Algorithms of interpretation of poly-timber vocal and instrumental ensembles in the concertmaster class
Authors: Iniutochkina Nina 
Published: July 2024

Statement of the problem. A significant part of the repertoire in the concertmaster class is chamber vocal works that engage the synthesis of Word and Music, that is, the inseparable trinity of the poetic text, its vocal embodiment, and instrumental accompaniment, which calls for the need for accurate correlation of the efforts of the singer and concertmaster, the performers’ synergy. And although chamber vocal works mostly have purely piano accompaniment, in some cases a part of a string or wind instrument is added to it, and then the mentioned trinity of musical and poetic synthesis is complicated by the appearance of a new, “performance” trinity unit of vocal and two instrumental parts, which requires especially high-quality ensemble, and therefore a special study of algorithms for its achievement, because the teacher from the concertmaster class has to be a kind of director in coordinating all the layers of the musical texture of such a poly-timbre ensemble. Objectives, methods, and novelty of the research. The purpose of this article is to designate a certain algorithm for the interpretation of a chamber vocal-instrumental ensemble in the concertmaster class as a poly-timbre structure represented by the performance trinity of vocal and instrumental parts. Until now, the interpretative issues of a musical and poetic work have not yet been thoroughly considered in scientific publications under such angle. Imagery and dramatic, intonation, timbre and textural, structural and functional, and performance analysis of the musical and poetic text of a number of chamber vocal compositions of different times and styles (by J. Brahms, V. Barvynsky, V. Sylvestrov), carried out in the study, reveals the specifics of the formimg the ensemble vocal and instrumental texture of works as an artistic integrity. Research results and conclusion. Given the specifics of vocal and instrumental compositions with the involvement of an additional string or wind instrument in the piano accompaniment, we state the advisability of using a certain algorithm for learning them in the concertmaster class. First, it is an in-depth analysis of the poetic original source of the work, if necessary, its complete translation from a foreign language, in order to reveal its leading idea and circle of images. Secondly, it is necessary to determine the main factors influencing the style and quality of the performance of the piece, namely: – the type of relationship between Words and Music, as well as the syntactic features of the verbal text, which determine the character of vocal and instrumental intonation; – genre orientation of the composition; – the functions of the instruments in the ensemble, according to the figurative dramaturgy and structure of the composition, both purely textural (solo, accompaniment, subvoice), and figurative-semantic (“Author’s voice”, “adding”, “finishing” of the vocal part, “leit-timbre”, etc.). Therefore, the poly-timbre quality of the accompaniment of the vocal part becomes an important “starting point” of the interpretive work on the vocal piece in the class of concertmaster skill. The performance “trinity unit” obliges to a particularly coordinated ensemble, in particular, between the instrumental parts, when they together realize the artistic idea of the vocal work as the embodiment of the “correlation of the author’s systems (Poet – Composer)” (Buchok, 2022: 44). Regarding the latter, according to our observation, the considered type of chamber vocal instrumental ensemble is connected with the involvement of poetic sources with special semantics – those that appeal to images and ideas of a “higher plane”, are aimed at spiritual contemplation, or convey personal “movements of the soul”, the adequate perception of which is impossible outside the context (in the examined compositions by J. Brahms, V. Barvinsky and V. Sylvestrov – spiritual and religious ones), which implies the presence of poly-semantic figurative structures in such works. So, the use by composers of the timbre of an additional solo instrument in chamber vocal compositions can be connected with the artistic embodiment of a “higher principle”: the inclusion of a segment of “pure” (instrumental) music best conveys the sublimity and spiritual pathos of the images of the poetic Word, reveals its semantic connotations, “personifying” the higher ideological level of the work or the actual “voice” of the Author (Poet – Composer).