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Assorted items => Individual composers => Topic started by: Aderichleau on December 24, 2017, 04:48:50 pm



Title: Gennady Vorobyov (1918-39)
Post by: Aderichleau on December 24, 2017, 04:48:50 pm
Thought I’d post a brief enquiry about a Soviet composer I’ve recently come across on YouTube, a Gennady Vorobyov (1918-39) from the Chuvash Republic of Russia. Before his untimely death in 1939, he almost finished a Symphony in C minor, which was, apparently, completed by fellow student, Nikolai Peiko. On first hearing, the work sounds quite accessible, in a late-Romantic style. I’m curious to know if anyone else is aware of the existence of this obscure composer, as I have unearthed nothing from Internet searches or New Grove. My efforts to uncover information on the conductor of the recording, Vitaly Kitaev, have also failed. Here’s the YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EiCufnNYGE. Season’s greetings to all…


Title: Re: Gennady Vorobyov (1918-39)
Post by: guest377 on December 25, 2017, 05:48:21 pm
Thought I’d post a brief enquiry about a Soviet composer I’ve recently come across on YouTube, a Gennady Vorobyov (1918-39) from the Chuvash Republic of Russia. Before his untimely death in 1939, he almost finished a Symphony in C minor, which was, apparently, completed by fellow student, Nikolai Peiko. On first hearing, the work sounds quite accessible, in a late-Romantic style. I’m curious to know if anyone else is aware of the existence of this obscure composer, as I have unearthed nothing from Internet searches or New Grove. My efforts to uncover information on the conductor of the recording, Vitaly Kitaev, have also failed. Here’s the YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EiCufnNYGE. Season’s greetings to all…

I believe that Vitaly Kitaev was a Belorussian conductor.. might check or do a search at Belarusian State Academy of Music.??


Title: Re: Gennady Vorobyov (1918-39)
Post by: Holger on December 26, 2017, 08:43:14 am
In fact, the same is wrongly spelt: the conductor's name is Vitaly Kataev (not Kitaev). He was a Soviet conductor who mostly worked in Belarus (though he was born and died in Russia). Here are the Russian and Belarusian wikipedia articles on him:
https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Катаев,_Виталий_Витальевич (https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Катаев,_Виталий_Витальевич)
https://be.wikipedia.org/wiki/Віталь_Вітальевіч_Катаеў (https://be.wikipedia.org/wiki/Віталь_Вітальевіч_Катаеў)
He recorded quite a number of orchestral works for Melodiya, mostly by Belarusian composers.

Vorobyov, in turn, is an obscure figure due to his early death but I heard his symphony before and it's really nice. Some information on him can be found here, for instance:
http://enc.cap.ru/?t=prsn&lnk=285 (http://enc.cap.ru/?t=prsn&lnk=285)
(though in Russian again, of course).


Title: Re: Gennady Vorobyov (1918-39)
Post by: Aderichleau on December 26, 2017, 03:34:43 pm
Thanks! The information and links are greatly appreciated. After finding so little on the Internet, a misspelling of either the composer or conductor's name did occur to me.


Title: Re: Gennady Vorobyov (1918-39)
Post by: Tetsugakusha75 on December 30, 2017, 12:01:21 am
Hello, I am the one who uploaded the Vorobyov symphony on YouTube. Thank you for correcting my spelling of the conductor's name, I have corrected it now in the video as well. Hopefully I can help you with some information. Since Chuvashia has not produced many composers, Vorobyov is well remembered there, as you can see on this site: http://kapella21.ru/diskografiya/126-gennadij-vorobev-neperekhodyashchie-tsennosti-iskusstva where you can even hear some other works by him and a more recent performance of the symphony.

Here is my translation of a text I found on the site http://gov.cap.ru/hierarhy.asp?page=./1/13313/34350 :

August 13 marks the 85th anniversary of the birth of one of the most gifted of a new generation of Chuvash composers that came up in the late 30’s, Gennady Vasilyevich Vorobyov (1918-1939). He lived a very short life, but his works were so great that the best of them entered the golden fund of Chuvash music.
Gennady Vorobyov was born in 1918 in Cheboksary, Chuvashia, in the family of the composer and choral conductor Vasily Petrovich Vorobyov, one of the founders of the Chuvash professional music.
Since childhood, Gennady Vorobyov’s craving for music was so obvious that he began his studies at a music school, and only then in general education.
The first piano compositions by G. Vorobyov – “Carousel” and “Children’s Suite” (1934-1935) – were written during his studies at the music college of Cheboksary. After brilliantly finishing college, Gennady Vorobyev entered the Moscow Conservatory. On September 15, 1935 in the newspaper “Krasnaya Chuvashia” a TASS report was published “17-year-old composer,” which quoted the head of composition department of the Moscow Conservatory, Professor G. Litinsky: “Vorobyov made a strong impression on the members of the commission at his talent test. In Vorobyov, Chuvashia has a very valuable creative musical force.” It is in the class of Professor G. I. Litinsky that Gennady Vorobyov honed his technique to the level of professionalism, contributing to the solution of large creative tasks. Already in the first two years he wrote a Sonatina for piano, a Sonata for violin and piano, about a dozen treatments of Chuvash folk songs, including the famous “Amartkayak” (“Eagle”) songs on poems by A. S. Pushkin, translated into Chuvash language, and some choral songs.
The creative activities of Gennady Vasilyevich Vorobyov lasted only for six years. But during this time he wrote about 70 works: instrumental chamber and orchestral works, choral songs and ballads, arrangements of Chuvash folk songs. The biggest piece, his four-movement symphony, can be conted among the best creations of Chuvash music ever.
The works of G. Vorobyov were at the same time published in Moscow and Cheboksary. But they have become a rarity. In the state archives of the Chuvash Republic Vorobyov’s printed works are carefully kept. Among them: “Five Chuvash folk songs” (1939), “Holiday on the farm” (1946), “Juras” (Song) (1947), “Pieces for piano” (1969), etc.
On the brief but extremely bright and intense creative searchings and findings in the life of the talented composer Gennady Vorobyov, its wonderful, genuine poetry, expressed in a variety of genres and forms, you can get information in the book by the well-known composer from the Chuvash ASSR and RSFSR, Viktor Alexandrovich Hodyashev, “Gennady Vorobyov: A brief sketch of the life and work,” published by the Chuvash Publishing House in 1968.


Title: Re: Gennady Vorobyov (1918-39)
Post by: Aderichleau on December 30, 2017, 04:32:03 am
Many thanks for your translation of the short biography. I have an interest in Soviet music, but must confess to not having heard of Gennady Vorobyov, until coming across your posting on YouTube. Since then, I've had the pleasure of listening to his symphony on a few occasions. Look forward to making further discoveries on your channel.


Title: Re: Gennady Vorobyov (1918-39)
Post by: Tetsugakusha75 on December 30, 2017, 09:45:00 pm
You're welcome  :D

A piano score of Vorobyov's symphony can be downloaded here:
http://elbib.nbchr.ru/lib_files/0/ichk_0_0000008.pdf