ERKKI-SVEN TÜÜR (1959) – – – – – Requiem for chamber choir, two soloists, piano and strings (1994) ARVO PÄRT (1935) – – – – – Da pacem Domine (2004) ERKKI-SVEN TÜÜR – – – – – Action. Passion. Illusion for strings (1993) TÕNU KÕRVITS (1969) – – – – – Kreegi vihik / Kreek’s Notebook (2007) I Nüüd ole, Jeesus, kiidetud / May Jesus, Thee Be Praised II Oh võta, armas Jeesus, vastu mult / Dear Jesus, Do Receive III Ma vaatan üles mäele / I Gaze At The Mountain Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir Tallinn Chamber Orchestra Conductor Tõnu Kaljuste This concert is produced by the Consulate General of Estonia. The concert tour in the United States is organised by New World Classics and supported by Estonian Ministry of Culture, Estonian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Tallinn City Government.
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ERKKI-SVEN TÜÜR (1959)– – – – – Requiem for chamber choir, two soloists, piano and strings (1994)
I Nüüd ole, Jeesus, kiidetud / May Jesus, Thee Be PraisedII Oh võta, armas Jeesus, vastu mult / Dear Jesus, Do ReceiveIII Ma vaatan üles mäele / I Gaze At The Mountain
Estonian Philharmonic Chamber ChoirTallinn Chamber Orchestra
Conductor Tõnu Kaljuste
This concert is produced by the Consulate General of Estonia.
The concert tour in the United States is organised by New World Classics and supported byEstonian Ministry of Culture, Estonian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Tallinn City Government.
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ERKKI-SVEN TÜÜR (1959) is one of Estonia’s most highly acclaimed contemporarycomposers. He began his career as a ‘chamber rock’ musician and founded theintellectual rock group In Spe in Tallinn at the age of seventeen. In 1980—1984 hestudied at the Tallinn Conservatoire with Jaan Rääts.
Tüür seeks to write music that combines technical know-how with emotionalpower to develop a musical reality where the two sides — intellectual and emotio-nal — can live together side by side. As a student Tüür was interested both inAmerican minimalism and also the post-serial textures of Ligeti and Xenakis. Bothtraditions find an echo in his works. His musical architecture is often influencedby visual ideas and he is interested in a combination of opposites: tonality versusatonality, regular repetitive rhythms versus irregular complex ones, tranquilmeditativeness versus explosive theatricality.
Tüür’s output ranges from chamber music to symphonies, concertos and largescale choral works, among them for instance the oratorio Ante finem saeculi (1985),an opera Wallenberg (2001), Architectonics etc.
Requiem for chamber choir, two soloists, piano and strings (1994) is dedicatedto the memory of the composer’s friend conductor Peeter Lilje. Tüür has shortenedthe liturgical text of the catholic mass and it could not be regarded as a cycle but asan integral whole. This composition became the recommended work at the ParisRostrum and has been broadcasted in radios in many countries all over the world.
Action, Passion, Illusion were first performed by Tallinn Chamber Orchestraand Tõnu Kaljuste in 1993. The individual works are constructions in which thehigher the musical building blocks go, the more they are joined together to form abuilding. This is the principle behind the string series Action-Passion-Illusion.Passion and Illusion are recorded on the CD “Crystallisatio”.
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ARVO PÄRT (1935) attracts large audiences in the world with the beauty and balanceof his musical style. He is the most remarkable and distinctive musical figure ofEstonian origin. He was born in Paide and grew up in Rakvere and Tallinn, in1980 he emigrated and now lives in Berlin. Arvo Pärt’s first orchestral work Nekro-loog (Necrology) of 1960 was the first Estonian work to employ serial technique.He continued with serialism through to the mid 1960s, but ultimately tired of itsrigours and moved on to experiment with collage techniques. At the very beginningof the 1970s, he wrote a few compositions in the spirit of early European polyphony,like his Symphony No 3 from 1971. Thereafter he turned to self-imposed silence,but re-emerged in 1976 after a transformation so radical as to make his previousmusic almost unrecognisable as that of the same composer. The technique he inven-ted, or discovered, and to which he has remained loyal, practically without excep-tion, he calls “tintinnabuli” (from the Latin, little bells).
Since leaving Estonia, Pärt has concentrated on setting religious texts, whichhave proved popular with choirs and ensembles around the world. His long timecollaborators have been The Hilliard Ensemble, the Estonian Philharmonic Cham-ber Choir with its conductors Tõnu Kaljuste and Paul Hillier, the conductor NeemeJärvi, and Manfred Eicher of ECM Records.
Da pacem Domine for mixed choir a cappella (2004) is an eloquent example ofPärt at his most characteristic — a simple texture (four parts throughout), a slowstraightforward pattern with almost no rhythmic variation, and near harmonicstasis in which each pitch is carefully placed in position like stones in a Zen garden.There are two basic elements in the work: the first is a manner of composition thatimmediately calls to mind the organ piece “Pari intervallo” (1976), and the secondcomprises passages of faburden (a short succession of parallel chords with theroot note either in the top voice or in the middle), resolving with a Landini cadence.The text is a prayer for peace and has been set by numerous composers over theage. The original version is scored for choir and full orchestra. The work is recordedby the EPCC and Paul Hillier (Harmonia Mundi) and the CD of the same titlereceived a Grammy award in 2007.
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TÕNU KÕRVITS (1969) graduated from Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre(1994, composition with Raimo Kangro). His work spans both chamber andsymphonic genres, contains incidental music for puppet animations and cartoons,plus arrangements and orchestrations of popular music. Music of Tõnu Kõrvits isfilled with highly poetical imagery. It varies from gentle and fragile sound paintingsto dramatic orchestral textures, full of vivacity and passion. Composer’s heedfultreatment of melodic lines is combined with well-considered timbre choice. Lastyears Oriental melodic styles and Estonian folk song are reflected in his work.Tõnu Kõrvits is Laureate of Heino Eller Music Award (2001). In 2003 his orchestrapiece Eldorado won III Prize at International Lepo Sumera Composition Contestfor Young Composers. In 2002, Tõnu Kõrvits received the Young Cultural FigureAward of the President of the Republic’s Cultural Foundation, and in 2004 theAnnual Prize of the Endowment for Music of the Cultural Endowment of Estonia.In 2007 he was awarded the Annual Music Prize of the Estonian Music Councilfor his contribution to Estonian orchestral music.
“Kreek’s Notebook” (“Kreegi vihik”) for choir and strings was first performedin 2007 by the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir, Tallinn Chamber Orchestraand conductor Tõnu Kaljuste.
The work is based on Estonian spiritual folk tunes that the Estonian composerCyrillus Kreek (1989—1962) used and collected. He was the first to thoroughlyand systematically delve into the world of popular versions of church hymns.Kreek wrote them down and arranged them to three- or four-voice choral casts.“Kreek’s Notebook” by Tõnu Kõrvits thus presents a new, modern look at thesehymns, yet it sounds as homage to Cyrillus Kreek. The movements of the workare written for different casts. Tonight there are performed three parts of the eight-movement work, all created for choir and string instruments: I May Jesus, Thee BePraised (Estonian folk hymn from Kihnu island), IV Dear Jesus, Do Receive (Estonianfolk hymn from Kolga-Jaani) and VIII I Gaze At The Mountain (Estonian folk hymnfrom Saaremaa).
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THE ESTONIAN PHILHARMONIC CHAMBER CHOIR (EPCC) is the Estonia’s best-knownprofessional music group abroad. The EPCC was founded in 1981 by Tõnu Kaljuste,who was its artistic director and chief conductor for 20 years. In the years 2001—2007 the artistic director was Paul Hillier. Since the season 2008/2009 the artisticdirector and chief conductor is Daniel Reuss.
The EPCC’s repertoire ranges from Gregorian Chant to the 20th century music.The choir has a close relationship with Estonian composers Veljo Tormis and ArvoPärt, whose music has hold a very special place in its repertoire for many years.The choir gives 60—70 concerts per season and tours regularly in Europe, theUnited States, Canada, and Japan.
The EPCC has worked with famous conductors and orchestras includingClaudio Abbado, Helmuth Rilling, David Willcocks, Eric Ericson, Ivæn Fischer,Ward Swingle, Neeme Järvi, Paavo Järvi, Nikolai Aleksejev, Andrew Lawrence-King, Roland Böer; Norwegian, Australian, Lithuanian Chamber Orchestras, IsraelPhilharmonic Orchestra, Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, Berlin Rundfunk Orchestra,Concerto Copenhagen, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie, etc.
The EPCC has been invited to participate in many famous music festivals allover the world, for instance BBC Proms, Edinburgh International Festival,Cheltenham Music Festival, Salzburg Festival, Abu Gosh Music Festival, MoscowEaster Festival, Bergen International Festival, Gaida Festival etc.
Besides the concerts the recordings for companies ECM, Virgin Classics, Carus,Harmonia Mundi hold an important place in the choir’s activity. The recordingshave won several prizes, from which the Grammy award for Arvo Pärt’s „DaPacem” recorded by the EPCC and Paul Hillier (2007, Harmonia Mundi) is themost remarkable. Besides, the choir’s recordings with Arvo Pärt’s, Erkki-SvenTüür’s and Baltic composers’ music have received eight Grammy nominations.
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TALLINN CHAMBER ORCHESTRA (TCO) was founded in 1993 by the conductor TõnuKaljuste. The members of the orchestra are all outstanding musicians, who oftenperform as soloists and are invited to perform with various other orchestras andensembles.
In cooperation with the company ECM Tallinn Chamber Orchestra has recordedmany important CD’s: Arvo Pärt’s “Te Deum”, Erkki-Sven Tüür’s “Crystallisatio”,Arvo Pärt’s “Litany” etc.
Tallinn Chamber Orchestra has performed together with Estonian PhilharmonicChamber Choir in many prestigious music festivals: Bach Cantatas Festival inMilan, Bremen Music Festival, Huddersfield Festival of Contemporary Music etc.Concert tours have taken orchestra and the choir to Canada, USA, Japan and tomany European countries.
The orchestra’s instrumental programmes have been prepared together withforeign and Estonian conductors, for instance Juha Kangas, John Storgårds, RichardTognetti, Terje Tonnesen, Valentin Zhuk, Daniel Raiskin, Samuel Wong, Eri Klas,Olari Elts, Paul Mägi, Arvo Volmer, Vello Pähn, Kristjan Järvi, Tarmo Leina-tamm. In 1993—1995 and 1996—2001 the Artistic Director and General Conductorof the orchestra was Tõnu Kaljuste, in the seasons 1995/1996 and 2001—2003 JuhaKangas. At the present the Artistic Director is Eri Klas.
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TÕNU KALJUSTE founded the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir (EPCC) in1981 and the Tallinn Chamber Orchestra (TCO) in 1993. In 1990s he was alsoengaged as principal conductor of Swedish Radio Choir and the NetherlandsChamber Choir. Freelance conductor since 2001.
In 2004 he initiated the project Nargen Opera which summerly productions’list includes three operas by Joseph Haydn, and in cooperation with Von KrahlTheatre Estonian Ballads, Songs of Estonian Women and Songs of Estonian Men byVeljo Tormis; chamber operas Firegarden and My Swans, My Thoughts by TõnuKõrvits, and Fidelio by Beethoven.
Mr Kaljuste has dedicated a significant part of his work to Estonian composers(Heino Eller, Arvo Pärt, Veljo Tormis, Erkki-Sven Tüür), whose music he has recor-ded for ECM. He has also recorded vespers and litanies by Wolfgang AmadeusMozart, as well as church music by Antonio Vivaldi (Carus). He has collaboratedwith composers Arvo Pärt, Alfred Schnittke, György Kurtag, Krzysztof Penderecki,Erik Bergman, Giya Kancheli, Sven-David Sandström, Knut Nystedt, EinojuhaniRautavaara, Brett Dean, Lera Auerbach and many others. In 2006 he initiated yetanother project, a yearly Nargen Festival.
He is a Grammy nominee and the winner of several prizes for his recordings(Diapason d’Or de l’Annee 2000, Cannes Classical Award, Edison Prize).
