Children's Choir of Russia and the Olympic Games Closing Ceremony

Of Elena Shchapova

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Olympics are the world's most important sports event for over a hundred years, the significant development in the international cooperation between countries. XXII Olympic Winter Games in Sochi has attracted the attention of the world community to Russia, but also caused serious positive changes not just in sports but also in Russian culture.

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The idea of participation of the thousand-voiced Children's choir at the Closing Ceremony of the Olympics indicates a revival of the tradition mass choir singing, widespread in Russia and the Soviet Union in times past, as well as new views about the artistic education of the younger generation.

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Difficult transition Today, Russia overcame the difficult time of the country’s transition to a new economic path, and revives traditions of massed children's singing again. We have to note that the second half of the twentieth century in the Russian Federation was marked by a number of significant achievements in children’s choral performance. Thanks to the activity of the All-Russian Choral Society (1957-1987), great success was achieved in the areas of both the science and practical application of stored theoretical knowledge. First of all, in professional education, the network of music education colleges and faculties preparing singing teachers and leaders of children’s choirs was enlarged, and evening and correspondence courses were opened at universities specializing in cultural studies. By the middle of the 1980s, the percentage of teachers in school across Russia had more than doubled. For example, in Magnitogorsk (410,000 inhabitants) in that time were 134 children’s choirs in 57 municipal schools and the 1986 «May song festival» the massed choir, which performed consisted of no less than ten thousands schoolchildren.

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Achievements of the past Children’s choral performances in USSR could not have reached such impressive standards without fundamental study of the culture of children’s voices and process of singing by physiologists, phoniatrists and educators, and the promotion and integration of these achievements into educational programs.

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All-Russian Choral Society (ARCS) popularized the new scientific knowledge of the Experimental Phonetics laboratory of the Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory and Phonetics laboratory of Scientific Institute of Arts Education of State Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of the USSR. ARCS arranged developmental programs through 76 region branches, which supervised children’s choirs. To develop extra-curricular choral activity, the ARCS ensured the scientific and instructional support of children’s choral associations at public and music schools, extra-curricular institutions, clubs and houses of culture. The experience of the Children’s Choral Studios and State Boys Choral Colleges in Leningrad (now Glinka Choral College in Sankt-Petersburg), Moscow (now Moscow State Choir College (MGHU) named after Sveshnikov), Gorkij (now Nizhniy Novgorod choral colledge named after Sivukhin) was considered the most promising and appropriate from the point of the educational process. They became something like a creative laboratory for study the process of children’s singing.

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In the late 1970-s the USSR had more than 600 choral schools and studios. The 1980s could be called the rise of massed children’s singing education, as its popularity grew significantly in that period. In the 64,168 schools in the Russia Federation there were about 18,000 organizations of the ARCS, and a large number of children’s choirs achieved the highest level of mastery.

High quality performance The high quality of children’s choral performance also spurred the work of leading Soviet composers (Banevich, Boyko, Pakhmutova, Podgaits, Rubin, Sidelnikov, Slonimsky, Kabalevsky, Kalistratov etc.). Nevertheless, children’s choral repertoire was not limited solely to secular Soviet music, but also ranges to world musical classics.

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The range and complexity of children’s choral repertoire was significantly expanded, from choral cycles and songs to oratorios, cantatas and operas. A lot of festivals of children choral music, all-Union and all-Russian competitions of children’s choirs were held.

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Due to a marked increase in the quality of education, Russian children’s choral art was highly rated at the Ninth International Conference of ISME (International Society for Music Education) in 1970. Despite the fact that in the 1990s, in Russia, the number of school and student choirs decreased, levels of many other groups continued to grow. Today this is particularly relevant given, that social and political leaders seem to be praising the advantages that vocal choir traditions have for the ethical and social values of Russian culture and are ready to support mass choir education. "The development of children's interest to music and art is the primary problem"- said conductor Valery Gergiev on a meeting of the Presidential Council for Culture and Art in the Kremlin - "I am more and more thought about how to help young people and children not to go away from music, but come to her". New steps A new step in the Russian choral art starts in February 2013. All-Russian Choral Society (ARCS) has been reconstructed through the initiatives the deputy prime minister for

social affairs of the Russian Federation Olga Golodets, Valery Gergiev and Civic Chamber at the Russian parlament.

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Children's Choir of Russia (CCR) is the first project of new ARCS. It is a truly unique choir, which brings together thousands of children from all 83 regions of Russia (the most remote region Chukotka is located about 6 200 km from Moscow), from different nationalities (Chechens, Yakuts, Tatars, Mordovias, Chukchis, Buryats and others), different religious beliefs. Several thousand children participated in the competition in September - October 2013, and the most talented, who is from 9 to 15 years old, who has a beautiful voice, the purity of intonation, as well as a cursory solfeggio reading and the singing a cappella skills, got the opportunity to take part in the project. 8

ARCS appointed a selection committee under participation well-known Russian choral conductors: Andrei Petrenko (Mariinsky Theatre Chorus), Viktor Zakharchenko (Kuban Cossack Choir), Gennady Dmitryak (Yurlov Russian State Academic Choir), Lyudmila Litsova (Saratov Theatre of Choir Music) and many others who took part in a preparation of the first music performance CCR in the new Mariinsky Theatre-2 in St. Petersburg. This event has attracted attention and united the professional and amateur choral community across the country.

Grand event The project was a grand event. CCR united not only children, but also chorus lieders, who trained and attended young singers. Many of them visited Moscow and St. Petersburg for the first time. The accommodation of the entire team at the same hotel opened an opportunity for exchange of experience and communication between participants, who noted a particularly joyful, creative and friendly atmosphere.

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It wasn’t easy to organize the project: logistic, managerial and creative. CCR consists of several independent choirs of the eight Federal districts of Russia. Each choir in addition to general musical program performs own choral program which reflect the music culture of their Regions. 9

Several musical compositions had been prepared by all singers which had just two general rehearsals in St. Petersburg. Among them were works by Sergei Rachmaninoff, Sergei Prokofiev, Georgy Sviridov, Alexander Alexandrov and other Russian composers.

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For a thousand-voices choir was difficult to find an adequate space for rehearsals and a concert. Even a Mariinsky Theatre-2 stage was not large enough, and thousand children barely placed on. Then young singers had to meet with technical difficulties. Due to the lack of monitors, the children in the back rows could barely see Valery Gergiev, who conducted from the orchestra pit, Therefore, the first rows of young singers had to sit during the concert. Fortunately all the difficulties were overcome. We hope in the future such complexity should be provided and fixed.

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Russian President visited the general rehearsal, and although Vladimir Putin is not "risked" to add his voice to singing (as it did for example Angela Merkel with German children’s choir), he listened with great attention the program and then communicated with young singers with big interest.

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The debut of the Children's Choir of Russia was held with Valery Gergiev and the Mariinsky Theatre Symphony Orchestra in St. Petersburg on January 8. After the concert Valery Gergiev said, "it was a musical event of the highest quality, one of the most exciting moments not only in the history of recently opened Mariinsky-2, but also in my life" („Rossijskaja Gazeta” Newspaper from 07/02/2014). A full house, grandiose applause and live webcast confirm the high artistic level of the program. This concert is now available on TV “Kultura” and youtube. The performance at the Mariinsky Theatre-2 was a kind of general rehearsal to the Closing Ceremony for the Sochi 2014 Olympic Games. Various projects – looking ahead After this big event, the choir will take part in various cultural projects, festivals. "Children's Choir of Russia was not created as a one-time Olympic project. This is a grand event of contemporary musical culture of Russia. Singing and choral training is the process which has to develop in Russia today.

I hope soon there will be a wide variety of children's choirs, thousands, in each Federal District, in each city. And I prophesy the success of this grand plan. So wait for further developments. I think that in next time Children's Choir of Russia will be of million perfectly singing children" – said maestro Valery Gergiev ("Rossijskaja Gazeta" 07/02/2014).

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Our colleagues, ARCS, the choirmasters themselves, the ones, who work with children’s choirs, put in a lot of effort to make this wonderful project as a part of Russia’s reality. To implement this big project, ARCS had demonstrated a high quality of organization work and willingness for bigger choral events, such as World Choir Games, quite possible in the near future in Sochi. Today we have reason to hope that the government and social institutions of Russia will try to create conditions which generate support for youth choirs and the development of cooperation throughout the network, including on an international level. FOTOS 1 – 3. Children's Choir of Russia is a participant of Closing Ceremony for the Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games 4. The concert of schoolchildren. Conductor – composer, music educator and president of the International Society of Musical Education Dmitri Kabalevsky (Tashkent. 1960s) 5. The First State Boys Choral Colleges in USSR (Leningrad. 1940) 6. The concert of Children’s Choral Studios in the State Kremlin Palace (Moscow. 1980s) 7. Valery Gergiev (Chairman of ARCS) and Pavel Pozhigajlo (Executive Secretary of ARCS) voted "Yes" at the founding meeting ARCS (Moscow. 2013) 8. The National qualifying competition for Children's Choir of Russia in Buryatia 9. The Choir of the Southern Federal District of Russia as a part of Children's Choir of Russia. Conductor – Viktor Zakharchenko (St. Petersburg. 2014) 10. Children's Choir of Russia on the stage of Mariinsky Theatre-2 (St. Petersburg. 2014) 11. Russian President Vladimir Putin and participants of Children's Choir of Russia (St. Petersburg. 2014)

LINKS The choir of Glinka Choral College in St. Petersburg performs "Let God Resurrect" from Concerto № 34, by Dmitri Bortnjanski (1751-1825) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iP_rKBPDufE The Film "Voices of the heart" about Moscow State Choir College named after Sveshnikov http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COkKuNbN0GM The concert of Children's Choir of Russia in Mariinsky Theatre-2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6AhZER7qgA