Traditional music
The first professional musicians appeared at the court of Kiev in the 9th century. These skomoroki are distinguished by the originalité́ of the instruments they use: the rozhok, a wind instrument, the gusli, with plucked strings and the volinka,
a kind of bagpipe. Russia's conversion to orthodoxy will condition the history of music for several decades. The latter, subject to the law of the Church, which tolerates only singing and considers all musicians as profane, is non-existent. Only the carillon was not banned, and it is understandable why the Russians became masters of this instrument. Thus, although traditional music varies from region to region, it often has the common core of being purely vocal (with exceptions here and there). Throughout the country, one finds mnogolossia ("several voices") polyphonies, byliny or tchastushka (sung poems). More locally, diphonic songs can be heard in the Altai region, in the Urals and Siberia throat singing is typical of Mongolian music, and among the Tatars or Kalmouks, Kazakh influences can be felt. On the whole, traditional and folk music has been very well preserved through the ages and was particularly valued during the Soviet era as a symbol of Russian identity. A pillar of local culture, traditional music regularly appears at various events and religious festivals. It can also be heard performed by great musicians at the Earlymusic Festival in Saint Petersburg, devoted to music from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, or at the Yakutsk Opera and Ballet Theatre, which is rich in locally inspired performances of traditional dances, songs and instruments.Classical music
Russia took a first step towards classical music when, in the 18th century, Peter the Great, wishing to open Russia to the West, introduced foreign musicians to the court. However, the real turning point in the history of Russian music came with Mikhail Glinka (1804-1857) and his two operas: A Life for the Tsar (1836) and Ruslan and Ludmila (1842). The originalité́ of these operas is to combine Russian popular melodies with Western compositional techniques. History recognises in these two works the foundation of Russian classical music, which paved the way for the symphonic school. From here on, Russian music will once again be torn between Western and Slavonic currents. While Anton and Nikolai Rubinstein created a conservatory in St. Petersburg and another in Moscow, a group of Slavophiles musicians was organized in the 1860s to defend the particularité́ of Russian culture. In this movement, the Group of Five was formed, including Alexander Borodin, Rimsky-Korsakov, Mussorgsky, Mili Balakirev and César Cui. They have no other goal than to compose specifically Russian music. To do so, they use all the springs of popular culture, from Slavic tales and legends to various melodies. The music they compose is imbued with new tonalities, resulting from a clever mix of oriental music and Russian popular verses. Rimsky-Korsakov uses the heavy corpus of Russian fairy tales to write his operas. Mussorgsky revives Pushkin's poem Boris Godunov to compose his famous opera. Alongside the Group of Five, a personality who was to revolutionize music emerged: Piotr Tchaikovsky. Giving his works a particularly Russian sound, he offered the world some pieces of rare beauty, including great opera classics such as The Queen of Spades and Eugene Onegin. It was at the end of the nineteenth century that Russian music took on its full scope, and his conservatories in Moscow and St. Petersburg enjoyed immense prestige at the time.
Then, at the beginning of the 20th century, three characters marked the musical scene. First, the pianist Rachmaninov, who composed operas, symphonies and piano concertos and developed a very particular style of music. After the Revolution, he left Russia and had a brilliant concert career abroad. Then Scriabin who revived the Russian mystical tradition and also became the precursor of a new style: serial music. Let us also note the emergence of Shalyapin, a fascinating voice whose beauté́, expressiveness and power enchanted the Mariinsky Theatre and the Bolshoi. All three are graduates of the Moscow Conservatory. Two other great names in Russian music of the time were Stravinsky and Prokofiev. The foreign tours of the dancer Diaghilev made the former's ballets, The Firebird and Petrushka very famous. Unclassifiable and feverishly modern, his compositions, especially The Rite of Spring, will cause a scandal in the West
The revolution first carries away the music in a fabulous creative momentum. Opera, which from then on had to be accessible to the people, experienced a considerable boom. It is at this time that the great name of this popular opera Dmitri Shostakovitch, with a masterpiece, The Nose (in 1930), was born. But from 1932 onwards, Stalin regained control of the arts and imposed an aesthetic doctrine, the famous "socialist realism". Henceforth, the artist created to educate the people and had to combine "national form" and "socialist content". Shostakovich and Prokofiev, despite being official composers, were the first victims of this ideological hardening and were even accused by the authorities of the "cult of atonality, dissonance and disharmony". The avant-garde was hunted down, creation was enslaved, and in the 1940s and 1950s Western music was even banned. Despite a brief respite during the thaw under Khrushchev, censorship and state control resumed during Brezhnev's regime. While musical composition was severely restricted, all the greatest performers left Russian conservatories, which acquired an invincible reputation. First prizes in all international competitions, acclaimed by the West, all the great Russian singers and musicians achieved a perfection that borders on legendary. History still remembers the pianist Sviatoslav Richter or the cellist Mstislav Rostropovitch. If this Soviet period remains a dark half-century in terms of freedom, it paradoxically proves to be fruitful in terms of masterpieces: shostakovich's SymphoniesNo . 7, dedicated to Leningrad, exalts the resistance against the German invader, his 10th is filled with Stalinist terror, Prokofiev's Dantesque opera War and Peace is a marvel written like a magnum opus, while the magnificent Gayaneh, by the Armenian Aram Khachaturian, glorifies Soviet peasant life (a work that reflects his past career in the good graces of the Party).
The contemporary period is not free of revered figures in the classical period, quite the contrary. Who better than Valery Guerguiev embodies this contemporary Russian style? Passionate and intense, his conducting has taken him to the Rotterdam and Munich Philharmonic Orchestras, the London Symphony Orchestra and the New York Metropolitan. Excelling in the Russian repertoire, he is the face of the Mariinsky Theatre of Saint Petersburg (second Russian theatre after Bolchoï̈ in Moscow) to which he has restored its prestige. Seeing him conduct there is an unforgettable (and particularly popular) experience. Another mythical place, the Bolshoi is more than a theatre or an opera house in the centre of Moscow, it has been a temple of art since 1776. Today it is directed by a name well known to French music lovers - since he also conducts the Orchestre national du Capitole de Toulouse - the Russian conductor Tugan Sokhiev. Let us also mention Mikhaïl Pletnev, a superb pianist with a career as a first-rate conductor and founder of the Russian National Orchestra. Also, from the indefatigable Elisabeth Leonskaja, "the last great Lady of the Soviet School" to Daniil Trifonov, the rising star, Russia maintains a culture of excellence among its soloists and continues to provide a plethora of renowned pianists such as Boris Berezovsky, Aleksey Volodin, Nikolai Lugansky, Denis Matsouïev..
Where to listen to Russian classical music?
The other testimony of the imperishable musical quality in Russia is undoubtedly the overall level of excellence of its stages. In the shadow of the Bolshoi or the Mariinsky Theatre, other less well-known (and less prized) names offer wonders. Starting with the St. Petersburg Philharmonic. The magnificent home of the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra - the oldest in Russia at 135 years old - conducted by the venerable Yuri Temirkanov, it was here that all of Shostakovich's symphonies were once inaugurated. An inratable one. More recently (2003), the Moscow International House of Music instantly became a sanctuary of great music. A magnificent, very modern palace where you can see the National Philharmonic Orchestra of Russia conducted by Vladimir Spivakov, who always amazes when he performs the national repertoire. In Ekaterinburg, there is also a Philharmonic Orchestra as well as an Opera and Ballet Theatre of international renown, in Kaliningrad, a Philharmonic Orchestra playing in a former Prussian-style church (concerts of very good quality) and the Mariinsky Theatre of Primorié, a subsidiary of the famous Mariinsky of St Petersburg, welcoming major artists from the opera and symphonic world.
Popular music
Impossible to approach Russian popular music without mentioning the bards. More or less equivalent to American folk singers, Russian bards are songwriters with frank, often political lyrics, simply accompanied by a guitar. Because of the political nature of their lyrics, many bards were never allowed to perform on stage during the Soviet era. While one of the first to become famous, Alexander Vertinski, began his career in the 1910s, the most illustrious appeared after the Second World War. This is the case of the famous Bulat Okoudjava and Yuri Vizbor or the cult artist Vladimir Vyssotski. Mainly known in France for having been the husband of Marina Vlady, he was one of the greatest Russian bards. Political, very cynical towards the Soviet regime, his cassettes first circulate under the mantle before becoming extremely popular in the USSR. Even though his musical work was banned, Vyssotsky was never really worried, and it is said that even the Communist nomenklatura knew how to appreciate his pen. Proof of his status apart, his death was the largest unauthorized demonstration in the history of the USSR. While a million people attended his funeral, the country's authorities paid no tribute to him.
The other history of Russian popular music is, of course, that of pop music. If at first glance, in the 1960s, the USSR tried to erect a cultural wall (again) with the West and jammed the BBC waves, the artistic revolution in progress pierced the Iron Curtain. In order to limit external influence, the Russian authorities then authorized certain groups, called "V.I.A." to perform and record their music. Some of these "state artists" were to be hugely successful, such as Vesiolie Rebiata or Poyushchiye Gitary (nicknamed the "Soviet Beatles") or Muslim Magomayev, the "Soviet Sinatra". The latter opened the door to the stars of the 1970s, the Sofia Rotaru, Valery Leontiev and especially Alla Pugacheva. A true Soviet diva, she is surely the most famous Russian singer in the country and beyond its borders. Artist of the People of the USSR and accustomed to the front pages of the tabloids, Pugacheva is also famous for her unique style and her clear and soft voice. After the fall of the Wall, despite the serious economic and political crisis that Russia is going through, the country continues to be a hyper dynamic breeding ground for Russian pop, with many great popular hits dating from this period. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the American influence in Russian pop was palpable, the industry changed and saw the emergence of "popsa" and its bands with sales-oriented productions, such as the very famous Zemfira or t.A.T.u.Russian rock
From Victor Tsoï, a Soviet icon, to the hyper-popular Lyube - of which Vladimir Putin is the first fan - Russians love rock. And consequently produce a lot of it. The history of Russian rock dates back to perestroika. Taking advantage of this new wind of freedom, the local creation is boiling and will carry the explosion of rock music. By the end of the 1960s, the first Russian rock bands began to form. The first star of the genre was Yuri Morozov, the precursor of psychedelic Russian rock. It was in the early 1980s that the first underground scene was formed, led by the mythical Kino, Machina Vremeni, Nautilus Pompilius, DDT and Akvarium. Sullied by radio and television channels, it was through word of mouth that these rock treasures became known. Soon, these groups became an international success among Russian youth and in its whirlwind, rock music changed the way people think, live and dress.
It was at this time that the absolute legend of Russian rock, Viktor Tsoï and his band Kino, appeared. Gorbachev aside, if there was only one name to remember from perestroika, it would probably be Tsoï. Consecrated in the beautiful Leto (2018) by Russian filmmaker Kirill Serebrennikov, he is probably the only Soviet rock star, a living god and martyr revered after his early death. Still as popular among children in the 2000s, Kino's rock is a dark and gentle new wave whose lyrics reflect the philosophical questions and fatalistic sadness of the youth of the time. In1990, the group filled Moscow'sLuzhniki stadium for a memorable concert, just before Tsoï died in a car accident at the age of 28, bringing a wave of suicides in his wake. Today, the music of successful young bands such as Motorama or Human Tetris (very cold wave) or Pinkshinyultrablast (very shoegaze) are following in the footsteps of Tsoï and Leto. Rock music is still very present in Russia and the country has many places to listen to it. Among the most remarkable, the Rock 'n' Roll Bar in Moscow is a temple of the genre, open continuously seven days a week, where you have fun very quickly, very well, on good rock. On the St Petersburg side, the Dacha is a real party bar famous for its drunken nights and its rock played very loudly. It's an absolute must. The other very good address in town is the Money Honey, quieter and bluer, but offering good concerts. Passing through Novosibirsk? Rock City is one of the most popular and wildest clubs in the city, which regularly invites famous Russian rock stars to perform on stage.
