Veljo Tormis

Veljo Tormis was an Estonian and Soviet composer, folklorist, musical ethnographer, and teacher, a representative of the “new folkloric wave.” He was born on 7 August 1930 in the Kõrveoja locality of the village of Aru in Kuusalu Parish, Harju County, near Tallinn, although some sources give Kuusalu itself as his birthplace. He died on 21 January 2017 in Tallinn, Estonia.

From 1937 to 1942 he lived in Kivi-Vigala, where his father served as organist in the village church. This environment led him to begin playing the organ at an early age and to pick out chorales. In 1942–1943 he took private organ lessons with Artur Topman, and in 1943 he entered Topman’s organ class at the Tallinn Conservatory, now the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre. He later studied with S. Krull. Military operations that reached Estonian territory in 1944, together with illness, interrupted his studies for a time; after the war he resumed them in the organ class of Eugen Kapp Arro from 1944 to 1947. In 1949 he re-entered the conservatory, this time studying composition with Villem Kapp.

Tormis composed his first works, mainly choral pieces, in 1947–1948. From 1951 to 1956 he studied at the Moscow Conservatory in the composition class of Vissarion Shebalin and also studied orchestration with Yuri Fortunatov, to whom he later dedicated his well-known cycle “Autumn Landscapes” in 1964. After graduating, he taught at the Tallinn Music School from 1956 to 1960 and led a composition class at the secondary specialized music school attached to the Tallinn Conservatory from 1962 to 1966. He became a professor at the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre, and from 1997 he was professor of the humanities at the University of Tartu.

He was a member of the Union of Composers of the Estonian SSR from 1956. Between 1956 and 1969 he served there as a consultant, and from 1974 to 1989 as first deputy chairman of the board. He was also a member of the Union of Cinematographers of the Estonian SSR. From 1969 onward he devoted himself entirely to composition. He made a major contribution to the development of modern choral music and became known as a collector and researcher of the musical and poetic folklore of Finno-Ugric peoples, drawing on this material in his works.

His output was centered above all on choral music, especially a cappella writing or works with only occasional instrumental participation. According to the musicologist Levon Akopian, Tormis set folklore and traditional epic texts—both Estonian and those of related ethnic groups—as well as poems by Estonian poets. Akopian emphasized his clear and natural declamation, deliberately simple diatonic language, harmonies derived from melodic structure, mastery of choral “orchestration,” and his tendency to unite smaller compositions into larger cycles. The article also notes that archaic runic song and modern techniques of symphonic composition are intertwined in his music.

His works were performed by leading Estonian ensembles, including the Estonia National Opera, the Vanemuine Theatre, the Estonian National Male Choir, the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir, the Tallinn Chamber Choir, the Estonian Television and Radio Choir, and numerous student and youth choirs, as well as choirs in Finland, Sweden, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, and Germany. In 2007 the Estonian Music Days festival both opened and closed with his works. In 1999 he was included in the list of the 100 great figures of Estonia of the twentieth century, compiled through written and online voting.

Tormis received many distinctions, among them the title Honored Artist of the Estonian SSR in 1967, People’s Artist of the Estonian SSR in 1975, People’s Artist of the USSR in 1987, and the USSR State Prize in 1974 for the choral works “Lenin’s Words,” “Ballad of Maarjamaa,” and “Curse Upon Iron.” He also received state cultural prizes of Estonia in 1995, 2002, and 2005, the Order of Friendship of Peoples, the Order of the National Coat of Arms in the 3rd and 1st classes, the Latvian Order of the Three Stars at the rank of Commander, and many other Estonian musical and cultural honors. His wife from 1951 was Lee Rummo.

Among his selected works are the opera “The Swan’s Flight” (1965), the cantata-ballet “Estonian Ballads” (1980), orchestral overtures, the “Little Symphony” (1961), piano pieces including “Three Preludes and Fugues” (1958), many vocal cycles, and a vast body of choral music such as “Kihnu Wedding Songs,” “Three Songs from the Epic,” “Autumn Landscapes,” “Estonian Calendar Songs,” “Livonian Heritage,” “Votic Wedding Songs,” “Curse Upon Iron,” “Ingrian Evenings,” “Vepsian Paths,” and “XVII Song of Kalevala.” He also composed cantatas, music for films, and music for dramatic theatre. After his death in Tallinn, his body was cremated in the chapel of Pärnamäe Cemetery on 28 January 2017 in a very close family circle, and his ashes were scattered in his homeland.

Connections

This figure has 1 connection in the Music Lineage catalog.