The work of the Provencal troubadours, which originated in the south of France, together with their followers – the North French Trouveurs and the German Minnesing-ers, covers the XI–XIV centuries. With sufficient study of this topic in scientific – foreign and domestic – literature, some controversial issues remain, in particular, concerning the origins of the work of the Provencal troubadours, which is understandable, since over time finds are dis-covered that were previously hidden in archival materials and other sources. In particular, this concerns the primacy of the fundamentals of the technique of the Provencal troubadours, who gave rise to Andalusian strophic poetry. The purpose of this article assumes an emphasis on the consideration of the structural features of the word-making of the Provencal troubadours, due to their aesthetic basis. In this regard, the task is to attract literary research, historical sources that help to present the activities of the troubadours in the context of time. From the analysis of the few extant fixed musical sources, conclusions are drawn about the patterns of musical language. The work also makes isolated references to the works of Trouver and Minnesinger. Constructive ingenuity in the work of the troubadours turns out to be consonant with the poetic and musical technique of the art of the twentieth century.

The article is devoted to “Antony and Cleopatra”, the opera created by the American composer S.Barber who based it on the tragedy by W.Shakespeare. The work (libretto by F.Zeffirelli) was first performed in 1966, commissioned to the opening of the new Metropolitan Opera House in New York, but turned out to be a failure. In this article, the authors solve the objectives determining the novelty of the study: to consider the history of two versions of the opera, to analyze the modified libretto written in 1975 by the composer together with G.К. Menotti, to compare it with the literary source and to identify the ways of working with Shakespeare’s play, as well as to determine the main plot lines of the musical work. The methodology presented in the article is aimed at a comprehensive study of Shakespeare’s work and the libretto of the opera, which made it possible to identify the emerging connections, their common and different features.

This article raises very relevant issues related to terminological definitions characteristic of scientific works with an oriental orientation. A concrete example is the rapidly developing sphere of musical sinology in recent decades, in which there is a frequent inconsistency or inadequate mixing of terminological designations, in particular, numerous types and forms of national musical and stage art. Having a multi-year history of development, varieties of the traditional musical theater of China, often found in provinces far from the capital, are characterized by an established apparatus of ethnonyms, including the own name of each particular phenomenon. United by the general term shitsyu, they are characterized by canonicity and an integral connection with national art and traditional crafts. With the advent of the capital's jiaju theater, called the Beijing Opera, scientists of the PRC began to designate all types of national traditional theater in a similar way, which gradually led to a terminological collapse that had no place in Russian oriental studies before. The author proposes to carefully comprehend the parameters of the terminological apparatus of the modern musical sinology from the methodological standpoint of the national musical orientalism.

Based on the historical process of China's cultural modernization in the early 20th century, this paper examines the characteristics of Li Jinhui's children's drama literature texts (1891–1967). The author emphasizes that in the field of education reform, Li Jinhui was the first to prove that singing is helpful to the study of the national language, which are different from the ancient Chinese and various dialects and are now widely used in conversation and writing. Based on Western European traditions, in the 1920–30s he wrote and published 12 children's operas, and they contributed to the popularization of the new language and had an invaluable influence on the formation and development of the literary language of modern China. In addition, the article points out that the texts of the opera script are guided by children's perception and take into account children's psychology. In addition, it also reveals the main features of Li Jinhui’s literary language.

The author of the article compares the works of the oratorical genre created by composers of the Soviet Union and China during the period of totalitarianism, in order to comprehend the specifics of the genre's existence in the cultural and historical context of the declared era and create a foundation for further formation of a scientifically based picture of its functioning in Chinese culture. It is revealed that the formation of the genre took place in two stages. The systematization of data on Chinese oratorios created within the framework of each of them was carried out, chronologically attributed lists of compositions were formed indicating the authorship of the music and text. The study of musical material from a comparative historical perspective showed that, being alarge cyclic work for choir and orchestra, the oratorio was very difficult to master in the absence of a professional Western-type school of composition in the country, a developed tradition of choral and orchestral music making, however, it allowed us to solve significant tasks in the context of building a new state. Such genetic features of the genre as its belonging to the field of applied-interacting music and the initial focus on the mythologized word turned out to be decisive. The genre turned out to be organic for the collective national identity. The defining period for the formation of the Chinese version of the genre canon was the second period associated with the strengthening of friendly relations with the Soviet Union. This led the composers to turn to the Soviet model of the oratorio. The inevitable simplification of its content and musical style, caused by the need to meet the requirements of socialist realism, had a positive impact on the development of the genre in China, making it accessible for mastering at the stage of formation of the national school. A positive consequence of the ideological dictate was the attention of Chinese composers to the rich folklore heritage of various regions of the country, the elements of which are reflected in both the poetic and musical material of the compositions. Thanks to the genre of the oratorio, significant episodes of Chinese history were comprehended, which generally contributed to the enrichment of the world's artistic heritage.

The article is devoted to the topic of enriching the performing repertoire and the educational side of the creative activity of the outstanding Soviet pianist A.D. Kamensky. The purpose of the study is to present a complete picture of the musician's multifaceted activity aimed at introducing the listening audience to new trends in composing creativity, reorienting the listener's perception to the innovative vectors of the composer's thinking. The main materials of the study are the archives of A.D. Kamensky, stored in the Central State Archive of Literature and Art of St.Petersburg (TsGALI SPb), as well as various articles from the 1930–1950s, published in publications of various levels and memoirs of contemporaries: V.M. Deshevov, M.S. Druskin. The conclusion of the study is the confirmation of the hypothesis about the existence of a unique performing intuition and composing interest in A.D. Kamensky to new music created by his contemporaries, which contributed to the enrichment of the performing repertoire not only for him as a performer, but also expanded the pianistic horizons – in general. It is also emphasized that mastering the craft of composition became the starting point in the creation of cadenzas and the replenishment of the piano repertoire: opera and symphonic music, which, being widely represented in concert programs, educated the modern listener. 

A significant part of A.G. Schnittke's creative legacy is film music. Throughout virtually his entire life, the composer worked in the field of film art – he created scores for feature, television, animated, chronicle and documentary films. From a wide list of works, the twopart historical and psychological drama «Agony» directed by E.G. Klimov was chosen for the article. The musical leit-symbol of the feature film is the tango genre as an acute expressor of the atmosphere of the epoch of historical and social catastrophes. A comparison of the film score of the tango, i.e. the author's «matrix» of the idea and the phonogram aimed at showing the rapidly perishing Russian Empire and the contradictory image of Rasputin, reveals significant semantic discrepancies. The composer's invariant is a carrier of transcendental meanings, revealed through the semantics of timbre variations on the theme of the tango ostinato. In the director's interpretation, the discourse of soullessness and powerlessness of power, the collapse of human destinies became the main one, as a result of which the negative and mystical-fatal properties of the genre were revealed in the interpretation of the tango phonogram through a denunciatory-critical approach.

The purpose of the article is to identify the features of the implementation of the artistic concept in the "Blake Sonata" (2008) by D.N. Smirnov. In the course of semantic and compositional analysis, the expressive and dramatic levels of the work are studied. An individual solution to the problem of updating the sonata genre in the 21st century is considered, which determines the relevance of the study. An example of the composer's sonata work is analyzed in scientific literature for the first time. The model of symphonic thinking appears in the work in combination with a modernized poem principle. The bright world of poetry and graphics of the poet and painter W.Blake (1757–1827) inspires the composer to create bizarre musical images. The composition of two contrasting parts, striving to merge into a single form, draws two polar “images of time”: pulsating “vector time” and frozen “circular time” of eternity. There is a paradoxical combination of classicist principles of form-building (rondo sonata, variations) with avant-garde methods of formation and transformation of thematic material, which develops the tradition of the New Viennese school (the use of artificial themes-ciphers in the hemitonics system, sophisticated polyphonic work: canons, mirror structures). The imposition of poem thinking on sonata-symphonic logic is expressed in monothematicism, dramaturgy of leaps and transformations, synthesis of cyclic, sonata, variation, rondal principles, as well as in a special combination of subjective and objective ways of presentation, expressed in filling artificial avant-garde material with bright expressive imagery and romantic pathos. Thanks to a careful selection of means, D.Smirnov finds an original way to achieve a new integrity of cultural consciousness.

This article examines the Concerto for Bayan and Symphony Orchestra, composed in 2014 by the Krasnoyarsk composer Oleg Meremkulov. It presents the first musicological analysis of the Concerto's artistic world, exploring its spatio-temporal characteristics, psychological environment, and ethical oppositions. These aspects emerge through distinct imagery-intonational spheres, each characterized by specific genre and stylistic markers, melodic-rhythmic-harmonic complexes, as well as textural-register and orchestral solutions. The study emphasizes how sonority and timbral colors generate physical sensations and evoke associations that distinguish between the infernal realm and Divine reality. Each imagery-intonational sphere operates according to its own laws within a distinct dimension, possessing unique spatio-temporal parameters, each representing a separate world. The composer's consciousness as the nexus where these worlds intersect, revealing to listeners the drama of end times while determining its emotional intensity, trajectory, and internal logic.

In recent decades, the work of composers has increasingly found itself in the research field, which involves the use of scientific experience from various related fields of knowledge: musicology, literary studies, aesthetics, psychology, pedagogy and other disciplines. The reason for this is often the field of activity of a musician, which is traditionally considered peripheral (performing, pedagogical, musicological, literary, etc.). To alarge extent, this applies to the multi–vector work of one of the largest Russian composers of the second half of the twentieth – early twenty-first century, Sergei Slonimsky, the author of scientific works and textbooks, a brilliant improviser pianist, a tribune-lecturer-educator. The creative power of the composer, which had not dried up until recent years, was organically combined with the creative power in the field of artistic expression. The literary heritage, which is significant in scale, allows us to study it as a field of activity that has interrelations and parallels with the figurative content, plots, ideas of instrumental, theatrical and other works. In this context, the book «Burlesques, elegies, dithyrambs in despicable prose», published in 2000, is of particular interest, whose analysis of the content, where irony and grotesque are freely intertwined with lyrical and psychological imagery and philosophical reflections, allows us to discover the signs of the novel of upbringing (or the novel of becoming). S.M. Slonimsky's «Memoirs of School Years» published in 2016, as well as the manuscript of the composer's essay «The Reluctant Brawler: Chronicle of Chronic Stress – 1943–1971», commented on in the autumn of 2024 by the widow of the composer R.N. Slonimskaya, initiated the task of comparing and comparing the thoughts recorded in them, reflections on moral and ethical issues with the meanings of significant instrumental and the composer's theatrical opuses. The results of solving this problem using an interdisciplinary approach form the basis of this article.

The article is devoted to the characteristics of manifestations of folk and Orthodox traditions in the micro-local calendar tradition of the Sedelnikovsky district of the Omsk region. Based on audio recordings from 2009, the authors consider the Christmastide, Lent, Easter, Trinity complexes, calendar-timed memorial days and days of memory of especially revered saints, the ritual of praying for rain during the summer drought. Examples of calendar folklore and Orthodox chants that exist in the folk song environment are given, as well as information about the ethnographic context of the performance of these works, contained in the oral stories of the bearers of the tradition. Based on these materials, a conclusion is formulated about the organic coexistence of elements from different ideological and cultural traditions, folk and Christian, in the calendar system of the Sedelnikovsky district. In some cases, the Christian content of a holiday or ritual is more vivid and obvious (Christmas, Easter, prayers against drought), due to the performance of church hymns on these days or at these moments. On other holidays or memorable dates, a purely folk understanding of the celebrated event prevails (Trinity, Soroki, parental days). In the composition of the actions, objective realities of a particular holiday, the ethnic affiliation of the informants – Belarusians and Russians – is not particularly clearly manifested. In the Christmastide cycle, Christmas has become the festive dominant, when along with the troparion, not only carols are sung, but also shchedrovki. The composition of the main Orthodox hymns is uniform: all performers know the Christmas and Easter troparia, while folk songs of Christmas and Easter are not reproduced by all bearers of the tradition. The musical appearance of Orthodox hymns, existing in the folk tradition, with rare exceptions, is as close as possible to canonical church models.

The cities of Western Siberia were the regional centers of Russian chest production of the XX century. In Tyumen, Novosibirsk, Barnaul, and Tomsk, there were workshops whose products were targeted at the local market. Over time, they have acquired great importance for the Siberian handicraft industry. However, until now they have received little attention from researchers. This article examines the history of the A.V. Rogozhin's chest workshop, which existed in Tomsk in 1906–1929. Based on information from special literature and information from the State Archive of the Tomsk region, milestones in the history of this chest institution have been identified. A stylistic analysis of individual works is also provided. The conclusion is that A.V. Rogozhin's institution was a typical regional workshop; the history of the workshop and the tragic fate of its owner reflect the socio–economic conditions that developed in Russia in the first half of the 20th century.

The article provides the first overview of the creative activity of Vladimir Yakovlevich Bakulin, one of the leading artist-stonecarver of the Sverdlovsk Factory "Russkie Samotsvety" in the 1960s–1980s. The artist's creative path is examined in detail, including the period of study at the Nizhny Tagil School of Decorative Arts, which significantly influenced the artist's future fate, the main areas of his activity as a stonecutter are revealed, and information about a number of works is provided. Special attention is focused on the features of the artist's Autor works, in contrast to the models developed as part of the factory's product range expansion. As a result of studying more than one hundred pieces, a new view on the creative activity of the stonecutter is proposed, including both labor-intensive author's works from various types of colored stone and in complex techniques, and models for mass production that differ significantly in approach, distinguished by the laconicism of forms in line with the aesthetic program of the 1960s with a gradual increase in decorative elements throughout the 1970s–1980s. Based on the study of the archival data of the plant, statistical information is provided about Vladimir Bakulin as an active participant in the process of expanding and updating the plant's product range. In addition, information is provided about the master's experience in creating jewelry and their compliance with the main trends of the Ural jewelry school of the second half of the 20th century.

The lacquer art of the Celestial Empire has ancient traditions. Chinese lacquered tableware of the Han Dynasty was distinguished by the highest artistic and technical skill. This article examines the history of the development of lacquer ware during the Han Dynasty. The research methods of the decorative and applied arts of Ancient China are interdisciplinary with a comprehensive examination of history, archaeology, source studies, and the systematic study of products. Logical and historicalcomparative methods are used to identify common features, peculiarities, and typologies of the of lacquer ware of the Han Dynasty. The source-based approach covers both archaeological data and the corpus of ancient treatises on the history of lacquer art. The formal stylistic method includes a description and visual analysis of the shape and internal structure of the lacquer ware. The assessment of the formation of lacquer art from the time of the Shang State, the Western Zhou Dynasty, the Kingdom of Chu, the time of the Warring Kingdoms, the Qin dynasties, Western and Eastern Han is given. The materials of the excavations, the time of the appearance of lacquer products, types and purpose of lacquer ware of the Han Dynasty are investigated. Attention is paid to the production process and types of decorative painting. In addition, the work examines the essence and symbolism of color in lacquer painting on tableware based on national ideas and Chinese philosophy