Valery Alexandrovich Gavrilin was one of the brightest stars within Russian music of the second half of the 20th century. His compositional style is immediately identifiable: he displays individualist creative aesthetics, and his compositions are amazingly beautiful, winningly appealing, and full of bright ethnic colour.

Gavrilin was born in ancient Vologda. The austere but beautiful nature of the Russian North, and his proximity to provincial surroundings, had a serious impact on his entire creative life. At a very young age he lost his father, who joined the Second World War efforts as a volunteer and was killed in the vicinity of Leningrad in 1942. In 1950 his mother was imprisoned, and Valery found himself in a children’s home in the village of Kovyrino near Vologda.

He entered a specialist music school in 1951, and it was there that I.M. Belozemtsev, a teacher at Leningrad Conservatory, heard him and suggested that the talented boy should move to Leningrad. From 1953 to 1958 Gavrilin attended Leningrad Conservatory’s Special Music School, studying clarinet, piano, and composition. In 1964 he graduated, majoring in two fields, composition (with O.A. Yevlakhov) and musicology (with F.A. Rubtsov).

After graduation, Valery Alexandrovich was connected with Leningrad his whole life. He taught at the Conservatory’s College of Music, worked as an editor for the Sovetsky Kompositor publishers, and composed a great deal for Leningrad’s theatres and the Lenfilm Studio, achieving wide renown and official recognition. Gavrilin was awarded the Russian Federation State Prize for The Russian Notebook in 1967, and the USSR State Prize and the title of National Artist of Russia for ‘performance symphony’ The Chimes.

Valery Gavrilin wrote four large vocal symphonic opuses, symphonic suites, multiple pieces for piano, songs and romances, chamber vocal cycles, and compositions for chorus and chamber ensemble. He wrote the music for four ballets, thirty-eight theatrical productions, and eleven films. Gavrilin was also recognised as an excellent music critic and author of literary essays.