Notebooks (Denisov)

The Notebooks (1980—1995) written by Edison Denisov

Русская музыка/Russian music. Translated from Russian (from the copy of manuscript) by Dmitri Smirnov.

Content

• Introduction
• Notebook I (1980/1—1982)
• Notebook II (1982—1986)
• Notebook III (1995)
• Записные книжки — Russian original text

Introduction

These segmental notes of an outstanding Russian composer Edison Denisov (1929-1996), were written in his late years (1980-1995) and reflect a wide spectrum of his thoughts and views on music, poetry, art, religion, politics and personal life. Collected together they represent a very important and valuable document, that the composer wanted to make public. After his death these notes were thoroughly selected, edited and published by Valeria Tsenova in the book ‘Неизвестный Денисов’ (‘Neizvestnyi Denisov’ — ‘Unknown Denisov’), Moscow, Kompozitor, 1997 (in Russian). Tsenova made quite a lot of the smaller and larger omissions that can be explained by very free, sincere, sometimes arguable and controversial character of these notes. As a former pupil of Denisov and his close friend I received the copy of the original manuscript of these notes from his widow Ekaterina Denisova-Bruggeman. With her permission I am presenting here my English translation that is linked with the Russian original text. I try presenting the text without omission even if there are some views which I would never personally subscribe. I aware of my limitations in English language and would be grateful for any suggestions of correction and amendment of the translation. You can leave your comments on my discussion page (here is the link).

Dmitri Smirnov, 8 February 2008

Notes