Honoured Art Worker of the RSFSR Lev Sivukhin
L. K. Sivukhin
Lev Konstantinovich Sivukhin was born in Gorky on 9 May 1935. He studied at the boys’ choir chapel and the Gorky Music College, then at the Glinka Gorky State Conservatory, from which he graduated in 1959.
The young, gifted musician gives all his strength and energy to the professional training of the rising generation of chapel boys.
His great and fruitful work with the boys’ choir chapel bound this versatile musician to this collective for life. From 1952 to 1960 he worked at the boys’ choir chapel as a teacher, and from 1960 to the present L. K. Sivukhin has been artistic director of the Gorky Boys’ Choir Chapel, a laureate of the Lenin Komsomol Prize.
Working with the collective of the Gorky Boys’ Choir Chapel, L. K. Sivukhin gives much attention to arrangements and adaptations of Russian folk songs for various types of choir and to other musical works.
L. K. Sivukhin’s gift as a composer, like all other aspects of his many-sided nature, is inseparably linked with the choir.
The style of L. K. Sivukhin’s choral works is distinctive, immediately recognisable and loved by listeners: “A Hundred Friends of the Song” (words by M. Marash), “Russia in My Heart” (words by M. Pushkareva), “Tell Us, Young Sailor” (words by V. Shamshurin). Recently a cycle of seven choruses to poems by A. Lyukin, “As Long as My Blood Boils”, was written for unaccompanied mixed choir.
L. K. Sivukhin’s creative activity is broad and varied. From 1972 begins the story of an interesting collective organised and led by L. K. Sivukhin, the chamber choir of the Gorky Choral Society. Despite its youth, the chamber choir is already known not only in its native city; three times it has won the main prize at the patriotic song competition in Ivanovo. The collective’s repertoire includes over 300 works of the most varied genres and styles, from early choral polyphony to contemporary composers.
L. K. Sivukhin, together with the boys’ choir chapel and the chamber choir, makes an invaluable contribution to promoting the work of the Gorky composers A. Kasyanov, A. Nesterov, B. Blagovidov, G. Komrakov, B. Getselev, S. Strazov, A. Baryshev and other authors. Both these collectives are constant and active participants in the festivals, plenums and congresses of the Union of Composers of the RSFSR and the USSR Union of Composers.
Lev Konstantinovich Sivukhin is the first performer of a large number of choral works by Gorky composers and of a number of works by Moscow composers.
Lev Sivukhin can be considered a co-author of many works by Gorky composers: G. Komrakov’s “So That War Never Happens Again” and “We Are the Chkalov People”, A. Nesterov’s “Boys and the Sun”, cantatas, and a number of other works.
The biography of L. K. Sivukhin and the biography of the boys’ choir chapel and the chamber choir are inseparable. Joyful events, memorable dates, daily work and honours are all shared.
Tours, performances in the best halls of Moscow, Leningrad and other cities of our Motherland, recordings on records (“Melodiya” company) and television filming are an incomplete list of the occupations of these collectives and their leader.
Bright talent, painstaking work and ardent enthusiasm have determined the mastery and success of the collectives and their leader. In 1967 he was awarded the medal “For Labour Valour” and the honorary title of Honoured Art Worker of the RSFSR. The leader’s varied and remarkable musical activity is combined with teaching. Since 1962 he has taught at the Glinka Gorky State Conservatory (since 1980, acting associate professor).
Lev Konstantinovich Sivukhin, a versatile, gifted musician in love with his work and a Communist, has been admitted to the Union of Composers of the USSR; he is currently a member of the board of the Upper Volga branch of the USSR Music Fund.