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Three hundred years ago, on the night of January 27–28, 1725, one of the most important and controversial tsars in Russian history died: Peter I the Great. His transformative vision reshaped not only the political landscape of Russia but also its cultural and artistic identity.

Born in Moscow 52 years earlier, Peter Romanov, the son of Alexei I, faced numerous challenges, including the formidable control of his sister Sophia. Freed from her tutelage after seven years, he took the throne in 1689, embarking on a relentless quest for modernization and Westernization. In 1697–98, Peter undertook a journey through Europe, visiting shipyards in the Netherlands and taking a shipbuilding course in England. He then continued his journey through Prussia, Bohemia, and Vienna, studying Western culture and technologies.
Upon his return, Peter crushed the streltsy military corps that revolted in Moscow in 1698, consolidating his power. Peter’s greatest military victory came at the Battle of Poltava in 1709, where his defeat of Charles XII of Sweden secured Russia’s access to the Baltic Sea. The subsequent Treaty of Nystad in 1721 expanded Russian territory significantly. In 1703, Peter founded the city of St. Petersburg, designed with the help of Dutch and Italian architects. This new capital, established on the banks of the Neva River, epitomized his vision of a modern, European Russia.
Peter was a visionary leader, the first to bring a deeply backward Russia into the European context. His reign marked the beginning of a process of Westernization that would radically transform Russian society.
The modernization sought by Peter the Great deeply affected music as well. During his reign, it was mainly foreign ambassadors, through organizing musical entertainments, who persuaded the tsar to invite musicians from their countries to the court. This foreign influence manifested itself in sacred music with the introduction of Western polyphonic singing, called partesnyj, or read from separate parts, which was integrated into the Russian liturgy. Ancient liturgical chant, which mixed Byzantine, Bulgarian, Serbian, and later Polish elements, was thus transformed by the Westernization promoted by Peter.
It would be Empress Catherine II the Great (†1796) who would give great impetus to music, opera, and liturgical music, hiring renowned musicians, especially Italians, including Baldassare Galuppi (†1785), maestro of the court chapel and composer for the Italian opera company; Francesco Araja (†1770), maestro of the chapel and court composer; Tommaso Traetta (†1779), court composer; Giuseppe Sarti (†1802), director of the Imperial Chapel; Giovanni Paisiello (†1816), maestro of the court chapel; Domenico Cimarosa (†1801), director of the Italian Opera in St. Petersburg; Catterino Cavos (†1840), director of the Imperial Theatre and author of the first operas on Russian subjects in the Russian language.
These composers formed a new generation of Russian musicians, providing them with a solid Western musical education. Consequently, the repertoire of Russian liturgical chant lost almost all connections with the plainchant of other Byzantine rite churches, instead linking them to the cultivated European musical tradition.
For some, such as Anatoly Grindenko, founder in 1980 and director of the Patriarchal Choir of the Russian Orthodox Church, the Westernization initiated by Peter represented a departure from the sacred traditions of Russian liturgical chant, leading to a loss of spiritual depth. He argues that
Rachmaninoff and Tchaikovsky are certainly great composers, but they are insignificant compared to the Tradition of liturgical chant. What does their desire for ‘personal creation,’ an absurd term in my opinion, mean? The Bible tells how Nebuchadnezzar had himself glorified through flutes, drums, and trumpets. But no divine melody emanated from this act of idolatry. Modern musical praise, founded on an imagination that contradicts the imaginal, has replaced the freedom of play implied by plainchant, even before God, with the realm of the arbitrary, whose illusory autonomy opposes God. Counterpoint is an example of this antagonism in which the artist believes he is competing with the Creator.
Thus, moving from the imaginal, which is a concrete universality or experienced as such, to the imaginary, which is an abstract individuality, indefinitely sought, opposes the spiritual dimension. Besides this, according to Grindenko, the practice of chant has been damaged: “the destruction of the 18th century, following the Westernization desired by Peter the Great, corresponded to a true loss, compensated only in part by the train.”[1]
Conversely, for others, such as composers Mikhail Glinka (†1857), Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (†1893), and Igor Stravinsky (†1971), the musical Westernization of Russia, initiated by Peter the Great, transcended pure nationalist aestheticism. Stravinsky, in particular, praised Alexander Pushkin (†1837):
By his nature, his mentality, and his ideology, Pushkin was the most perfect representative of that wonderful line which began with Peter the Great and which, by a fortunate alloy, has united the most characteristically Russian elements with the spiritual riches of the West. […] As for myself, I had always been aware that I had in me the germs of this same mentality only needing development, and I subsequently deliberately cultivated them.[2]
This latter view is shared by the Roman Church, which has always recognized and promoted artistic progress. Therefore, it is not surprising that, in addition to Gregorian chant and polyphony, it allows the use of more modern music in celebrations, provided it respects the liturgical spirit and true artistic values. Thus, the particular Churches in the various nations can enhance, in compositions written for divine worship, “those special forms which may be said to constitute the special character of [their] native music.”[3]
[1] J.F. Colosimo, Il silenzio degli angeli. Viaggio tra monasteri e voci dell’Oriente cristiano, Jaca Book, Milan 2004, p. 143; our translation.
[2] I. Stravinsky, An Autobiography, New York 1936, p. 97.
[3] Pius X, Tra le sollecitudini, n. 2.