Lazare Saminsky’s “Vigiliae”, Triad of Poems
Notes by TŌN violist Casey Lebkicker
Lazare Saminsky was born in Vale-Gotzulovo, which is about 100 miles from Odessa in Ukraine. Saminsky was born into an upper-middle-class family; his mother was a singer and his father was a merchant. Saminsky dabbled in singing and composition throughout his childhood, but did not study music until he began piano lessons at the age of 15, which differs significantly from most composers we know who were either prodigies or well-accomplished and began studying music at a very early age. He then went to the St. Petersburg Conservatory, where he studied under Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Anatoli Liadov, and Nikolay Tcherepnin, and was classmates with Sergei Prokofiev. Saminsky was one of the founding members of the Society for Jewish Folk Music in St. Petersburg, where they sought to explore the relationship between classical music and Jewish folk and liturgical music. He also visited New York in 1920, but his composition Vigiliae was composed while he was in Russia.
Vigiliae, Triad of Poems was conducted by Saminsky himself in 1913 in Moscow. The piece is inspired by three Russian symbolist poems, one representing each movement, and is evident of Rimsky-Korsakov’s influence on Saminsky. The first movement is represented by an 1897 poem by Konstantin Balmont titled “O waves of the ocean, akin to the blood in my veins…”. The second movement is centered around the line “At the crossroads of existence…” from a 1903 poem by Fyodor Sologub. The third movement is centered around the line “Having completed the entire heavenly path through heights and valleys….” from Valery Bryusov’s 1903 poem “In This Valley of Tears”.
I listened to the piece first before reading the poetry and knowing the titles, and I am glad I did because the music represents the poems very well. While I did not come up with the same titles as the poems, I did come up with a similar story line of seeing myself travel through an enchanted forest. The forest had a lot of beauty and defining features, turning to turmoil, and then concluding the long and eventful journey. Almost as if Walt Disney himself came up with the story line and music.