Arvo and Nora Pärt and the staff of the Arvo Pärt Centre pay tribute to the memory of Sofia Gubaidulina (24.10.1931—13.03.2025), a beloved composer whose deeply personal and multi-faceted work has left an indelible mark on the history of music.
In some respects, the lives of Sofia Gubaidulina and Arvo Pärt are similar. Both began their creative careers in the late 1950s, and by the 1960s Gubaidulina, along with Alfred Schnittke, Edison Denissov, Valentyn Sylvestrov and Arvo Pärt, was among the leading avant-garde composers and thinkers in the Soviet Union. Their work was discredited by the authorities. Therefore, active interaction and exchange of creative ideas was very important for all of them.
Like Pärt, Gubaidulina had to endure Soviet censorship and was forced to leave her homeland. At the beginning of the 1980s, she dedicated her Offertorium for vioin to Gidon Kremer. Together with Pärt’s Tabula rasa, it reached a wider audience in the West.
Alongside Pärt, Gubaidulina was one of the first Soviet composers to reflect a deep connection with religious themes. She has commented: “As a believer, I understand religion in the literal sense of the word, as re-ligio, which means a re-establishment of connections, a re-establishment of the legato of life. There is no more serious task for music than this”.
The experience of silence, joy and hope is inherent in Sofia Gubaidulina’s work. Memory eternal!