On two recent episodes of The Pursuit of Beauty podcast, I had the tremendous privilege of interviewing long-time Orthodox Arts Journal contributor Vladimir Morosan. He relates his experiences traveling abroad to the Soviet Union, being given access to photograph thousands of musical scores, and his process smuggling them back to the United States. He founded the publishing company, Musica Russica, as a means of making these Russian choral treasures available to the general public. We discuss the deliberate suppression of Russian Orthodox music, the resurgence of sacred music post-1990, and the seeming absence of any real successors to the Tchaikovsky – Kastalsky – Rachmaninov lineage of great Russian choral composers. Considerable time is spent explicating the distinctions between Kievan, Znamenny and Obikhod chant, especially as those terms are used in a modern American context, as well as touching upon Valaam, Byzantine, and Carpatho-Rusyn chant traditions. Of particular interest is the role that the Old Believers played in the preservation of Znamenny chant.

In the second interview, we go into more detail concerning Tchaikovsky’s role in renewing interest in Znamenny chant, as well as the purported “savior of Russian choral music,” Kastalsky. Vladimir has a unique relationship with Kastalsky, as Musica Russica was instrumental in publishing Kastalsky’s Requiem in the West for the first time, a score which would later be utilized in a Grammy-winning recording. We went into detail about lesser-known composers, such as Tcherepnin, Golovanov, Kalinnikov, and Steinberg, as well as current projects that Vladimir is working on, such as the Orthodox Church Music Journal. We delve into the philosophical conundrum of innovating within a tradition, and touch on topics as wide as Appalachian chant, Alaskan chant tones, and Western Rite music.

The combined four and half hours of discussion was some of the most interesting and engaging conversation that I have had thus far on The Pursuit of Beauty podcast, and I hope that you will find it edifying and informative:

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