Image of Ivan the Terrible in creativity of the composers: on question of national identity in musical art

Abstract

The author of this article examines the phenomenon of implementation of Russian national identity in music in the creativity of the contemporary composers in their work on disclosure herein the embodiment of Ivan the Terrible’ s image. “Stichera for the 1000-th anniversary (millennium) of the Christianization of Rus” for symphony orchestra of Rodion Shchedrin and opera “Visions of Ivan the Terrible” of Sergei Slonimsky are defined as the representative samples for study. The composers managed to embody the concept of national cultural identity through ancient musical code – znamenny chant – in disclosure of the image of the tsar and of his era. For this purpose the composers have reproduced znamenny chant of Tsar Ivan, applied traditional Old Russian musical hymnographic creative principles of art in its development. This is a new word in disclosing the image of the Tsar Ivan and his time. Nobody of their great predecessors, who applied to the disclosure of the image of the Tsar Ivan and his time, implements the “znamennost” phenomenon in the music. Special attention is paid to the “Stichera” of Shchedrin. It is shown that the self-identification of image of the tsar, presented in the manuscript sources of the 16th – 17th centuries by Ivan himself, is correlated with musical image, presented by the composer, as well as with the idea of the spiritual elevation of the Russian State. Znamenny chant, found in depths of ancient Russian church-singing culture, has received scientific basis as the archetype of a national musical identity. Based on the ancient manuscript sources, the musical “Russianness” has deep historical cultural tradition and chronological substantiation.