Sofia Asgatovna Gubaidulina (born October 24, 1931) is a Russian composer.

Gubaidulina's music is characterised by the use of unusual instrumental combinations. In Erwartung combines percussion (bongos, güiros, temple
blocks, cymbals and tam-tams among others), bayan and saxophone quartet.
Career
Gubaidulina was born in Chistopol, in the Tatar ASSR. She studied composition and piano at the Kazan Conservatory, graduating in 1954. In
Moscow she undertook further studies at the Conservatory.
Gubaidulina became better known abroad during the early 1980s through Gidon Kremer's championing of her violin concerto Offertorium. She later
composed an homage to T. S. Eliot, using the text from the poet's Four Quartets. In 2000, Gubaidulina, along with Tan Dun, Osvaldo Golijov, and
Wolfgang Rihm, was commissioned by the Internationale Bachakademie Stuttgart project to write a piece for the Passion 2000 project in
commemoration of Johann Sebastian Bach. Her contribution was the Johannes-Passion.
Since 1992, Gubaidulina has lived in Hamburg, Germany.[4] She is a member of the musical academies in Frankfurt, Hamburg and the Royal
Swedish Academy of Music.
Aesthetic
For Gubaidulina, music was an escape from the socio-political atmosphere of Soviet Russia.[5] For this reason, she associated music with human
transcendence and mystical spiritualism, which manifests itself as a longing inside the soul of humanity to locate its true being, a longing she
continually tries to capture in her works.[6] These abstract religious and mystical associations are concretized in Gubaidulina's compositions in
various ways. Gubaidulina is a convinced Russian-Orthodox believer.[7] The influence of electronic music and improvisational techniques is
exemplified in her unusual combination of contrasting elements, novel instrumentation, and the use of traditional Russian folk instruments in her
solo and chamber works, such as De profundis for bayan, Et expecto- Sonata for bayan, and In croce for cello and organ or bayan.
Another influence of improvisation techniques can be found in her fascination with percussion instruments. She associates the indeterminate nature
of percussive timbres with the mystical longing and the potential freedom of human transcendence.[8]
She was also preoccupied by experimentation with non-traditional methods of sound production, and as already mentioned, with unusual
combinations of instruments, i.e. Concerto for Bassoon and Low Strings (1975), Detto- I – Sonata for Organ and Percussion (1978), The Garden of
Joy and Sorrow for Flute, Harp and Viola (1980), and Descensio for 3 Trombones, 3 Percussionists, Harp, Harpsichord/Celesta and Celesta/Piano
(1981).[9]
Gubaidulina notes that the two composers to whom she experiences a constant devotion are J.S. Bach and Webern. Among some non-musical
influences of considerable import are Carl Jung (Swiss thinker and founder of analytical psychology) and Nikolai Aleksandrovich Berdiaev (Russian
religious philosopher, whose works were forbidden in USSR, but nevertheless found and studied by the composer).[10]
Style
A profoundly spiritual person, Gubaidulina defines "re-ligio" as re-legato or as restoration of the connection between oneself and the Absolute.[8]
She finds this re-connection through the artistic process and has developed a number of musical symbols to express her ideals. She does it through
narrower means of intervallic and rhythmic relationship within the primary material of her works, by seeking to discover the depth and mysticism of
the sound, as well as on a larger scale, through carefully thought architecture of musical form.[11]
Melodically, Gubaidulina's is characterized by the frequent use of intense chromatic motives rather than long melodic phrases. She often treats
musical space as a means of attaining unity with the divine—a direct line to God—concretely manifest by the lack of striation in pitch space. She
achieves this through the use of micro-chromaticism (i.e., quarter tones) and frequent glissandi, exemplifying the lack of "steps" to the divine. This
notion is furthered by her extreme dichotomy characterized by chromatic space vs. diatonic space viewed as symbols of darkness vs. light and
human/mundane vs. divine/heavenly.[12] Finally, the use of short motivic segments allows her to create a musical narrative that is seemingly open-
ended and disjunct rather than smooth.
Harmonically, Gubaidulina's music resists traditional tonal centers and triadic structures in favor of pitch clusters and intervallic design arising from
the contrapuntal interaction between melodic voices.[13] For example, in the Cello Concerto Detto-2 (1972) she notes that a strict and progressive
intervallic process occurs, in which the opening section utilizes successively wider intervals that become narrower toward the last section.[14]
Rhythmically, Gubaidulina places significant stress on the fact that temporal ratios should not be limited to local figuration; rather, the temporality
of the musical form should be the defining feature of rhythmic character. As Gerard McBurney states:
In conversation she is most keen to stress that she cannot accept the idea (a frequent post-serial one) of rhythm or duration as the material of a
piece. ... To her, rhythm is nowadays a generating principle as, for instance, the cadence was to tonal composers of the Classical period; it
therefore cannot be the surface material of a work. ... [S]he expresses her impatience with Messiaen, whose use of rhythmic modes to generate
local imagery, she feels, restricts the effectiveness of rhythm as an underlying formal level of the music.[15]
To this end, Gubaidulina often devises durational ratios in order to create the temporal forms for her compositions. Specifically, she is prone to
utilizing elements of the Fibonacci sequence or the Golden Ratio, in which each succeeding element is equal to the sum of the two preceding
elements (i.e., 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, etc.). This numerical layout represents the balanced nature in her music through a sense of cell multiplication
between live and non-live substances. She believes that this abstract theory is the foundation of her personal musical expression. The "Golden
Ratio" between the sections are always marked by some musical event, and the composer explores her fantasy fully in articulating this moment.
The first work in which Gubaidulina experiments with this concept of proportionality is Perceptions for Soprano, Baritone, and Seven String
Instruments (1981, rev. 1983–86). The 12th movement, "Montys Tod" (Monty's Death), uses the Fibonacci series in its rhythmical structure with the
number of quarter notes in individual episodes corresponding to numbers from Fibonacci series.[16]
In the early 1980s, she began to use the Fibonacci sequence as a way of structuring the form of the work. The sequence was especially appealing
[ ]
because it provides a basis for composition while still allowing the form to "breathe". clarification needed It plays a prominent role in such pieces as
Perception, Im Anfang war der Rhythmus, Quasi hoketus and the symphony Stimmen... Verstummen...). Later the Lucas and Evangelist series,
sequences derived from that of Fibonacci, were added to her repertoire.
Piano music
Gubaidulina's entire piano output belongs to her earlier compositional period and consists of the following works: Chaconne (1962), Piano Sonata
(1965), Musical Toys (1968), Toccata-Troncata (1971), Invention (1974) and Piano Concerto "Introitus" (1978). Some of the titles reveal her interest
in baroque genres and the influence of J.S. Bach.
The Piano Sonata is dedicated to Henrietta Mirvis, a pianist greatly admired by the composer. The work follows the classical formal structure in 3
movements: Allegro (Sonata form), Adagio, and Allegretto. Four motives (pitch sets) are utilized throughout the entire sonata, which also constitute
the cyclical elements upon which the rhetoric of the piece is constructed. Each motive is given a particular name: "spring", "struggle", "consolation,"
and "faith".
There are two elements in the primary thematic complex of the first movement: (1) a "swing" theme, characterized by syncopation and dotted
rhythms and (2) a chord progression, juxtaposing minor and major seconds over an ostinato pattern in the left hand. The slower secondary theme
introduces a melodic element associated with the ostinato element of the previous theme.
In the development section, these sets are explored melodically, while the dotted rhythm figure gains even more importance. In the recapitulation,
the chord progression of the first thematic complex is brought to the higher registers, preparing the coda based on secondary theme cantabile
element, which gradually broadens.
The second movement shifts to a different expressive world. A simple ternary form with a cadenza–AB (cadenza) A, the B section represents an
acoustic departure as the chromatic figurations in the left hand, originating in section A, are muted.
In the cadenza the performer improvises within a framework given by the composer, inviting a deeper exploration of the secrets of sound. It consists
of two alternating elements– open-sounding strings, stroke by fingers, with no pitch determination, and muted articulation of the strings in the bass register—
separated by rests marked with fermatas. The third movement is constructed of 7 episodes, in which there is a continuous liberation of energy accumulated during the
previous movement.
Two distinct aspects of the sonata—the driving force and the meditative state—can be seen through the architecture of the work as portraying the image of the cross.
The first movement is related to the "horizontal" line, which symbolizes human experience while the second movement reflects the "vertical" line, which represents man's
striving for full realization in the Divine. The meeting point of these two lines in music happens at the end of second movement, and that reflects transformation of the
human being at crossing this two dimensions. The third movement "celebrates the newly obtained freedom of the spirit". [Wikipedia, 2019]