The «virtus» problem in musical performing
Authors: Ilienko M.M. 
Published: March 2020

The article is devoted to consideration of a virtuosity phenomenon (from Latin virtus – virtue, talent) in musical performing. It is stated that this phenomenon and research approaches to it compose an entire musical area in today’s performing musicology which has been actively developing during the last two or three decades both abroad and in Ukraine. The given research underlines strong connection of a performing virtuosity with other phenomena and categories dealing with the problem under consideration. First of all, it is thinking of a musician-interpreter acting as an authentic co-author of a piece of music as well as his/her style, the so-called “stylish performance” (according to L. Gakkel), which employs music expression as the main feature of its semantics from the point of affecting audience. The article observes stages of formation of performing art, which are closely related to the evolution of musical thinking, and distinguishes instruments that were taking the lead at different historical periods. Therefore, all these factors together stipulate scientific originality of the suggested research. It is noted that traditionally the concept of “virtuosity” in performing art, as a rule, reflects only one aspect of artistic process – the technical one which is connected with professional skills of a musician. As if behind the scenes there remains a philosophical and aesthetic background of virtuosity leading to praxeology – the science about forms of human activity. From this perspective, “activity” is linked to “freedom” and makes up a dialectical pair with it. In other words, the freer a performer is, the higher level of his “mastery of doing” (according to T. Cherednichenko) is, and the more widely he understands the category of virtus, which came to Baroque music from the theatrical theory of affects. It was during this time that the “class” of professional virtuoso performers was formed, which makes Baroque “concert style” basically different from the Renaissance one in which the performers – choristers and orchestra members – were “anonymous”. Each performing school – epochal, national, regional, authorial – develops its own performing standards, determined by the peculiarities of musical thinking under different historical or “geographical” conditions. As a result of these processes, paradigmatic attitudes of musical thinking emerge in the form of its social communicative and artistic determinants, generating one or another type of musical culture, including its performing aspect. It is proved that musical performing was most influenced by evolution of semantic ideas which serve as a basis for epochal stylistic systems: 1) in Antiquity there prevailed an “idea of a number” which dealt directly with cosmological harmonia mundi (the leading instruments were plucked string ones – lyre, cithara as well as aulos; 2) in the Middle Ages influenced by the ideas of Antiquity the Christian idea of Divine Universe was prevailing, and performing culture-bearers were anonymous choristers performing Gregorian chants and their first adaptations; 3) Renaissance period with its idea of humanization of art puts a focus on the image of a virtuoso creator that combines the roles of a performer and a composer (the leading instruments here are organ and clavier in combination with voices and bowed string instruments); 4) Baroque period with its cult of theory of affects is notable for the image of a virtuoso performer that combined in-depth knowledge and high-class technique (the range of instrumental timbres was being expanded significantly – up to the usage of most instruments of then-orchestra with the focus on bowed string instruments as well as some brass ones – flute, trumpet, oboe); 5) Classicism which replaced Baroque clearly differentiated composers and performers giving a strong preference to the first ones (there could be observed a variety of performance specializations from the point of instruments: traditional bowed string instruments and a clavier were enriched with both woodwinds and brass winds). In the era of Romanticism, there can be observed a new synthesis of composer’s and performer’s intentions in the creation and representation of musical compositions of various genres and forms, compliant with the Baroque era to some extent. The style of “creative virtuosos” was formed, and it replaced the style of “playing creators” (according to N. Zhaivoronok), which constitutes the main (epochal) division in the formation and evolution of the virtus phenomenon in music: it becomes universal and can reveal itself in three versions – composer’s, performing, and mixed. The latter one includes two styles, distinguished by the emphasis on the components – composer-performer or performer-composer style (according to V. Tkachenko). As for music of the most recent period (XX – the beginning of XXI century) with its stylistic pluralism, it does not feature complicated intertwining of all variants of the phenomenon virtus that needs to be dealt with separately in terms of individual styles – composer’s and performer’s as well as their combination.