Viacheslav Ganelin, Vladimir Chekasin, Vladimir Tarasov

By Rūta Skudienė and Aušra Listavičiūtė

The Ganelin Trio (Viačeslav Ganelin, Vladimir Čekasin and Vladimir Tarasov) was the only widely recognised jazz ensemble in Vilnius in the 1970s. “The trio led by Viačeslav Ganelin became famous so quickly that the audience did not immediately realise that its applause marks a completely new trend in the development of jazz.”¹ Today, with time being the most objective judge, we can only be amazed by the artistic legacy of the trio that existed from 1971 to 1987, and their ability to survive and adapt to the dreary years of Soviet stagnation, and also to write, perform and record music that was so new for those times, and to travel the world.
Ganelin spent ten years looking for suiatble partners.² The new ensemble was born in 1969. Ganelin and Vladimir Tarasov made their debut with the programme “Opus à 2” at jazz festivals in Gorky and Donetsk in 1970. Vladimir Čekasin, a saxophone player from Sverdlovsk, joined the duo in 1971.
The composer and pianist Viačeslav Ganelin was born in the small town of Kraskov near Moscow in 1944. His family moved to Vilnius in 1951. He studied at the Tallat-Kelpša Music School with the composers Jurgis Gaižauskas and Mikalojus Novikas, and at the Lithuanian State Conservatoire, where he took a course in composition given by Antanas Račiūnas. While still a student, he was very active on the jazz scene, and founded a big band, a quartet and a trio (in 1964, with Grigorijus Talas and Aleksandras Melnikas). Between 1967 and 1987, he served as music director at the Russian Drama Theatre of Lithuania. In 1987 he moved to Israel, where he teaches at the Samuel Rubin Academy of Music and Dance in Jerusalem, and participates in various international jazz festivals. He has composed the opera A Red-Headed Liar and a Soldier, the musicals The Cat’s House and The Devil’s Bride (made into a film in 1975, directed by Arūnas Žebriūnas), compositions for orchestra, pop music, and music for film and the theatre.
The saxophonist, clarinettist, multi-instrumentalist, composer, pedagogue and director Vladimir Čekasin was born in 1947 in Sverdlovsk (present-day Yekaterinburg). He studied the violin at music school. In 1967, he was accepted by the jazz club in Sverdlovsk. In 1970, he graduated from the Sverdlovsk Conservatoire, where he studied the clarinet. In 1971, Čekasin moved to Vilnius. The same year, he sent a recording to the international young performers’ competition Prague’ 71, and won first prize. He was subsequently invited to the Supraphon studio to record the programme “V.N .Čekasin a Pratele/Setkani”, together with Czech, German and Slovak jazzmen. In addition, he was a member of the Trimitas wind orchestra, and frequently appeared on programmes in various restaurants. Between 1975 and 1989, he led a big band and a quartet at the Lithuanian State Conservatoire. From 1975, he taught at the Balys Dvarionas music school. He educated many Lithuanian jazzmen, and developed an original method of teaching jazz. Čekasin gave polystylistic avant-garde jazz performances, composed music for film and theatre, including music for the film Taxi Blues (directed by Pavel Lungin) in 1990. He also wrote the music and directed the film Bolero or Provincial Melodrama with an Emotional Outburst in 1992 (first prize at the Post-Montreux festival).
The self-taught drummer Vladimir Tarasov was born in Arkhangelsk in 1947. After settling in Vilnius, in 1968 he played in the Nemuno Žiburiai orchestra, the Lithuanian Television and Radio Orchestra, Trimitas, and the Lithuanian State Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra. He also appeared at the Šaltinėlis and Dainava bars in Vilnius. For some time after the break-up of the trio, he performed with Čekasin, as well as solo (Atto). Tarasov founded the Lithuanian Art Orchestra (1991), initiated numerous multimedia projects, and composed music for film and various performances.
From 1971 onwards, the trio prepared solid new programmes annually, as if affirming their ground-breaking artistic explorations. The first programmes "Consilium", "Triptych", "Postludium", "Ad libitum" and "Ex libris", made a strong impression on jazz aficionados, and were discussed eagerly by critics and listeners.
In 1974, the Ganelin Trio was one of the first ensembles in the former Soviet Union to give concerts in the USA. The Lithuanian State Philharmonic granted it the status of a contemporary chamber music ensemble, which made it easier for it to get permission to participate in festivals in the Soviet Union and abroad. The musicians (one of the few Soviet jazz ensembles) performed in Eastern and Western Europe, Cuba, India, and the USA. They also performed at festivals such as Jazz Jamboree, Pori Jazz, the North Sea Jazz Festival, and Jazz Yatra. Their records were released in Poland, Germany, Switzerland, the USA and Great Britain.
The trio’s first programme “Con anima”, specially designed for recording, was recorded at the Vilnius Recording Studio in 1976, and released in 1977.
The trio’s programme “Poco a poco”, performed at the Jazz Jamboree festival in Poland in 1976, received the highest acclaim from critics and listeners. The Polish press wrote: “The performance of the Soviet jazz trio was the biggest surprise. It proved that it was not in vain that we have been waiting for several years for this trio’s performance. The contemporary chamber music ensemble of the Lithuanian State Philharmonic … is one of the most fascinating ensembles in all of Europe. Theirs is intuitive music, free jazz, grounded in tradition.”³ The French drummer Bernard Lubat, one of the leading figures in European jazz, commented: “The Ganelin Trio does not suffer from an ‘American centrism complex’ … the musicians do not replicate anybody, so their art is so humane. I have not heard a better ensemble … I want to listen to the Vilnius trio again and again.”
A mixture of musical styles and cultures, new forms, an inclination towards plastic art, collaborative authorship, multi-instrumentalism, disclaiming the dichotomy of soloist and accompanist: all these characteristics made the trio akin to the first performers of free jazz, and the Art Ensemble of Chicago. The trio’s music was compared to compositions by Anthony Braxton.
“It is customary to talk about the complexity of the musical language of the Vilnius trio. Meanwhile, the functional connections of harmony characteristic of the trio are mostly simple: usually short motifs that are very convenient to develop further ... The other thing that makes the trio's music accessible is its clear form  … The form, its thematic, and sometimes melodic and textural elements are invented in advance collectively, concisely, written down and ‘finished’ during a concert, depending on the audience’s perception of the music. The trio is essentially a collective composer. The texture itself is complex for the ensemble, but not for the listener. Constant dialogues between leaders and subleaders, and interrelationships in the creation of music, give birth to many unexpected situations that need to be realised immediately by playing them. The individual way of thinking of each makes now a bit independent, now very close, lines of development. However, it is this that determines the highest emotional and intellectual tension of the ensemble’s collective improvisation.”⁴

Ancora da capo score, 1980. Personal collection of Viacheslav Ganelin

In a conversation with the authoritative jazz critic Aleksey Batashev, Ganelin said: “We listen to all kinds of music. Even the simplest polka tune could lend a needed rhythmic pattern or sonority. We cannot do without Classical music or traditional jazz … In addition, we should not forget modern jazz, or other up-to-date issues of the music world. The model of Classical theatre is of great interest to us. Sometimes our artistic creations could be called ‘psychological instrumental theatre’ ..."⁵
The programmes of the trio “Albumas jaunimui” (Album for Young People), “Katalogas” (Catalogue) and “Namų muzikavimas” (Home Music Making) testify to the musicians’ fascination with theatricality. Visual effects are often used to heighten musical messages. “The three musicians even visually embody three archetypes. Čekasin is a demon tempter, an evil werewolf, a devilish instigator. Tarasov is a lyrical hero, a young prince, the embodiment of goodness. Ganelin is an impartial author, a commentator, a choir in tragedy, the puppeteer behind the scenes."⁶
The instrumentation of the trio included about 20 different instruments: Ganelin played the piano, bass keyboard, synthesiser, percussion, guitar and drums. Tarasov would equip himself with an array of percussion instruments, sometimes he would even blow a whistle or a trumpet. Čekasin played the flute, clarinet, various saxophones, and, like Roland Kirk, often two instruments simultaneously; he also played the violin. At times, the musicians broadened traditional instrumentation by employing various non-musical instruments. The percussion section was especially rich. “Our music is polyphonic, in that each of us approaches a musical idea individually. You feel when it is time to keep quiet, and when to come in. In a conversation, the partners feel each other. If one of us discovers an interesting idea, the other two follow,” Ganelin said.⁷ The second programme “Concerto grosso”, recorded at the Vilnius Recording Studio, caused an uproar at the Melodiya Art Council in Moscow. The management, resisting avant-garde manifestations, was shocked by such a radical musical concept. All divisions of Melodiya were ordered to "control" the ideological and artistic aspects of the music recorded. The record was released only three years later.
In the 1970s, the Vilnius Recording Studio (a branch of Melodiya, the main state-owned record company of the Soviet Union) was a progressive, creative recording laboratory for musicians of all genres.⁸ Their recordings, as though hand-made (there was no digital montage, or many other possibilites that are now available), still surprised listeners with the musical energy, the quality and the culture of the sound. It was at the Vilnius studio that the trio's programme “Non troppo” was also recorded, and which the German company Enja Records released in 1983, bypassing Melodiya, with Tarasov astutely ordering the recording through the Lithuanian Composers’ Union.
By 1985, the trio had created 19 programmes and released 43 records (LPs and CDs) around the world. The musicians were well aware of the difference between studio recordings and live concerts: programmes devised for recording were worked out in detail, while those meant for live concerts did not lack a "theatrical jazz" flavour or spontaneity.
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the Ganelin Trio toured extensively, receiving international acclaim. Ernst Joachim Berendt, the renowned German jazz expert, claimed that the trio played “… the most organised and the most professional free jazz I have had the chance to hear”.⁹ The trio was the first professional jazz ensemble from the Soviet Union to perform in 1986 in America, the homeland of jazz. The tour organisers demanded that popular jazz standards be played at concerts as well. The musicians also mastered the traditional jazz style, but never repeated the style of others, or copied; they performed only their own compositions. Obliging the American public, the trio created a real masterpiece, a jazz miniature from a simple song by the composer Kurt Weill; it was repeatedly encored. This artistic solution, it can be assumed, "Mackie Messer" (Mack the Knife) became the impetus for many of Čekasin’s later programmes, called "non-standard standards". A unique factor in the trio’s creative work was the attention paid by the small independent British record label Leo Records. Leonid Feigin, the company’s founder, an immigrant from Russia and now on the other side of the Iron Curtain, who was passionate about promoting new music from Russia and Eastern Europe, released most of the trio’s concert programmes. Symbolically, we can compare the activities and services to free jazz coming out of Eastern Europe with Blue Note Records in the 1950s and 1960s, one of the oldest American jazz labels, when this legendary company began to release albums of avant-garde-permeated free jazz music. We should mention the extremely valuable releases by the Melodiya company recorded in the Vilnius studio: Ganelin’s musical The Devil’s Bride (1974); records of his pop songs (1983); Chekasin’s suite “Prisiminimai” (Memories, 986); the solo percussion programmes by Tarasov “Atto I–IV” (1984, 1987, 1989, 1990); and the legendary big band programme of the Lithuanian State Conservatoire led by Čekasin "А можно ли так?" (Is this Possible?), recorded during the Osenniye ritmy ’86 (Autumn rhythms) festival in Leningrad (1987). And this is only a small part of the creative activities of these talented musicians.    
The trio’s music can be related to contemporary art on two levels: means of expression and aesthetics. The trio’s music is a unique artistic discovery, stemming from the well-rounded education, erudition, uniqueness and artistry of the musicians. Even though they have not renewed their creative collaboration permanently (apart from some rare reunion concerts), the experience from the times when they were an ensemble is being developed and transformed in the ongoing activities of the members of the trio: they play solo and with various jazz, Classical and folk musicians, as well as composing music for theatre and film. Ganelin and Tarasov have written some substantial oratorio-type works. Tarasov brought together the large Lithuanian Art Orchestra, with a changing formation and musicians of different kinds. Similarly, Čekasin has always appeared with large diverse collectives (made up mostly of students), whose programmes were not infrequently marked by theatrical extravagance. Besides this, Tarasov is known today as a visual artist, with sound playing an important role in his installations.¹⁰

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¹ Batashev, Aleksey. "Vilniaus trikampis" (Vilnius Triangle), Literatūra ir menas, 13 August 1983.
² See the chapters Tallinn’67 and Jaunystė ’68.
³ Express Wieczorny, 3 November 1976.
⁴ Batashev, "Vilniaus trikampis" (Vilnius Triangle).
⁵ "Viacheslaw Ganelin talks to Alexey Bataschev", Jazz Forum, No 25 (5) 1973.
⁶ Batashev, idem.
⁷ "Muzika – visų kalba“ ("Nemuno“ svetainėje – kompozitorius Viačeslavas Ganelinas). Interview recorded by Marina Baublienė. Nemunas, 1978, No 8, p. 56–57.
⁸ Skudienė, Rūta. "(Un)forgotten Melodiya. The 60th anniversary of the Vilnius Recording Studio", Lithuanian music link, No 20, 2017 p. 22–27.
⁹ DownBeat, 1980, USA.
¹⁰ Skudienė, Rūta. "Con anima. The Metamorphoses of Jazz", Lithuanian music link, 2016, No 19, p. 11–17.