Gavrilin V.A. (1939-1999), composer

Categories / Art/Music, Theatre/Personalia
GAVRILIN Valery Alexandrovich (1939-1999, St. Petersburg), composer, People's Artist of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (1985). In 1964, he graduated from the Conservatory majoring in composition and folklore. The opening night of his first major work, the vocal cycle entitled Russian Song Book (1965), was a real event in St. Petersburg's musical life. Gavrilin's love for the appearance of Russian songs in many forms, together with his rare gift for melody, made him a truly national composer. He possessed a naturalness devoid of imitation, stylisation, or adoption of folk stereotypes, writing his songs as though they wrote themselves. His Russian Song Book was followed by the oratorio The Skomorokhs (1967); the vocal cycles Seasons (1970), War Time Letters (1972), and The Evening (1975); and the chorus symphony Chimes (narrated by V.M. Shukshin, 1981). The success of Anyuta, his ballet for television (1982), set the way for a sequence of ballets, including The House by the Road (1984), Lieutenant Romashov (1985), and The Wedding of Balzaminov (1989). After his Russian Song Book, Gavrilin composed three vocal cycles called German Song Books (1961, 1972, 1976; after the verses of H. Heine), and wrote symphonies, chamber and variety music, cantatas, and music for the theatre and cinema. In 1967 he was awarded the State Prize of Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, and the State Prize of the USSR in 1985. Gavrilin used to live at 12/22 Pestelya Street (memorial plaque installed). He was buried at Literatorskie Mostky. Since 1999 a festival is held in Gavrilin's honor in St. Petersburg and Vologda. Gavrilin's name was also given to the children's contest I Am A Composer, which takes place within the framework of the annual Children's Music Festival (St. Petersburg).

Works:: On Music and Not Only (St. Petersburg, 2002).

References: "Этот удивительный Гаврилин..." СПб., 2002.

A. L. Porfiryeva. Gavrilin Valery Alexandrovich
Heine Heinrich
Shukshin Vasily Makarovich
the Shuvalovs
Pestelya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 12/22
О музыке и не только. СПб., 2001
"Этот удивительный Гаврилин..." СПб., 2002 Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory
Literatorskie (Literary) Mostki, the museum-necropolis