Draft:Kirill Richter

• Comment: Unsourced, promotional and not notable. Theroadislong (talk) 11:45, 30 July 2024 (UTC)

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KIRILL RICHTER

Introduction

Kirill Richter (b 1989, Russia) is a composer and pianist based in Paris. He is a prolific composer of contemporary and classical music, with works ranging from solo, chamber and orchestral symphonies to film, theatre and ballet scores as well as individual commissions for major iconic cultural events. He is also a prodigious and renowned live and recording artist, and also regularly performs worldwide with his own ensemble, Richter Trio, alongside cellist August Krepak and violinist Alena Zinovieva, since their debut in 2016. Their repertoire is modern classical music written by Kirill Richter specifically for the ensemble. His best-known works to date include orchestral suite Faith of our Fathers, the 2018 FIFA World Cup theme. and ballet Complexions. His debut album Chronos launched in 2019 to great acclaim, followed by a recording of his own composition, In Memoriam, released by Deutsche Grammophon and included in XII, an album showcasing contemporary music. The release of Chronos coincided with Richter’s debut tours of Russia, Germany and the UK. Of its musical style, the composer says: “This album talks about my relationship with time. It contains my reflections on time’s ‘physical’ states in our life, be that a memory of those who are no longer with us, an abstract notion of history as a whirlpool of events, or a mythological perception of time as a living creature that humans can bargain with.”

Early life and education Kirill Maksimovich Richter was born in December 1989 in Naro-Fominsk near Moscow. His interest in music began at a young age and he showed a prodigious ability in mastering theory and technique at an early stage in his education. In 2004 he entered the Moscow District Musical School and graduated two years later with a Piano Performance Degree. In that same year, 2006, he started to pursue an interest in design. He began a four-year degree course at the Moscow Engineering Physics Institute and emerged in 2010 with a first class honours degree in Design & Engineering. And 2012 saw a move to the UK where he obtained a first class degree, a Bachelor of Arts (Hons.) in Fashion Design from the University of Hertfordshire.

Composing and performing career Richter cites four main influences on his own development as a musician: composers Maurice Ravel, Sergei Prokofiev, Igor Stravinsky and Arvo Part, his ‘guiding star’. Critics have debated over the definition and direction of his compositions, described variously as minimalism and neoclassicalism. Richter himself prefers ‘expressive minimalism’ – bold, reflective, sometimes melancholic, deeply emotional, embroidering the simplest of harmonies and melodies and imbuing them with a powerful and distinctive style which resonates with all his audiences. Kirill Richter’s career in music began in earnest in 2017 when he first embarked on a wide-ranging performance schedule initially in Europe, taking in dozens of appearances including his first concert with a symphony orchestra; and many appearances at prestigious festivals, events and venues including the Reeperbahn Festival in Hamburg, the German Elbphilarmonie, Rotterdam festival Classical NEXT and the Elgar Room at Royal Albert Hall in London. Of his eclectic style and schedule he says “My music is a soundtrack for a life. The stories I tell somehow resonate in other lives. This gives birth to the feeling that we all speak the same language. “I like to do various concerts in different places, with different concepts so listeners know that the event they attend will never happen again.” In 2018 he created the official 2018 FIFA World Cup theme for FOX Sports, Where Angels Fear to Tread, which became the TV anthem for this global sporting event and which he premiered performing live in Times Square, New York to a world-wide audience of millions. The instrumental theme reflects Richter’s interest in science fiction and its title, Where Angels Fear to Tread, was inspired by the eponymous award-winning sci-fi novella about time travel by Allen M. Steele. Influenced by Russia’s rich culture, Richter’s composition is comprised of bold, complex and emotionally charged passages using a 23-piece orchestra, featuring strings, trumpets, cornets and a piano. “I used the title as an abstract image of a bloodless battle, where even the gods are afraid to interfere. Out of all the contests that humanity has invented, the Olympic Games exemplify competitiveness in the highest degree. And the World Cup for me falls into the same category. That’s the image I had in my mind, while I worked on the music," Richter said in an official statement. In 2019 Richter premiered Requiem with a symphony orchestra at the Julier Theatre, Switzerland as part of the Origen Festival curated by Giovanni Netzer. The inspiration for this piece is highly personal and drawn from Kirill’s own family experiences. It explores the history of the Gulags - the inhumane labour camps that deprived millions of their freedom under Stalin – and their legacy in the collective memory, as well as memorialising those who never returned.

In 2020 a major collaboration between Apple and the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg culminated in a live concert of the Chronos album by the Richter Trio, performed within the museum itself. Cinema Since 2016 Kirill Richter has composed wide-ranging scores for cinema including I Close My Eyes (dir Andrei Tallberg), Jumpman (dir Ivan Tverdovsky,2018), Feya (dir Anna Melikyan, 2020) and Execution (dir Lado Kvatania, 2022). Ballet This is the art form to which Richter is especially drawn. In 2019 his first ballet score for the two-act Rasputin received its premiere at the London Palladium. Subsequent commissions have included Red Riding Hood (2019), Complexions (San Francisco Ballet, 2021), Staying Alive (Eric Gaultier Ballet, Stuttgart, 2023) and Seven Ages (Switzerland, 2023). In Seven Ages, Richter explores Shakespeare’s metaphor for life as captured in As You Like It: the seven ages of man from birth to the forgetful existence of old age, with its echoes of childhood: a musical symbol of human life to choreography created by Marco Goecke.

Works 2016 Kirill Richter founded Richter Trio, featuring cellist August Krepak and violinist Alena Zinovieva.

2017 | Orchestral suite The Faith of Our Fathers

Anti-war suite The Faith of Our Fathers takes as its theme the Second World War and the need to prevent any future such catastrophe for mankind. The Faith of Our Fathers is a suite about the non-repetition of evil, music about what our ancestors survived for and what they overcame the horrors of war for: for the sake of love and light, for the sake of a peaceful sky above our heads.

2018 | FIFA World Cup 2018 In 2018, the American broadcaster FOX SPORTS invited Kirill Richter to compose the official theme of the FIFA World Cup 2018. This piece called “Where Angels Fear to Tread” became the anthem of the world sporting event for the TV viewers of the English-speaking world.

2018 | National Qatar Day Anthem In 2018, Kirill Richter became the author of the official music for National Qatar Day. The piece Songs of the Distant Earth is currently exhibiting at the National Museum of Qatar.

2019 | Chronos Album The major event of 2019 was the release of Richter’s debut album, CHRONOS. “This album talks about my relationship with time”, explains the composer: “It contains my reflections on time’s ‘physical’ states in our life, be that a memory of those who are no longer with us, an abstract notion of history as a whirlpool of events, or a mythological perception of time as a living creature that humans can bargain with.” The album’s release was marked by the composer’s first Russian, UK and German tours.

2019 | Deutsche Grammophon release of In Memoriam In September 2019, the legendary music label Deutsche Grammophon released Kirill Richter's composition In Memoriam. The work was also included in their release of contemporary composers’ music ‘XII’.

2019 | Requiem In October 2019, six premieres of Kirill Richter's Requiem, dedicated to the prisoners of the GULAG, took place in Switzerland. Concerts with a symphony orchestra were held in the Julier Theatre as a part of the Origen Festival.

‘This music is dedicated to all the victims of the Great Purge and prisoners of the GULAG, to my great-grandfather among them, also to my grandmother and all the children of the “enemies of the people” who had to endure fear, the horror of alienation and rejection, and then the struggle for the honour of their parents, seeking their official rehabilitation’.

2020 | Apple Worldwide & Hermitage Museum - Chronos In 2020, Apple Corporation launched a joint project with the main museum of St. Petersburg Hermitage Museum. The five-hour one shot film about the museum culminated with a Kirill Richter’s concert and his Richter Trio. Musicians performed pieces from the CHRONOS album among the museum's galleries. Awards 2020 Cosmopolitan Man Awards – laureate in Music and Art nomination 2021 Bravo Music Award – laureate in Contemporary Instrumental Music nomination

Press

‘The hero of the new time, who will change the future’/ Esquire

‘Kirill Richter is a talented young musician who may well become one of the few contemporary composers known not only in Russia and not only to a narrow circle of experts, but worldwide’/ VOGUE

‘In just a year, Kirill Richter has become one of the main hopes of the Russian music scene’/ ELLE

‘The new hero of the generation, able to make a splash’/ Marie Claire

‘Thrilling, incredibly beautiful piano compositions and goosebumps-beautiful orchestral compositions’ / London in Stereo

‘From serenity to experimental. Graceful Compositions. Luxurious Arrangements’/ Clash

‘Call him a prodigy, call him a genius, call him the next Nils Frahm/Max Richter all you want. Quite frankly, his popularity will explode over the next year and it won’t be long before he’s playing the real Royal Albert Hall’/ Metro UK