Valentin Silvestrov

Composer Valentin Silvestrov began with modernist methods before shaping a distinctive postmodern idiom and, in later pieces, a spiritually inflected idiom. Among Ukrainian composers he ranks among the most significant.

Born in Kyiv on 30 September 1937, when the city belonged to the Soviet Union, Silvestrov’s given name appears in print as either Valentin or Valentyn. The Second World War interrupted his early years, so formal music study did not start until he turned fifteen. Between 1955 and 1958 he studied at the Kyiv Evening Music School. He next entered a university course in construction engineering, yet soon yielded to music and transferred to the Kyiv Conservatory, where he took composition lessons with Boris Lyatoshynsky and counterpoint lessons with Levko Revustky. While still a student he produced works whose eclectic character drew notice, at times setting purely tonal passages beside wholly atonal ones. His Piano Sonatina dates from 1960; three years later he completed the first of what would become nine symphonies by the early 2020s.

Over time Silvestrov cultivated a personal manner often labeled postmodern, a quality he himself characterized as allegorical or metaphorical. Many scores drew on historical idioms, employing conventional tonal and modal harmonies that were nevertheless placed in new juxtapositions and contexts. Symphony No. 3 (“Eschatophony”), finished in 1966, set “cultural” sounds written in standard notation against “mysterious” passages left to improvisation. Certain compositions stretched to considerable length; the forty-five-minute piano trio Drama (1971) is one example, while Symphony No. 5 (1982) unfolds in nine slow movements that absorb apparently ordinary melodies into an intricate, multistylistic fabric. In 1974 Silvestrov came under official censure, partly for having denounced the 1968 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia and partly because his music satisfied neither Socialist Realism nor the approved modernist currents sanctioned by Soviet authorities. He withdrew from public musical life for several years, composing only for private performances. After resurfacing, and especially once the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991, his output shifted again toward choral music that incorporated elements of Orthodox liturgical tradition. A pianist as well as a composer, Silvestrov has released ten albums of his own music on the ECM label. He has continued to work well into advanced age, completing Symphony No. 9 in 2019. Several scores embed Ukrainian national references; when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, he left the country and settled in Berlin, Germany.