Firma Melodiya presents one of the most significant choral works by modern classic Rodion Shchedrin composed after Nikolai Leskov's story The Sealed Angel.
Shchedrin repeatedly worked in the choral genre. He was often attracted with religious plotlines and liturgical texts. And still, the choral music to The Sealed Angel has a special, personal imprint on how the composer perceives Leskov, and through it, Russian spirituality as it is.
"If the so-called Russian soul really exists, there's no one who can answer this sacramental question better than Leskov", Shchedrin wrote.
This music is not a direct reflection of the substance of Leskov's story where external events are also just a symbol. Shchedrin uses texts of Orthodox prayers and fragments from service books but does not adhere to any strictly dogmatic text. The musical structure of the piece is similar to liturgy but the prayers do not sound in the sequence of the liturgical ritual. Their purpose is to gradually disclose the main idea of the literary source, and it is an idea of "…imperishable artistic beauty, magical and elevating power of art," as Shchedrin defined it.
Shchedrin's work is performed by two outstanding choirs – the State Academic Russian Choir and the Moscow Choir conducted by Vladimir Minin.
