Alexander Gretchaninoff (1864-1956)

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GRETCHANINOFF, Alexandre Tikhonovich (b. 13 [25] October, 1864, Moscow; d. 4 January, 1956, New York) — studied at the Moscow Conservatory (1881-1890) and the St. Petersburg Conservatory (1890- 1893), which he completed in composition as a student of Rimsky-Korsakov. Collaborated with various choral ensembles, including Melnikov’s Choir in St. Petersburg, the Moscow Synodal Choir and Vasilyev’s Choir in Moscow, which premiered his numerous choral compositions. Also worked in the ﬁelds of theater music, children’s music, and musical ethnography. Toured in Russia and abroad as a pianist, accompanist, and conductor. In 1925 emigrated to Paris, where he lived until 1939, when he moved to New York. Gretchaninoff composed several operas, symphonic and chamber music, as well as numerous solo songs, children’s songs and choruses, choral part songs and arrangements of folk songs for chorus. On texts from the Russian Orthodox liturgy, he composed four settings of the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, an All-Night Vigil, and a cycle of hymns from Passion Week, as well as approximately 20 shorter works. He also composed several settings of the Latin Mass and several Latin motets, some of which remain in manuscript. Early in his musical career, Gretchaninoff came under the inﬂuence of Stepan Smolensky, Director of the Moscow Synodal School of Church Music and leader of the movement to return Russian church music to its roots in ancient ecclesiastical chant and the choral folk song. Although Gretchaninoff tended not to use actual chants in his sacred works, he frequently devised new chant-like melodies. Together with other composers working at the Moscow Synodal School (e. g., Kastalsky, Chesnokov, Nikolsky), he used a rich palette of choral textures, ranging from stark unison (sometimes doubled in two or three octaves, reminiscent of Old Believers’ singing) to “choral symphonism” in eight to twelve diverse parts. In a quest to expand his expressive resources, in 1917 he made a major break with tradition by including instruments in his third setting of the Divine Liturgy, the Liturgia domestica, opus 79. No other composers have followed Gretchaninoff’s lead, however: to date this work remains the only setting of a text from the Russian Orthodox liturgy with instrumental accompaniment.

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Alexander Gretchaninoff All-Night Vigil

Vsenoshchnoye bdeniye

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: Mixed

Language: Church Slavonic

No. of titles: 10

No. of pages: 114

Cat. No: Gr-ANV

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Liturgia Domestica, (piano-vocal score)

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: Mixed

Language: Church Slavonic

No. of titles: 14

No. of pages: 88

Cat. No: Gr-DL3

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Liturgy of St John Chrysostom No. 2

Liturgiya Sv. Ioanna Zlatousta

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: Mixed

Language: Church Slavonic

No. of pages: 110

Cat. No: Gr-DL2

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Passion Week

Strastnaya sedmitsa

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: Mixed

Language: Church Slavonic

No. of titles: 13

No. of pages: 144

Cat. No: Gr-PW

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Praise God (piano-vocal score)

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: Mixed w. orchestra

Language: Church Slavonic

No. of titles: 3

No. of pages: 60

Cat. No: Gr-PG

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Alexander Gretchaninoff The Collected Sacred Choral Works, volume 2

Sobraniye duhovno-muzïkal'nïkh proizvedeniy, t. 2

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Language: Church Slavonic

No. of titles: 32

No. of pages: 440

Cat. No: M-AG2

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Alexander Gretchaninoff As Many as Have Been Baptized; Arise, O God

Yelitsï vo Hrista; Voskresni, Bozhe

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Arrangement of: Znamenny Chant

Voicing: SATB (dvi)

Language: Church Slavonic

Cat. No: Gr055

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Behold, the Bridegroom Comes

Se Zhenih griadet

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Arrangement of: Kievan Chant

Voicing: SATB(div)

Language: Church Slavonic

Cat. No: Gr044

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Beneath the Waves of the Sea

Volnoyu morskoyu

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: SATB(div)

Language: Church Slavonic

Cat. No: Gr018

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Blessed Are They Whom Thou Hast Chosen

Blazheni, yazhe izbral

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Arrangement of: Bulgarian Chant

Voicing: SATB(div)

Language: Church Slavonic

Cat. No: Gr043

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Blessed Art Thou, O Lord

Blagosloven yesi, Ghospodi

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: SATB(div)

Language: Church Slavonic

Cat. No: Gr063

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Blessed Is the Man

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: douBch

Language: Church Slavonic

Cat. No: Gr059

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Bless the Lord

Blagoslovi, dushe

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: SATB (div)

Language: Church Slavonic

Cat. No: Gr020

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Bless the Lord, O My Soul

Blagoslovi, dushe

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: SATB(div)

Language: Church Slavonic

Cat. No: Gr058

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Bumblebee

Pcholka

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: SSAA

Language: English, Russian

Cat. No: PS006

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Alexander Gretchaninoff Cherubic Hymn

Heruvimskaya pesn'

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

Voicing: SATB(div)

Language: Church Slavonic

Cat. No: Gr032

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CD track: Litany of Fervent Supplication

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Russian Sacred Hymns, Folk Songs, and Romances; recordings from 1920-1930

Performers: Feodor Shalyapin

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CD track: The Bee

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Without Time or Season: Russian Choruses for Children

Performers: The Bolshoi Theatre Children's Choir

Get the Sheet Music for this track: PS006

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CD track: Rain

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Without Time or Season: Russian Choruses for Children

Performers: The Bolshoi Theatre Children's Choir

Get the Sheet Music for this track: PS007

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CD track: Glory/Only Begotten Son

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: The Sacred Spirit of Russia

Performers: Conspirare

Get the Sheet Music for this track: Gr026

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CD track: Like The Wave Of The Sea

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: In the Bond of Love

Performers: Male Choir of the Moscow Representation Church of the Holy Trinity-St. Sergius Monastery

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CD track: The Rainbow

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Without Time or Season: Russian Choruses for Children

Performers: The Bolshoi Theatre Children's Choir

Get the Sheet Music for this track: PS008

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CD track: Bell Chimes

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Without Time or Season: Russian Choruses for Children

Performers: The Bolshoi Theatre Children's Choir

Get the Sheet Music for this track: PS009

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CD track: Lullaby

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Without Time or Season: Russian Choruses for Children

Performers: The Bolshoi Theatre Children's Choir

Get the Sheet Music for this track: PS046(wc)

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CD track: Hearken, O God

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Triumph of Russian Orthodoxy; Hymns from the Prayer Service

Performers: Choir of the Church of "Joy of All Sorrowful" Icon - Moscow

Get the Sheet Music for this track: Gr022

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CD track: Now Lettest Thy Servant Depart in Peace - Kievan Chant

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Chants of the Russian Emigres; v.9

Performers: Novospassky Monastery Choir

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CD track: It is Truly Meet

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Come, Bless the Lord

Performers: St. Symeon Orthodox Church Choir

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CD track: O Only Begotten Son

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Let God Arise

Performers: Male Choir of Moscow Representation Church of the Holy Trinity-St. Sergius Monastery

Get the Sheet Music for this track: Gr026mc

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CD track: Troparion for the Mother of God

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Today All Nations Beheld Glorious Things; Selected Hymns from Vigil, Liturgy, and Feasts

Performers: Choir of Holy Trinity-St. Sergius Monastery

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CD track: It is Truly Fitting

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Rejoice, Our Joy

Performers: Choir of Precentor School, Moscow Theological Academy

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CD track: The Creed

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: The Sacred Spirit of Russia

Performers: Conspirare

Get the Sheet Music for this track: Gr034

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CD track: The Augmented Litany

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Classical and Folk Music

Performers: Russian Patriarchate Choir

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CD track: Our Father

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: The Sacred Spirit of Russia

Performers: Conspirare

Get the Sheet Music for this track: Gr037

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CD track: Now the Powers of Heaven

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: The Sacred Spirit of Russia

Performers: Conspirare

Get the Sheet Music for this track: Gr049

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CD track: Exclaim to the Lord, All the Earth

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: We Have Seen the True Light

Performers: Male Choir of the Representation Church of the Holy Trinity-St. Sergius Monastery

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CD track: Preserve, O Lord, for Many Years

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: The Sacred Spirit of Russia

Performers: Conspirare

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CD track: Preserve, O Lord

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Orthodox Divine Liturgy; Master, Bless!

Performers: Archangel Voices

Get the Sheet Music for this track: OMP-Gr-DL3-15aE

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CD track: Only Begotten Son

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Hymns of the Russian Orthodox Church (2 CD set)

Performers: Choir of the Church of "Joy of All Sorrowful" Icon - Moscow

Get the Sheet Music for this track: Gr026

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CD track: I'll go out

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Russian Folk Songs, vol. 1 (2 CD set)

Performers: State Academic Russian Choir

Get the Sheet Music for this track: FS031

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CD track: Beneath the waves of sea

By: Alexander Gretchaninoff

On CD: Hymns of the Russian Orthodox Church (2 CD set)

Performers: Choir of the Church of "Joy of All Sorrowful" Icon - Moscow

Get the Sheet Music for this track: Gr018

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