On the Role of Ritual-Mythological Imagery in Musical Drama “Farhad and Shirin” by V.A. Uspensky

Main Article Content

Natella V. Chakhvadze

Abstract

The author of the article tries to find out: which ways of reflecting the national helped Russian composers who worked in Uzbekistan and solved the most difficult problem of mastering polyphonic European genres and forms, to gain success with the national audience? The problem has not lost its relevance in our time, as far as the accumulated experience has shown following: it cannot be irredundant to quoting, processing or creating musical material in the folk spirit.
By considering from new positions (it permits to do the approaches tested in literary criticism, which studied myths, ritual and ritual actions) the first in Uzbekistan polyphonic musical drama “Farkhad and Shirinˮ created by V.A. Uspensky and approved by the national audience, the author comes to conclusions that are distinct from the results obtained by predecessor researchers. In the process of analysis, it is possible to identify the archetypal motifs and images that determined the peculiarities of the musical drama by V. Uspensky, to reveal its connection with the literary source, the poem by A. Navoi, and to prove that the solutions found by the composer continued Uzbek national tradition. Not only quoted melodies, but also mythological and ritual archetypes acted as a connecting thread between the classical and literary heritage and the polyphonic opus created by the composer. In such a way Uspensky managed to anticipate the dramatic discoveries of the Uzbek authors, who worked, at the time of maturity of the national composer school in the 1980s of the 20th century.


Keywords: V.A. Uspensky, musical drama, Sufi motifs, myth, rite, ritual in music.

Article Details

How to Cite
Chakhvadze Н. В. (2023). On the Role of Ritual-Mythological Imagery in Musical Drama “Farhad and Shirin” by V.A. Uspensky. Music Scholarship / Problemy Muzykal’noj Nauki, 52(3), 112–122. Retrieved from https://musicscholar.ru/index.php/PMN/article/view/1469
Section
History and Theory of Music
Author Biography

Natella V. Chakhvadze, Magnitogorsk State M.I. Glinka Conservatory (Academy), Magnitogorsk, Russia

Dr.Sci (Arts), Associate Professor, Professor at the Music History and Theory Department