This monographic album published by Deutsche Grammophon strikes a chord with this tribute to the composer Sofia Gubaidulina on the occasion of her ninetieth birthday. Three recent works are recorded here, in their world premiere, by the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra conducted by Andris Nelsons, who is a great admirer of the intellectual, spiritual and sensual music of the great Russian composer. In 1959, as Shostakovich's assistant, Gubaidulina composed a Chamber Symphony that was much appreciated by the Soviet composer, who encouraged her to continue in this direction. But it was not until the 1980s that her work began to receive international recognition, thanks to interpreters such as Gidon Kremer, the Arditti Quartet and Sir Simon Rattle.
In 2018, Sofia Gubaidulina wrote Ich und du ("I and Thou"), her third violin concerto, composed for the virtuoso Vadim Repin in reference to the masterpiece of the same name by the philosopher Martin Buber published in 1923. Both philosophical and theological, this book speaks of Otherness as an essential dimension of all human life. Gubaidulina sets this duality to music in the form of a powerful wordless dialogue between the solo violin and the orchestra.
First performed at the Wien Modern Festival in 2020 in a Musikverein left almost deserted by the coronavirus pandemic, The Wrath of God is her most recent work, a piece of telluric power using a large brass, percussion, bell and string ensemble and written in connection with the instrumental interlude of the same name from her oratorio About Love and Hate.
Despite its title that sounds like a promise of hope, The Light of the End, composed in 2003, is essentially dramatic. This work plays on Sofia Gubaidoulina's conflicts and inner demons, represented musically by dissonances that struggle to be resolved. Gubaidulina's powerful and expressive music is striking for its message and its originality. © François Hudry/Qobuz