in the Government of Vladimir, near Moscow on October 24, 1877 and died on March 14, 1944. Tchesnokov was known throughout Russia as a composer, teacher, and choral instructor. While attending the Moscow Conservatory [The Moscow Conservatory was the center of Russian music. It was a great contributor to the distribution of Western as well as nationalistic ideals and styles of music throughout all of Eastern Europe. It was the 'Juilliard' of Russia (Bakst 1966). ] , he received extensive training in both instrumental and vocal music including nine years of solfege, and seven years training for both the piano and violin. His studies in composition included four years of harmony, counterpoint, and form. During his years at the school, Tchesnokov had the opportunity to study with prominent Russian composers like Sergei Taneyev [Sergei Ivanovich Taneyev (b. Nov. 25, 1856 – d. Jun. 19, 1915) was a Russian composer and pianist who studied composition with Tchaikovsky at the Moscow Conservatory from 1866-75. In 1880, he succeeded Tchaikovsky as professor of instrumentation, and later in 1885-89 served as Director of the Moscow Conservatory. As a theorist, he opposed the nationalist leanings of the Kuchka, or the Russian Five which included Balakireff, Cui, Mussorgsky, Borodin, and Rimsky-Korsakoff (Thompson 1975).] , and Mikhail Ippolitov-Ivanov [Mikhail Mikailovich Ippolitov-Ivanov (b. Nov. 19, 1859 – d. Jan. 28, 1935) was a Russian composer who studied with Rimsky-Korsakoff. His music is in the tradition of the Russian national school. After the Revolution he became the director of the Moscow Conservatory, and in 1925 he was appointed conductor of the Moscow Opera. As a Russian nationalist, he supported the ideas of the Russian revolution (Thompson 1975).] , who greatly influence his style of liturgy driven, choral composition.

At an early age, Pavel Tchesnokov gained recognition as a great conductor and choirmaster while leading many groups including the Russian Choral Society Choir. This reputation earned him a position on staff at the Moscow Conservatory where great composers and music scholars like Tchaikovsky shared their skills and musical insight. There he founded a choral conducting program, which he taught from 1920 until his death.

By age thirty, Tchesnokov had completed nearly four hundred sacred choral works but his proliferation of church music came to a standstill at the time of the Russian revolution. Under communist rule, no one was permitted to produce any form of sacred art. [“… every science, every philosophy, every art ceases to enjoy freedom of growth” under communist rule. Artists were expected to create the new music and culture of the proletarian society. Following Karl Marx, the communist state of Russia called religion “opium for the people.” Consequently, the Soviet leaders were all militant atheists, determined to uproot religion from Russian society. All religions were suppressed and the power of the Old Russian Orthodox Church destroyed. Along the same lines, works of any religious nature were banned completely (Leonard 1956).] So in response, Tchesnokov composed an additional one hundred secular works, and conducted secular choirs like the Moscow Academy Choir and the Bol’shoy Theatre Choir. With Stalin as dictator of the U.S.S.R., many of the religious persuasion suffered for his effort to enforce a universal doctrine of atheism. In this pursuit, Christ the Savior Cathedral, [The church was demolished in 1933 in order to free the land for the construction of a House of Soviets - a massive skyscraper intended to house various government authorities and promote the Soviet regime. The building was to be topped with a 100-meter-tall aluminum statue of the Bolshevik leader Vladimir Lenin. However, due to numerous technical difficulties the building was never actually constructed and the site was instead devoted to the creation of an outdoor swimming pool, which occupied the area till the early 90s, when government officials began to seriously consider a project to rebuild the church as it had been in Ton's day. It was reconstructed in the early 1990’s (Moscow Hotels, JSC 2001-2007).] whose last choirmaster had been Tchesnokov, was destroyed. This bothered Tchesnokov so much that he stopped writing music all together.

Notes

ome notable works

*"Corpus"
*"Salvation is Created (1912)"
*"O Lord God"
*"Now We Sing the Praise"

References

* Bakst, James. A History of Russian-Soviet Music. New York: Dodd, Mead and Company, 1966.
* deAlbuquerque, Joan. Salvation Is Created, Pavel Tschesnokoff (1877-1944). Vol. IV, in Teaching Music through Performance in Band, by Larry Blocher, Eugene M Corporon, Ray Cramer, Tim Lautzenheiser, Edward S. Lisk and Richard Miles, 370-374. Chicago, IL: GIA Publications, Inc., 1997-2002.
* Leonard, Richard Anthony. A History of Russian Music. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1956.
* Moscow Hotels, JSC. The Cathedral of Christ the Savior. 2001-2007. http://www.moscow-taxi.com/churches/cathedral-of-christ-savior.html (accessed April 8, 2008).
* Thompson, Oscar. The International Cyclopedia of Music and Musicians. Tenth Edition. Edited by Bruce Bohle. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1975.

External links

* [http://www.cpdl.org/wiki/index.php/Salvation_is_Created_(Pavel_Chesnokov) Salvation is Created] at ChoralWiki