Dmytro Bortniansky

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Dmytro Stepanovych Bortniansky (Ukrainian: Дмитро Степанович Бортнянський, Dmitro Stepanovych Bortnians’kyi; Russian: Дмитрий Степанович Бортнянский, Dmitrij Stepanovič Bortnjanskij; also referred to as Dmitry or Dmitri Bortnyansky; 1751-1825) was a Ukrainian composer in Imperial Russia. He composed in many different musical styles, including choral compositions in French, Italian, Latin, German, Slavonic and Russian.

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[edit] Student

Dmytro Bortniansky was born on October 28, 1751 in the city of Hlukhiv in present-day Ukraine (officially referred to as "Glukhov" at the time, as part of the Russian Empire). At the age of seven, his prodigious talent at the local church choir afforded him the opportunity to go the capital of the empire and sing with the Imperial Chapel Choir in St. Petersburg. There he studied music and composition under the director of the Imperial Chapel Choir, the Italian master Baldassare Galuppi, with whom a bond was developed. When Galuppi left for Italy in 1769, Bortniansky went with him. In Italy, he gained considerable success composing operas: Creonte (1776) and Alcide (1778) in Venice, and Quinto Fabio (1779) at Modena. He also composed sacred works in Latin and German, both a capella and with orchestral accompaniment (including an Ave Maria for two voices and orchestra).

[edit] Master

Bortniansky returned to the court at St. Petersburg in 1779 and flourished creatively. He composed at least four more operas (all in French, with libretti by Franz-Hermann Lafermière): Le Faucon (1786), Le Fete du Seigneur (1786), Don Carlos (1786), and Le Fils-Rival ou La Moderne Stratonice (1787). Bortniansky wrote a number of instrumental works at this time, including piano sonatas and a piano quintet with harp, and a cycle of French songs. He also composed liturgical music for the Russian Orthodox Church, combining Eastern and Western European the styles of sacred music, incorporating the polyphony he learned in Italy; some works were polychoral, using a style descended from the Venetian polychoral technique of the Gabrielis.

After a while, Bortniansky's genius proved too great to ignore, and in 1796 he was appointed Director of the Imperial Chapel Choir, the first director not to have been imported from outside of the Russian Empire. With such a great instrument at his disposal, he produced scores upon scores of compositions, including over 100 religious works, sacred concertos (35 for four-part mixed choir, 10 for double choruses), cantatas, and hymns.

Dmytro Bortniansky died in St. Petersburg on October 10, 1825, and is interred at Alexander Nevsky Monastery in St. Petersburg.

[edit] Musical legacy

In 1882, Pyotr Tchaikovsky edited the liturgical works of Bortniansky, which were published in ten volumes. While Dmytro Bortniansky's operas and instrumental compositions are on par with those of the great classical composers, it is his sacred choral work that is performed most often today. This vast body of work remains central not only to understanding 18th century Russian sacred music, but also served as inspiration to his fellow Ukrainian composers in the 19th century.

The tune he wrote for the Latin hymn Tantum Ergo eventually became known in Slavic lands as Коль славен (Kol slaven), in which form it is still sung as a Christmas carol today. The tune was also popular popular with freemasons. It travelled to English speaking countries and came to be known by the names Russia, St. Petersburg or Wells; in Germany, the song was paired with a text by Gerhard Tersteegen, and became a well-known chorale and ­traditional closing piece to the military ritual Großer Zapfenstreich (the Ceremonial Tattoo). Prior to the October revolution in 1917, the tune was played by the Moscow Kremlin carillon every day at midday.

James Blish, who novelized many episodes of the original series of Star Trek, noted in one story, Whom Gods Destroy, that Bortniansky's Ich bete an die Macht der Liebe was the theme "to which all [Starfleet] Academy classes marched to their graduation."

[edit] Works

[edit] Operas

[edit] Choruses

  • Da ispravitsia molitva moia ("Let My Prayer Arise") no. 2.
  • Khiruvimskaia pesn (Cherubic Hymn) no. 7
  • Concerto No. 24: Vozvedokh ochi moyi v gory ("I Lift Up My Eyes to the Mountains")
  • Concerto No. 27: Glasom moim ko Gospodu vozzvakh ("With My Voice I Cried Out to the Lord")
  • Concerto No. 32: Skazhi mi, Gospodi, konchinu moyu ("Lord, Make Me to Know My End")

[edit] External links

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