On November 18, 2024, the Russian-Chinese cultural center «Firebird» hosted a presentation of music publications prepared by the center in 2024 with the assistance of the Chinese Patriarchal Palace in Moscow and financial support of the «Russian World» Foundation, the Palace's website reports.
The presentation was held at the Russian-Chinese cultural center «Firebird».
The participants of the event were presented a collection of «Two-voice liturgy in Chinese on the basis of ancient chants» and bilingual Russian-Chinese «Collection of spiritual songs» which includes chants of Christmas and Easter periods, as well as Russian spiritual and folk songs and canticles.
An introductory speech was delivered by Hieromonk Kirill (Peregudin), an employee of the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate, a cleric of the Chinese Palace, who acted as the curator of the publishing project. He spoke about how the idea of this project came about and its participants, as well as about how the first copies of the music book editions have already been given to priests and regents of choirs of Orthodox communities in the Celestial Empire.
In the course of the presentation, the author-compiler of the collections, musicologist and regent, graduate of the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory Olesya Lesina shared the history of the compilations, told about the the process of working on musical arrangements, interaction with translators and other project participants. The coordinator of the translation group of the collection «Two-voice Liturgy» Secretary of the Chinese suburb, Priest Alexei Yusupov, illustrated with several examples the characteristic features and difficulties in translating Orthodox liturgical texts, including the work of the translation group on the unification of Orthodox terms.
The presentation was also attended by the illustrator of the «Collection of Spiritual Songs» Secretary of the Chinese suburb, Priest Alexei Yusupov.
The illustrator of the «Collection of Spiritual Songs» artist Irina Vlasova was also present at the presentation. She presented Christmas cards with her drawings as a keepsake to everyone present.
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At the end of the presentation, the ensemble of the Chinese farmstead performed several chants from the published collections.
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The history of Orthodoxy in China dates back to the second half of the 17th century, the time of the birth of the Russian Orthodox Mission in China. However, a stable and time-tested tradition of Orthodox singing in Chinese has not been finally formed during the existence of the Chinese Orthodox Church, so a wide field for experimentation and creative search is open. This is especially important today, when in contemporary China great importance is attached to the Chineseization of religious traditions. The first edition is based on ancient Orthodox chants that laid the foundation for the art of church singing, including znamenny, Byzantine, etc. in two-voice presentation, as well as stylizations by spiritual composers of the present day. When working on the text of the collection, modern Orthodox, Protestant and Catholic translations were used, as well as the translation works of the chiefs of the Beijing Theological Mission, St. Gurius of Tauris and Metropolitan Innokenty (Figurovsky). At the same time, some of the existing translations were substantially edited, and some texts were translated anew.
The second edition, which is a bilingual collection of spiritual hymns in Russian and Chinese, is intended to introduce the Chinese to Orthodox musical culture as well as to church festivals through the singing tradition. It is intended both for Chinese living in Russia and abroad and for Russian-speaking people learning Chinese. The book is colorfully illustrated, which gives the texts of the chants an additional semantic perception. EVCS Communication Service/Patriarchy.ru
