Peteris Vasks

Review: Peteris Vasks (1946), Latvia's most prominent composer, was the son of a Baptist minister, and while he always felt a strong affinity for sacred music, he didn't feel free to express it through vocal music since it would never have been allowed to be performed under the Communist regime. Since the early '90s, he has turned his attention more and more to religious texts, and this CD includes three of his most significant sacred choral works, including a setting of the Mass. Vasks' style of choral writing links him to the composers who have come to be described as 'holy minimalists,' a group that includes Part, Gorecki, Kancheli, and Tavener, whose music, while stylistically diverse, tends to rely on tonal and modal harmonies, is frequently harmonically static or slow-moving and is often linked to plainchant and ancient liturgical traditions. Vasks' choral music is firmly rooted in Western polyphony and is for the most part traditional-sounding; there is little in it apart from certain unconventional harmonic progressions that would make it immediately identifiable as a product of the late twentieth century. Among the other holy minimalists, the sound of his music is most closely related to that of Gorecki in its harmonic textures and the somber earnestness of its moods. The three works recorded here are polyphonically and harmonically sensual, in spite of their serious tone. An exception to the sober tone is the Mass' Sanctus, which, while not exactly lighthearted, is lively; the composer imagines it 'sung by happy, little angels.' The Latvian Radio Choir sings with warmth and passion and with excellent control in the composer's extended, sustained vocal lines. Sigvards Klava, conducting Sinfonietta Riga, leads them in deeply felt performances. The CD should be of interest both to fans of choral music and of new trends in minimalism tinged with Romanticism.

Songlist: Pater noster, Dona Nobis Pacem, Missa

Review: Peteris Vasks' songs for mixed choir, like all of his compositions, provide a look at events, a portrait of the times. Quality, not quantity, is the keyword. This recording contains those compositions which the composer feels to be his best contributions to a genre which he has approached relatively sparingly.

Songlist: Three Poems By Czeslaw Milosz, Window, So Little, Encounter, Zemgale , Mate Saule (Mother Sun), Madrigals (Madrigal)#, Litene# (Ballad for 12-voiced chorus to a text by Uldis Berzins ), I, II, Dona nobis pacem

Review: Peteris Vasks' strong attachment to his Latvian home country shows particularly in his choral music. Nature, customs and traditions as well as the idea of freedom are the central themes of the texts he sets to music, while carefully using modern techniques of choral singing as well. Alternating with traditional, even archaic singing, the music creates a multi-faceted, immediately effective sound image in the listener's mind

Songlist: Musu Dziesma (Our Song), Miedzins Jaja (Sleep Was Riding), Maminai Klausidama (Following Mother's Advice)

Review: Peteris Vasks' strong attachment to his Latvian home country shows particularly in his choral music. Nature, customs and traditions as well as the idea of freedom are the central themes of the texts he sets to music, while carefully using modern techniques of choral singing as well. Alternating with traditional, even archaic singing, the music creates a multi-faceted, immediately effective sound image in the listener's mind. These six songs for female choir centre on the themes of man, nature and transience, and home in aphoristic brevity. Vasks wrote music on these folk poems which contains rewarding tasks for the choir and opens up a fascinating world of sound to the listener.

Songlist: The Sad Mother, Small, Warm Holiday, Sunmmer