CHANTS OF THE GREAT LENT

With its annual concerts of the Great Lent (previously in the Concert Hall “Ave Sol” and this year in Riga Cathedral), one of the best performers of the sacred music - the Riga Orthodox Chamber Choir "BLAGOVEST" under the direction of Aleksandrs Brandavs is continuing the tradition of public performances of the Great Lent chants, established in the 19th century in St. Petersburg by the great Russian composer Alexey Lvov, giving the opportunity to the secular audience to hear these chants filled with deep emotions and blessed solemnity. 

The program of the Great Lent concert, as every year, will commence with Artemy Vedel's “Pokayaniya otverzi mi dveri” (Open to Me the Doors of Repentance), a composition that is sung only during the Great Lent and that expresses the essence of all human emotions during the Great Lent. The audience will have the opportunity to hear again movements of the Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom of Sergey Rachmaninov and - performed by "BLAGOVEST" for the first time - an Ode from the Arvo Pärt's "Kanon Pokayanen" (Canon of Repentance). The concert program will also feature compositions, both traditionally included in the choir’s repertoire and newly discovered, by Alexander Arkhangelsky, Alexander Grechaninov, Pavel Chesnokov, Nikolai Golovanov, Georgy Sviridov.