Ru
EnA. Shadrina
The church-singing culture of the Rostov region at the close of the 1950–1980s
The article is devoted to the peculiarities of the church-singing culture in the Rostov Region for a period of “the second wave of persecutions” the Russian Orthodox Church in the USSR. This period was characterized by intensified control of religious organizations on the part of Soviet government bodies and massed ideological pressure to bear including the precentors and choristers of the church choirs. Analysis of the archives original sources (to be not appearing in the research works till now) allows establish that church-singing collectives (to debar from participation in divine services forcedly) reverted to the usual life since opening the temples in the years of the Great Patriotic War. But from the later 1950s on the initiative of the local authorities the number of choristers of the church choirs was strictly declined. The noted declining was mounted to 50 per cent for the parish churches (from 15–20 to 8–12 choristers). The commissioned age qualifications were the cause of raise the age of choristers. As a result to the later 1970s church-singing culture premeditatedly was in the conditions of surviving and the professional level of the appropriate collectives was essentially reduced. For a period of the 1980s, since stoppage of the named ideological pressure, the gradual rebirth of church choirs was happen. The number and qualitative level of choristers are increased. The musicians with professional education were at the church choirs. In connection with it, the problem of the repertoire for singing collectives was actualized. The analysis of reserved authentic church collections of music displays that in the Rostov Region they showed the preference to the divine-service canticles of the period German influence the Russian sacred music, and the works by the regional church composers.
Key words
church-singing culture of the Rostov Region, “the second wave of persecutions” the Russian Orthodox Church in the USSR, town temples, precentors of the Rostov Region, music collections, regional church composers.
For citation
Shadrina A. The church-singing culture of the Rostov region at the close of the 1950–1980s // South-Russian Musical Anthology. 2021. No. 4. Pp. 124–132.
