“One of the most prominent composers of the late 20th century has died. Giya Kancheli was from Georgia—and the music he wrote, whether for films or for the concert hall, was full of light, shade and an incandescent longing,” writes Anastasia Tsioulcas on Wednesday (10/2) at National Public Radio. “He died Wednesday at age 84 in his home city, the Georgian capital of Tbilisi…. Kancheli’s work spanned seven symphonies and large-scale works, like his Styx for viola, chorus and orchestra, as well as many intimate pieces.… Kancheli’s work became known in the West as early as the 1970s—his Fourth Symphony, ‘In Memoria di Michelangelo,’ was performed by the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1978—but it was in the 1990s in particular that important international champions of his music emerged, including the ECM record label as well as conductors Dennis Russell Davies and Kurt Masur, violinist Gidon Kremer, violists Kim Kashkashian and Yuri Bashmet and Kronos Quartet, among others.… As the Soviet Union collapsed and Georgia was beset by civil war, Kancheli settled … first in Berlin, and then in Antwerp, where he became composer-in-residence at the now Antwerp Symphony Orchestra. But Kancheli’s beloved Georgia was never far from his compositional imagination.”
Posted October 4, 2019
