Articles

https://www.lrytas.lt/kultura/scena/2019/05/08/news/grimzti-i-kuryba-kompozitoriu-arvyda-malci-skatina-beribis-smalsumas-10250322/

The  music works created by Arvydas Malcys sound more frequently abroad than in Lithuania. „I am glad to know that performers set eyes on me. It is a high appreciation of my creation“, 62-year old Lithuanian composer Arvydas Malcys told to daily „Lietuvos rytas“. The earliest opportunity of listening to music created by A. Malcys will be provided in Lithuania on 11 May at the concert of Lithuanian Chamber Orchestra be arranged at the Palace of Grand Dukes of Lithuania where his Concerto for a violin, a viola and stringed instruments will be presented. This work also had appeared in course of co-operation with foreign performers.

- You have dedicated your Concerto for a violin, a viola and stringed instruments to violist Yuri Bashmet. He played it with Russian violinist Alyona Baeva at the première (Moscow State Philharmonic, 2013).  How this work appeared? – I asked A. Malcys.

The première of the work took place at the annual Y. Bashmet Music Festival. In 2013, the said Festival was more solemn because the maestro celebrated his 60th birthday. And he ordered new works from seven composers whose creation he was interested in. They included: Tan Dun (China), Alexander Tchaikovsky (Russia), Igor Raykhelson (USA), Giovanni Sollima (Italy), Jean Luc Ponti (France), Giya Kancheli (Georgia, Germany) and me. Yuri Bashmet knew my works already: his symphony orchestra „Novaya Rossiya“ had played some of them. All the seven music works were of quite different stylistics.  In fact, the principal final concert of the Festival was huge – with circus acts and interplays, it lasted for about five hours. I think, for this reason, Y. Bashmet wished various music – from me, he ordered a concerto.

- Your  Concerto for a violin, a viola and stringed instruments is included in the programme „Amadeus in Lithuania“ of Lithuanian Chamber Orchestra“. Are there any links  with music created by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and the Concerto?

No direct links exist; however, the principal instruments – a violin, a viola and the stringed instruments – create, first of all, associations with the popular „Sinfonia concertante“ for a violin, a viola and stringed instruments by W.A. Mozart. However, the inspirations differ. Many years ago, I listened famous „Concerto grosso“ for two violins and the stringed orchestra by Alfred Schnittke at the Philharmonic performed by Gidon Kremer and Tatjana Grindenko. I was admired by the emotionality of the music work  as well as by the artistry and impressionability of the performers. This impression accompanied me for a long time. When Y. Bashmet provided me the opportunity to create  the Concerto for a violin, a viola and the stringed instruments, I wished to try conveying the emotional mood felt aforetime while listening to „Concerto grosso“ by A. Schnittke. The music work was created in the traditional form consisting of three parts according to the principles of the genre of a concerto and based on the contrast between the soloists and the orchestra developed both in the acoustic and emotional dramatic aspect. The subject of the score is odd. In the music work, the soloists are narrators of their life-stories, as if  personages with protean multifaceted music characteristics. The soloists form the axis of the whole work, they provide musical and emotional impulses to the orchestra. Three parts of the Concerto are original studies with different subject-related and emotional lines. By the way, it was the 11-th presentation of the music work: it was presented twice in Vilnius by the St Christopher Chamber Orchestra, twice – in Kaunas by Vytautas Magnus University (VMU) Chamber Orchestra, four times in Ukraine and twice in Russia. The couples of the performers differred as well: in addition to the above-mentioned soloists, violonists Bohdana Pivnenko (Ukraine), Ingrida Armonaitė, Rūta Lipinaitytė, Indrė Andrikonytė, violists Hertmut Rohde (Germany), Robertas Bliškevičius (Lithuania), Katerina Suprun (Ukraine), Vidmantė Andriūnaitė and Ugnė Gaučaitė (Lithuania) were involved. At the approaching presentation, violonist Gerald Bidva and violist Hertmut Rohde will play.

- Your works are known wordwidely, they are played by famous performers.  In addition to famous orchestra conductors of Lithuania, performance of your music works was conducted by Mstislav Rostropovich, Andris Nelsons and Sergey Krylov, they were played by David Geringas, Karine Georgian, flutist Camilla Hoitenga. How your works find their way to the repertoirs of the performers?

Our times are distinguished for a diversity of online communication opportunities. So, the music performers more and more frequently find individually the works they are interested in. I am glad to know that performers set eyes on me. It is a high appreciation of my creative activities. Today performers having entrenched in repertoires of music-halls can take the liberty of performing an interesting original music work. Each good performer, upon striving to ensure the own exclusive style, looks for works to be included in his/her original repertoire, so, in addition to chefs-d-oeuvre of classical music and music of romanticism, elects also modern works that express the today expectations and disclose the character of the specific performer. The today music should live with the changing world, reflect our daily life. In such a case, it can be relevant, interesting and attractive both for performers and the listeners. Read in addition: The 100-th season of Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre was commemorated by returns of famous Lithuanian artists.

- You are one of the most prolific Lithuanian composers and probably one of authors of today academic music whose works are most frequently performed. For merits to Lithuanian culture and arts, you were awarded with a Premium of Lithuanian Government in 2018. What  does motivate your creative activities?

I try implement in my creation some ideas that may be inaccessible in the today life. My creative activities are motivated by abundant factors; they include wishes of performers, my curiosity, striving for self-expression and cognition. Our life is a travel; creation is a kind of travel – in its end we become other, as compared to the beginning. In our times, the language of arts is highly individual. Each author creates the own signs and the own vocabulary. A music work is not only an idea or a thesis expressed in music language. It is also a document proving that the composer perceives his/her craft, aesthetics and the surrounding world.