GALLERY: Pärt’s music for children released
Estonian Public Broadcasting (ERR) and the Arvo Pärt Center have collaborated to release a new Arvo Pärt album, entitled “Songs from Childhood”.
The album, which was launched on Tuesday night at the Russian Cultural Center in Tallinn, introduces a selection of children’s songs and piano pieces composed by Pärt for plays and animations between 1956 and 1970, with close to ten previously unreleased pieces.
The recording was initiated by the singer and conductor Kadri Hunt, as she wished to record Pärt’s children’s pieces with the ERR’s Children’s Music Studio and to include them in the repertoire of Estonian children’s choirs.
Pärt too participated in the recording process. Collaborating with composer Tauno Aints, new instrumental arrangements of songs that previously only existed as piano reductions or scores for film, were created. All the arrangements are also presented as independent phonograms – primarily to aid music teachers and to give children the opportunity to sing the songs with an ensemble even at home.
Arvo Pärt is the most successful Estonian composer of all time and the most performed living composer in the world. He celebrated 80th birthday in September.
Editor: S. Tambur