The originality of G. Kancheli’s music, to which the above lines are devoted, is combined with the extreme openness of the style with its strictest selectivity, national soil with the universal significance of artistic ideas, the turbulent life of emotions with the sublimity of their expression, simplicity with depth, and accessibility with exciting novelty. Such a combination seems paradoxical only with verbal retelling, the very formation of music in the Georgian author is always organically,
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The originality of G. Kancheli’s music, to which the above lines are devoted, is combined with the extreme openness of the style with its strictest selectivity, national soil with the universal significance of artistic ideas, the turbulent life of emotions with the sublimity of their expression, simplicity with depth, and accessibility with exciting novelty. Such a combination seems paradoxical only with verbal retelling, the very formation of music in the Georgian author is always organically, welded lively, song by nature intonation. It is an artistically integral reflection of the modern world in its complex disharmony. The biography of the composer is not too rich in external events. He grew up in Tbilisi, in the family of a doctor. Here he graduated from the musical seven-year plan, then the geological faculty of the university and only in 1963 - the conservatory in the class of composition I. Tuskia. As a student, Kancheli’s music was at the center of critical discussions that continued until his award in 1976. State Prize of the USSR, and then broke out with renewed vigor. However, if at first Kancheli was reproached for eclecticism, in an insufficiently vivid expression of his own individuality and national spirit, then later, when the author's style was fully formed, they began talking about self-repetition. Meanwhile, the first works of the composer revealed “his own understanding of musical time and musical space” (R. Shchedrin), and later he followed the chosen path with enviable persistence, not allowing himself to stop or calm down on his achievements. In each new work, Kancheli, according to him, strives to find at least one step leading up, not down. Therefore, it works slowly, spends several years on finishing one work, and editing the manuscript usually continues after the premiere - up to the publication or recording on the record. But among the few works of Kancheli can not find experimental or passing, especially unsuccessful. Prominent Georgian musicologist G. Ordzhonikidze likened his work “to climbing one mountain: from each height, the horizon is thrown further, opening previously unprecedented distances and allowing you to look into the depths of human existence.” A born lyricist, Kancheli rises through the objective equilibrium of the epic to tragedy, without losing the sincerity, immediacy of lyrical intonation. His seven symphonies are like seven lives relived, seven chapters of the epic about the eternal struggle between good and evil, about the difficult fate of beauty. Each symphony is a complete artistic whole. Various images, dramatic decisions, and yet all symphonies form a kind of macrocycle with a tragic prologue (First - 1967) and "Epilogue" (Seven - 1986), which, according to the author, sums up a great creative stage. In this macrocycle, the Fourth Symphony (1975), awarded the State Prize, is both the first climax and the harbinger of a fracture. Two of its predecessors are inspired by the poetics of Georgian folklore - primarily church and ritual chants, rediscovered in the 60s. The second symphony, subtitled Songs (1970), is the brightest of Kancheli’s works, affirming the harmony of man with nature and history, the inviolability of the spiritual precepts of the people. The third (1973) is similar to a slender temple to the glory of the brilliant anonymous creators of Georgian choral polyphony. The fourth symphony dedicated to the memory of Michelangelo, preserving the hard-won integrity of the epic worldview, dramatizes his reflections on the fate of the artist. Titan, who broke the shackles of time and space in his work, but turned out to be humanly powerless in the face of tragic existence. The fifth symphony (1978) is dedicated to the memory of the composer’s parents. Here, perhaps for the first time in Kancheli, the theme of time, inexorable and merciful, setting limits to human aspirations and hopes, is colored by deeply personal pain. And although all the images of the symphony - both mournful and desperate protesters - lapse or disintegrate under the onslaught of an unknown fatal force, the whole carries a feeling of catharsis. This is grief wept and overcome. After performing the symphony at the Festival of Soviet Music in Tours, France (July 1987), the press called it “perhaps the most interesting contemporary work to date.” In the Sixth Symphony (1979–81), the epic image of eternity reappears, the musical breath becomes wider, the contrasts become larger. However, this does not smooth out, but sharpens and generalizes the tragic conflict. The triumphant success of the symphony at several authoritative international music festivals was facilitated by its “over-dare conceptual scope and touching emotional impression”. Arrival of the famous symphonist at the Tbilisi Opera House and production here in 1984. “Music for the Living” came as a surprise to many. However, for the composer himself, this was a natural continuation of the long-standing and fruitful cooperation with the conductor J.K. Kakhidze, the first performer of all his works, and with the director of the Georgian Academic Drama Theatre named after S. Rustaveli R. Sturua. Combining their efforts on the opera stage, these masters here turned to a significant, acute topic - the theme of preserving life on earth, the treasures of world civilization - and embodied it in an innovative, large-scale, emotionally exciting form. "Music for the Living" is rightfully recognized as an event in the Soviet musical theater. Immediately after the opera appeared the second anti-war work of Kancheli – “Bright sadness” (1985) for soloists, children’s choir and a large symphony orchestra on the texts of G. Tabidze, I. V. Goethe, V. Shakespeare and A. Pushkin. Like “Music for the Living,” it’s about children – not those who will live after us, but the innocent victims of World War II. Enthusiasticly received already at the premiere in Leipzig (like the Sixth Symphony, it was written by order of the Gewandhaus orchestra and the publishing house Peters), Bright Sadness became one of the most heartfelt and sublime pages of Soviet music of the 80s. The last of the completed scores of the composer – “Lamented with the Wind” for the solo viola and the large symphony orchestra (1988) – is dedicated to the memory of Givi Ordzhonikidze. The premiere of this work took place at the festival in West Berlin in 1989 In the mid-60s, Kancheli begins cooperation with major directors of dramatic theater and cinema. To date, he has written music for more than 40 films (mostly directed by E. Shengelai, G. Daneliya, L. Gogoberidze, R. Chkheidze) and for almost 30 performances, the vast majority of which were staged by R. Sturua. However, the composer considers his work in the theater and cinema as just a part of collective creativity, which has no independent significance. Therefore, none of his songs, theatrical or film scores have been published or recorded on a record.