Yesterday, 19th July, at the second final concert of the Pärnu Music Festival, composer Erkki-Sven Tüür was presented with the Lepo Sumera Composition Award, initiated by the Estonian Authors’ Society and the Estonian Composers’ Union.
“The sense of the world’s wholeness often tends to be lost in contemporary times, and Erkki-Sven Tüür’s music powerfully counterbalances this tendency towards fragmentation. His deep engagement with fundamental existential themes imbues his work with a potent transformative energy and a sense of cosmic vastness,” commented jury chair Helena Tulve on the jury’s decision.
Erkki-Sven Tüür is one of Estonia’s most prominent symphonists. Beginning his career in the late Soviet era, he synthesised the trends of the time—progressive rock music, neomodality, post-serialist complexity, and the aesthetic of electronic music. By the turn of the millennium, he had developed an original compositional technique and style, where sound and its unfolding in time manifest in classical instrumental large forms, such as symphonies and instrumental concertos. By stripping modern sound of its often superficial and fragmented nature and using it to create coherent structures in the classical sense, Tüür largely continues the tradition central to Estonian music in the last decades of the 20th century, represented by Lepo Sumera.
The Lepo Sumera Composition Award values a clear developmental trajectory in the recipient’s personal style, the breadth of musical thought, and the artistic depth within a composer’s body of work.
This year’s recipient was selected by a jury comprising composer Helena Tulve, musicologist Kerri Kotta, and pianist Kadri-Ann Sumera.
Previous laureates of the Lepo Sumera Composition Prize include Tõnu Kõrvits, Helena Tulve, Toivo Tulev, Jüri Reinvere, Galina Grigorjeva, Ülo Krigul, Tatjana Kozlova-Johannes, and Age Veeroos. The prize has been awarded since 2016.
The award includes a monetary prize of 4500 euros, sponsored by the Estonian Authors’ Society and the Estonian Composers’ Union.
Krista Must, Press Representative
+372 5156364, krista.must@corpore.ee
