Vyacheslav Artyomov

Vyacheslav Petrovich Artyomov (Вячесла́в Петро́вич Артё́мов; born on June 29, 1940, in Moscow) is a Russian and Soviet composer.

Artyomov was preparing to become a physicist, studying music at the same time.

Christian edition The Christian Review writes: “The profound, spiritual nature of Vyacheslav Petrovich Artyomov’s music led the conductor Teodor Currentzis to liken the Russian composer, who was born in 1940 in Moscow and is considered Russia’s greatest living composer, to Anton Bruckner”.

Due to the great interest in Artyomov's work, Divine Art decided to supplement the series by releasing new discs.

He finished studying at the musical college affiliated to the Moscow Conservatory (composition class of A. Pirumov), then graduated from the Moscow Conservatory in 1968, where he studied composition with Nikolai Sidelnikov and piano with Tovi Logovinsky.

He became a member of the Union of Soviet Composers and Association for Contemporary Music (ACM).

He was active as an editor at the Moscow publisher "Musyka" for several years.

In 1975, he joined the improvisation group "Astreya," together with the composers Sofia Gubaidulina and Viktor Suslin.

In 1979, he was blacklisted as one of Khrennikov's Seven at the Sixth Congress of the Union of Soviet Composers for unapproved participation in some festivals of Soviet music in the Western world.

His music was performed by M.Rostropovich, G.Rozhdestvensky, D.Kytaenko, V.Fedoseyev, M.Pletnyov, V.Spivakov, T.Currentzis, Virko Baley, D.Alexeev, S.Bunin, F.Kopachevsky, L.Isakadze, T.Grindenko, Yo-Yo Ma, A.Rudin, O.Yanchenko, L. Petrova.

Artyomov's compositions show his interest in the archaic ("Incantations", "Totem") and Christian motifs ("Requiem", "Ave, Maria") as well as Eastern meditation ("Awakening", "A Symphony of Elegies", "Moonlight Dreams").

As a young composer, he developed a profound interest, successively, in Russian folklore, traditional music of the East, works of Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Messiaen, and the Polish avant-garde.

But it was Arthur Honegger's Symphonie Liturgique, as well as the works of Edgar Varèse and Sinfonia by Luciano Berio that made the greatest and most lasting impression on him.

Artyomov considers music a science – concentration of soul experience – and, side by side with astrophysics, – one of two main fundamental sciences: astrophysics broaden the horizon of knowledge of the universe, and music exposes the profundity and strength of human's spirit, his interconnection with the World's Soul (Anima Mundi).

Music is "a mediator between God and man", "a concentrate of spiritual energy, which should awaken man's ethical understanding and purify his soul" (Foundation of the Philosophy of Music).

"Artyomov would appear to be just the sort of composer whose appearance is especially timely at this point in the life of his country ... His music and his artistic outlook in general reflect the questing for a new order of spiritual values as well as a new regard for individuality."

The reason was a series of ten CDs with recording of works by the Russian composer Vyacheslav Artyomov, which was released by the English-American company Divine Art as a tribute to the composer on the occasion of his 80th anniversary.

The series has provoked great public resonance to Artyomov's music and the avalanche of reviews in popular music editions like Gramophone, American Record Guide, Pizzicato, Musical Opinion, Fanfare, The Classical Reviewer, etc. They often contain expressions such as «the most unusual talent today», «a work of exceptional beauty», «new order of spiritual values», «masterpiece», «unforgettable and touching», «magnificent», «bravo».

Some consider Artyomov as “one of the greatest living composers” (MusicWebInternational), “one of the most individual and distinctive composers not just in the music of his native Russia but in Western Classical music as a whole!” (Musical Opinion), for others “The series of issues and re-issues of the music of Vyacheslav Artyomov on Divine Art is one of the primary revival events of the past decade… It is time we celebrate his music—as the most bracing and original music of our times”(Classical Modern Music).

Some reviewers recall that Mstislav Rostropovich, who ordered and performed three Artyomov's symphonies (two of them performed by Teodor Currentzis and Vladimir Ashkenazi were included in the present series), was absolutely visionary saying: “Artyomov has absolutely clear and unique composer’s image... Artyomov brings glory to our country and to Russian art”.

The French edition Classica had remembered even the former persecutor of Artyomov—Tikhon Khrennikov, who “by the irony of history (like A.Salieri who after listening to Mozart’s Requiem in Amadeus said: «Forgive your assassin! Mozart!») also eventually recognized the greatness of his enemy” and after the performance of Artyomov's Requiem told journalists: “Artyomov is outstanding composer.

His Requiem has raised Russian music to the unattainable previously height.

I’m sure it is due to Artyomov that we have not only reached the European level in this genre, but surpassed its acmes—Requiems by Mozart and Verdi”.

(Stephen A. Whealton. Way to Olympus CD by Mobile Fidelity, 1989)

"Vyacheslav Artyomov is considered by many to be Russia's greatest living composer ... His music is deep, ultimately spiritual and brilliantly crafted, with influences from the Russian symphonic tradition colored by Mahler, Honegger and Messiaen to name a few – but melded into a unique voice."

(Richard Freed. Kennedy Center Stagebill, September 1990)

"What we are witnessing is music that dares simply to exist, shining like the sun, allowing us to bask in its warmth … The first part of the tetralogy, the Way to Olympus, is stunning ... Artyomov's On the Threshold of a Bright World is even more rare – it is a work of genius" (Octavio Roca. The Washington Times, September 24, 1990)

"What cannot be emphasized too strongly is the nobility and sincerity of genuine spirituality which informs so much of Artyomov's art. It is an astounding creation, occupying a unique place for its composer and for Russian music in the last quarter of the 20th century."

(Robert Matthew-Walker. "Elegies" CD by Olympia, 1993).

"In the age of minimalism and abstraction Artyomov stands apart – his music is created to serve a greater purpose, much in the same way as the later works of Scriabin and the music of Messiaen."

(Kathryn Marshall. "Divine Art", 2016)

"Artyomov writes big, ambitious tunes; listening to his music — and also on this Way to Olympus CD – we always feel small; Artyomov is a being who understands and has mastery of the universe while we are merely hairless monkeys on a speck of dust on the distant tip of the Sagittarius arm of the Milky Way."

– Grego Applegate Edwards (Gapplegate Classical Modern Music, February 16, 2017)

(JMC. The Chronicle, 13 September 2018. www.chronicleseries.co.uk)

Digest of press reviews on Artyomov’s ten CDs released by Divine Art during last three years (see “Quotations” below).

For the first time in recent decades, enthusiastic assessments of contemporary Russian culture have appeared in the foreign press.

Disc Astraea containing joint improvisations on non-orchestral instruments of composers V.Artyomov, S.Gubaidulina and V.Suslin was released in January 2020 (re-release of the 1994 disc).

The Artyomov's eleventh CD (Album XI), which includes mostly unreleased chamber works by the composer, is expected in May 2020.

(R.Gruzdkov. Way Up, 3, 2020)

"Surprise! This is a fully developed voice in new music, someone who has carried over the mysterious cosmos of late Scriabin and Messiaen and made something new out of the unrealized potentials that lurked behind those composers' most prescient creations. Artyomov speaks to me, in elegant and vivid eloquence. The Russian National Orchestra under conductors Teodor Currentzis and Vladimir Ponkin bring this complex and very personal music into vivid relief against the seeming silence of the universe. Artyomov travels in the wake of those before and manages to say something new and different. That is a remarkable achievement and he most certainly deserves a hearing. All you modernists and seekers of the new look no further, at least today. Give a listen to Vyacheslav Artyomov on this very moving sample of his work. It gives us another way to thread the futurist needle."