“4 Preludes” Pianist Eva Doroszkowska
Garūta’s piano preludes stand as a testament to Latvian resilience and artistry. Born in 1902, her music combines traditional motifs with Romantic influences, mirroring her nation’s turbulent past. Pianist Eva Doroszkowska, visits Garuta’s historical home observing her workplace and examines the expressive harmonies and rhythmic intricacies that define Garūta’s work.
Rainis and Aspazija’s poetry in the music of Lūcija Garūta
2015 will be the year of Rainis and Aspazija’s 150th birthday. Valuing the work of both writers highly and actually even confessing their love for it, “Mūzikas Saule” wants to contribute to honoring both masters. Here is the text of the first swallow – the granddaughter of Lūcija Garūta’s sister, sculptor Daina Pormale, about the creative dialogue between Garūta and Rainis.
Lūcija Garūta. Vēstules
Lūcija Garūta ir rakstījusi daudz. It sevišķi tad, ja šķīris attālums, bijis kas vēstījams, radies kāds samezglojums vai sakāms kas īpašs.
Komponiste, pianiste, pedagoģe
“Starry—that’s what I call Lūcija Garūta in spirit. Her music takes you from the earth, it lifts you towards the stars and the sun. Her music has the power of tenderness that cleanses and explains.” (Z. Mauriņa).
Oļģerts Grāvītis, Lūcijas Garūtas Klavierkoncerts (1956)
In just over a century of independent Latvia’s development of music history, 4 names of female composers already stand out. The first is Marija Gubene (1872-1947), (author of many tasteful arrangements of folk songs), a graduate of the organ class of the Moscow Conservatory, later joined in the 1920’s by graduates from the Riga Conservatory by:Paula Līcīte, Laura Reinholde and Lucija Garūta. The name that is the most significant of these composers, is Lūcija Garūta. Her work covers a broad spectrum of genres. Reaching professional maturity early on, her music enriched the cultural values of Latvian Soviet music together with the art of Jānis Ivanovs, Ādolfs Skulte, Marģers Zariņš, Arvīds Žilinskis, Jānis Ķepītis, Jānis Ozoliņš and other talented contemporary composers. Lūcija Garūta was born in Riga on May 14, 1902 into a working class family. The middle sister of 3 daughters, she engaged with music from an early age, although no one in her family received a musical education. Thinking continually about music, she says to her elder sister, “You don’t need to sing real songs at all, it’s enough just to sing about what you see around you,” as they return home one evening after a walk, “ then new melodies always come out,” she explains. Confirming her statement, she sings a self-composed melody about flowers she observes in the beautiful Vērmaņa garden. Her only concern is how to write down these melodies? Her older sister already learnt how to write at school and taught her little sister already to read fluently in Latvian and Russian. This however, is no help for writing the young Lūcijā’s self composed melodies. Neither her father, weary from work or her mother can advise their young daughter. She decides to learn for herself. Fortunately a few days later, an old collection of folk tunes falls into Lūcija’s hands. Seeing the strange dots and stalks next to melodies with words from songs she already knows, she is able to decipher the meaning of the strange symbols, using her listening skills to understand the different pitch notations hearing the music in her head without any instrument at all. With a little more time and effort Lūcijā can freely sing all the melodies included in the collection. Most importantly, she knows how to record her flights of melodic fantasy on sheets of self-made sheet music. An amazing musical talent is revealed. The little composer had not yet begun learning a musical instrument but seeing her keen interest, her father managed to buy a piano. This instrument at home opened up unexplored artistic horizons for Lūcija, as she puts her notation skill to good use. Every evening she improvises, never tiring of playing on the piano much to her family’s delight. Developing her skill, all of Lūcija’s dreams are invested in the piano, forgetting other childhood games. Finally at the age of seven, Lūcija Garūta has the opportunity to study with the well-known cellist Otto Fogelmanis (1876-1926) who turned out to be a good piano teacher for her. His pedagogical method has the ability to unleash the creative imagination of his students whilst working on their musical refinement. He motivates and encourages Lūcija not to abandon her early attempts at composition. Her first composition from this time is a solo song “Jūrnieks”, a programmatic miniature composed to her own text. At school her classmates soon discover this musical side to her personality and the pianist that is blossoming. She enjoys contributing to the school’s musical events with her intimate and personal sound world. Strong-willed, she ignores the advice of others to start cultivating theoretical knowledge more seriously. She worries that studying theory will not allow her to compose from the heart. Despite these concerns, aged 15, Lucija begins her theoretical education under the guidance of music critic and composer Nikolajs Alunans (1859-1919). At the same time she has piano lessons with Marija Žilinska, a former student of world renowned pianist, Anton Rubinštein. In the autumn of 1919 the Riga Conservatory is founded in the newly independent Latvia. Lūcija Garūta enrols in the piano class. Her talents are spotted during entrance aural exams by Jāzeps Vītols, the conservatoire’s director. Vitols hears many things about this young talented student and learns of her compositions, which over the years, have accumulated to a substantial amount of work. Under Vitols’ direction, encouraged by his enthusiasm and guidance, Lūcijā Garūta takes her first steps in a small group of young composers – first to learn the “secrets” of the art of composition in the newly founded Riga Conservatory. In 1924, Lūcija Garūta graduates from Jāzeps Vītola’s composition class, a year later receiving her piano diploma. Travelling to Paris in 1926 and 1928, provides Lūcijā Garūta the opportunity of working with excellent musicians abroad including the composer Paul Dukas. A successful independent career is begun. By 1925 Lūcijā Garūta has become a well known name with the Riga concert going public, holding regular musical evenings showcasing her compositions and featuring many outstanding singers of the time : Milda Brechmane-Štengele and Ādolfs Kaktiņš amongst others. An excellent soloist and accompanist she creates a regular series of chamber music concerts, which through her participation, sees her artistry flourish and establishes a tradition of music making with a high level of excellence in Riga. In the autumn of 1927 the second chapter of Lūcijā Garūta’s musical career began – her work as a pedagogue in piano and theory at the Riga Conservatory. This was later to become the State Conservatory under the Soviet regime and during this period, Lūcijā Garūta retained her position in the newly named music academy. A force of nature, she was a favourite amongst the composition teaching faculty. It is thanks to her that an entire generation of young music academics and composers gained theoretical knowledge and training under her tutelage. The list of Lūcijā Garūta’s compositions is extensive: symphonic compositions Teiksma, 1932 and Meditation 1934 ; variations “ My homeland “ 1935 and piano works, the “Variations in F minor”
Koncerts klavierēm un orķestrim
Veltīts māsasmeitas Lailiņas piemiņai
Sapņainā, skumstošā, svētā. Lūcijas Garūtas mīlestības.
Oratorio “God, thy earth is aflame!” is the most notable work of Lūcijas Garūta, which made him widely known in Latvia and the world. However, thanks to her outstanding talent as a pianist and long-term cooperation with singers, she has also composed many songs that can be seen as pearls of vocal chamber music. The most popular of them, “Svētā mīlā”, is a masterpiece in the genre of Latvian solo songs, which experienced its climax precisely in the interwar period, because in the following Soviet years, intimate lyrics were largely denied. The story of this song reveals to us not only the troubled personal life of the young composer, but also changes in her ideas about love.
Liene Jakovļeva par kantāti "Dievs, Tava zeme deg!"
Viņas mūzika aizrauj no zemes, tā ceļ zvaigznēm un saulei pretī. Viņas mūzikā ir maiguma spēks, kas šķīstī un skaidro.” Tā par komponisti, pianisti, mūzikas teorētiķi un pedagoģi Lūciju Garūtu teikusi rakstniece Zenta Mauriņa.
Improvizācijas meistare
Numerically, there is a small group of Latvian musicians who graduated from both composition and piano classes at the Latvian Conservatory, often playing their works in concerts – Arvīds Žilinskis, Lauma Reinholde, Pēteris Plakidis. And, of course, Lūcija Garūta, because it was her concert activity in Latvia between the wars that was the most active and the most extensive, giving both solo concerts and performing the duties of concertmaster.
Lūcija Garūta Latvijas kormūzikas ābele
Even as a child, I used to read the last pages of the book as the first. Over time I’ve chalked this up to a greater interest in causes rather than solutions – I’m a stickler for the retrospective, which also correlates well with an interest in music history.
