Results matching “Arvo Pärt”

Tonight in Leipzig, Germany, Gidon Kremer and the Kremerata Baltica under conductor Roman Kofman will perform the German premiere of Arvo Pärt's "4th Symphony" in dedication to Mikhail Khodorkovsky, as well as the "Silent Prayer" by Giya Kancheli.

All proceeds from the concert will benefit the Podmoskovny Lyceum boarding school, an orphanage founded by the Mikhail Khodorkovsky Foundation in 1994 to provide educational support for orphans and children from underprivileged families.  The Podmoskovny Lyceum is run by Khodorkovsky's mother Marina Filipovna, and is under constant pressure to close from the public authorities, so your help is most appreciated.

Read more about the concert here.

In the past we have blogged about the famed Estonian composer Arvo Pärt's dedication of his latest Symphony #4 to Mikhail Khodorkovsky.  Tonight at 8PM at the Toronto Centre for the Arts this work will debut.  For my fellow Canadian citizens and blog readers, please get out there to Yonge street to see this unique event if you can!

Personally, I am very heartened to see the arts community step so admirably to support human rights in Russia, when so many others have been hesistant.  From our past concerts in Paris, to the upcoming performance in Leipzig, and the recent arrival of student sketch artists to the trial in Moscow, it really feels like an awakening is taking place.  Let's hope this continues.

In the past we've blogged about the composer Arvo Pärt dedicating a symphony to Mikhail Khodorkovsky, and given the second show trial, he has spoken out again in his defense.  Below is a follow up from Helsingin Sanomat:

"He is a genius, amazing, a great talent, who has a warm heart and a pure vision."

This is how Estonian composer Arvo Pärt describes jailed Russian businessman Mikhail Khodorkovsky, to whom he has dedicated his fourth symphony (Los Angeles).The European première was in Helsinki on Thursday, April 16th, just a few months after the world's first performance, which was conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen in Los Angeles.

"All of the bad things that you have read about Khodorkovsky is propaganda put out by the Russian state", Pärt declares.

Estonia's most famous contemporary composer, Arvo Pärt, premiered a new major symphony work in Los Angeles this past weekend dedicated to Mikhail Khodorkovsky (whom he calls "a great man") and gives a nod to "all those imprisoned without rights in Russia."  The composer similarly dedicated all of his works between 2006-2007 to Anna Politkovskaya.

For those who haven't heard of him, Arvo Pärt is world's most celebrated contemporary composers, whose unique post-modern, transnational minimalist music (you could pick another dozen adjectives) has won him awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the Léonie Sonning Music Foundation.  Born in Estonia in 1935, much discussion revolves around the impact of the repressive Soviet environment and the state censorship of Pärt's early works (these works were banned by the Soviets for having been based on religious texts).  Pärt ended up becoming one of those amazing artists to thrive despite Stalinism.

From the LA Times Culture Monster: