«The winter evening» by A. Pushkin in the composer reflections.
Background.In recent years, there has an increasing interest in the study-ing of musical thinking by methods gender psychology science. Elements of individual and typical composer styles are visible on the creative working with same poet text. The special interest is concluding to study vocal pieces written by several authors which have also one name – «The winter evening» by A. Pushkin and the piano part. These authors are composers of the same national school, but representative of different musi-cal styles and generations. Their names are Michael Yakovlev, Nikolai Medtner, Samuil Feinberg, Georgy Sviridov and Valentin Silvestrov. Objectives.The objectives of this study are to determine the phenomenon of image unity on which the meaning of musical works are basing. The archetypal image of the Mother (by the definite of S. Birkhojzer-Ojeri) presents the key of the cognition. It appears on different levels of the music and stimulates the development of dramatic lines according to the composer idea. Methods. The study is based on a complex approach and the method of gender-semantic analysis. Results.There are more than 45 musical version of Pushkin’s poetry «The winter evening». In this study 5 works are chosen that have the same performers – for voice and piano, the author’s «The winter evening» as a title-name and the presence of a time perspective. This poetry was written in the one of difficult periods from Pushkin’s life when he couldn’t live in Moscow or Petersburg. The poem demonstrates sadness and depression of the author. This is described by means of romantic style-image: a winter, a storm, a blizzard, the bad weather, the sadness, a decline of hopes and a loneliness of the lyric hero. The poem contains four stanzas (8 lines each) and realizes the features of musical forms. The poet uses the exact reprises: first four lines from stanza 1 are the same ones from stanza 4 and last lines of the poetry repeat first four lines from stanza 3. Sound images appear in special words as knock, noise, crying, buzz, woman’s singing. This poetry creates its musical doubles.The archetype of the Mother is the basis of musical works. From the point of view of gender semantics there are a prevalence of women’s type markers in the poetry. Among them for example are (in Russian grammar): a storm, a mist, she, the ramshackle roof, a straw, the sad and dark ramshackle hut, my tired old woman, a good girlfriend, my poor youth, a mug, a song, a tit, a maiden, water. These words are dividing into three groups of artistic image: 1) Nature, 2) Woman (her different sides) and 3) other objects which are the symbol of mother’s beginning. Nature is connected with the archetypal image of the Mother through the idea of the harmony between Life and Death, the unity of light and dark, the triad: Birth, Death and regeneration (it reminds about «symbol of Eight»). One of the first musical incarnation is writing «The winter evening» by Michael Yakovlev (1798–1868). He was a friend of the poet, the singer (baritone) and the popular composer in the salon style. This song is a typical sample of the ordinary town romance. The composer does not open in this music piece psychological levels of the maintenance. There is another musical version in the legacy of Nicolas Medtner (1879–1951). It is the composer’s early vocal piece but it is very popular in our time and many perform-ers include this song in their concert repertoire. Medtner interprets the artistic image of the winter evening in the romantic style. Passages in the piano part draw an image of a blizzard, it corresponds to gusts in the human troubled heart. In this music the winter is coming to the double of a personality, it self’s universe. The archetype of the Mother as a strength of the creation or the destruction gets on the first plane of the romance. The song of the same name gets to the vocal cycle “Ten romances on the text by A. Pushkin”, op. 26 (¹ 2), writing by Samuil Feinberg (1890–1962). The musical lan-guage of this piece is complicated. The composer brings into the melody empty intervals (quints and quarters) and descending seconds; he uses a polyphony technique, intonation repetitions and irregular rhythm. Author refuses the last poetry stanza (four lines) therefore a sense of this song changes. On the first plane there is the winter (a personification of the archetype of the Mother) as a symbol of a cold, an emptiness, a sleep, a freeze and a death. There is a new decision of the romance by Georgy Sviridov (1915–1998) in the cycle “Six songs on the text by A. Pushkin” (1935). Here the winter contains the next semantic line: a blizzard, a howl = a sound of a spindle (a buzz) = a perpetual movement as a symbol of the eternal life and at the same time it’s terminus. The appearance of a chorale in a middle of the vocal piece changes the main artistic image. It is an another chain where there is an old woman, a nurse, an old age, the evening of the life, a winter, an experience, a mysterious knowledge, a chorale, a sacredness. The archetype of the Mother in this interpretation is bonding with a beginning of create, a Woman, her important knowledge and a skill to the magic of Nature. A different version there is in the cycle “The soft songs” by Valentin Silvestrov (b. 1937). The composer uses a transparency of expressive means, slow movement, a simple accompaniment in the piano part, where the bass line is a harmonic support for the vocal melody. This style reminds of the composer’s writing by M. Yakovlev. It is an example of a dialog between different times, cultures, generations, styles in a space of the same artistic meta-image. But V. Silvestrov interprets the piano as a sonorous instrument; he creates a vibrating space with pedal effects, a special intonation line, features of the rhythm 6/8, a soft vocal (sotto voce). This song is a sincere conversation, the reflection. In the context the winter means a stop, a cold, a pause of the life because it is only waiting for an awakening. Efficient strengths of the archetype of the Mother and the reflection as a faculty of a human consciousness are sublimated in this music. Conclusions.The artistic meta-image of the vocal piece which was writing by differ-ent composers and has the same name includes one of the archetype of the culture – the archetype of the Mother. Mother’s archetype stipulates the choice to features of an ex-pressiveness. In the field of the creative dialogue there are a sincerity and a simplicity by M. Yakovlev, the nostalgic romanticism by N. Medtner, a polyphony and a coldness by S. Feinberg, a sound image and a sacredness by G. Sviridov, the reflection and a quiet conversation by V. Silvestrov.