Svyatoslav Krutikov (born May 19, 1944, Tbilisi, USSR) is a Soviet and Ukrainian composer, musician, artist, and founder of three musical groups. Member of the National Union of Composers of Ukraine (1995) and the National Union of Cinematographers of Ukraine (2005).
He was born in 1944 in Georgia, a country that now has friendly and fraternal relations with Ukraine. The wonderful city of Tbilisi, its climate, temperament and openness of its inhabitants influenced Sviatoslav and laid down a certain, unlike anything else, tone and warmth in his work that he has carried throughout his life. His father, L. V. Krutikov, was a composer, violist, and musicologist. He came from a small Russian nobility and also had distant Kazan Tatar roots. His mother, Tetiana Mykolaivna Voyachek, was a harpist and singer, the granddaughter of the famous Ukrainian musician of Czech origin Bohumil Voyachek and the daughter of Olha Ivanenko, who was the sister of the famous Ivanenko family (writer Oksana, nuclear physicist Dmytro, forestry scientist Borys...). Before the war, Tetiana moved from Ukraine to Georgia to follow her harp teacher, Georgii Haase, who was offered a position in Tbilisi. It was in Georgia that she met Sviatoslav's future father.
Sviatoslav began his schooling in Tbilisi, but from an early age he was already connected to Ukraine, where his grandparents lived, with whom he spent the whole summer traveling along the Dnipro River on the yacht Tanya. At the age of eleven, he moved to Kyiv with his mother for good. Then he studied at the composition department of the Kyiv Conservatory (1961-1964, class of Borys Liatoshynskyi), from which he voluntarily left in his fourth year of study to create music for his soul-not for the department. His act was a manifestation of individual "passive" resistance to the demands of the totalitarian regime: students wrote music of a politically useful nature under the threat of expulsion from the Conservatory. Of course, the lack of a higher education diploma later negatively affected Krutikov's employment, but his own convictions were always more important to the artist. His unconquered creativity still reflects the artist's highly spiritual ideals and values.
His film work
After studying at the conservatory, he decided to try working as an assistant cameraman at the Ukrkinokhronika film studio. Because of his knowledge of filming techniques, he immediately received the second category. For Sviatoslav, this work was important because it gave him the opportunity to realize his range of interests in the film process and to build an ethic of cooperation with all members of the shift team.
Svyatoslav first proved himself as a film composer in a TV movie directed by Arkady Mikulsky, Watercolors of Kyiv. This film was the beginning of his career, as it won the Best Film Award at the All-Union TV Film Festival. His next work was the film Blind Rain, which later received a Diploma and the Jury Prize for his directorial debut at the Third All-Union Festival of Television Films in Leningrad and the Golden Nymph Grand Prix at the International Festival of Television Films in Monte Carlo. After that, Svyatoslav became a composer for more than 50 films, and to this day he continues to write music for films.
His most famous works:
1970. "Piece on a Free Theme" 2h. [Kyivnaukfilm Film Studio; Director: R. Plakhov-Modestov].
1972. "A Ray Tied in a Knot" 2h. [Kyivnaukfilm Film Studio; Director: R. Plakhov-Modestov] - The main prize of the All-Union Festival in Alma-Ata.
1972. "Life, Life, Life..." 2 h. [Kyivnaukfilm Film Studio; Director: A. Mikulsky] - Diploma of the Kyiv International Film Festival "Molodist-73".
1973. "The Adventures of a Giraffe" MLT [Kyivnaukfilm Film Studio; Director: I. Gurvych].
1973 "The Bunny Got Lost" MLT [Kyivnaukfilm Film Studio; Director: V. Honcharov].
1974. "The Adventures of Baby Hippo" ILT [Kyivnaukfilm Film Studio; Director: V. Goncharov] - Prize of the Kyiv International Film Festival "YOUTH-74" for the best ILT for children.
1976. Feature film "Roerich" [Kyivnaukfilm Film Studio; Director: R. Sergienko].
2000. Feature film "In the Name of the One" [National Cinematheque of Ukraine "Kyivnaukfilm"; Director: M. Burnos].
2002. "We were Cossacks before. In the first circle" 3h. [Kyivnaukfilm; Director: R. Plakhov-Modestov].
2003. "How We Were Cossacks. In the second circle" 3h. [Kyivnaukfilm. Director: R. Plakhov-Modestov].
2009. "Paradise Lost" 55 minutes. [National Cinematheque of Ukraine (Kyivnaukfilm); Director: R. Plakhov-Modestov] (Kino-Theater Magazine 2009)
2010. "Women of Chernobyl 30 minutes. [CHERNOBYLINFO; Director: M. Burnos].
Three musical film scripts for director B. Nebieridze (Ukrtelefilm):
1979. film-opera "Bohdan Khmelnytsky";
1982: film-opera "Faust" - Diploma and first prize at the X All-Union Festival of TV Films in Alma-Ata.
1987. film-opera "Boris Godunov"
Three ensembles
The first ensemble, the Renaissance, found its home in the House of Culture of the Kyiv Heat and Power Plant (KotPZ). The creation of the ensemble was a significant contribution to the revival of ancient music in Ukraine. The members of the ensemble, who were interesting and gifted individuals, played exotic instruments at that time. In addition, A. Zayaruznyi, the master and co-author of the idea of creating the ensemble, and S. Krutikov spent many hours in front of the eleventh-century fresco of St. Sophia of Kyiv. Sophia of Kyiv, which is still called "Skomorokhi". After analyzing the iconography and previous studies of the fresco, including those conducted by Irma Totska, they proved that the fresco depicts a typical medieval European and, accordingly, Byzantine ensemble playing stringed, percussion, and wind instruments. This ensemble could have been present in Kyiv during the times of Kievan Rus.
During the first years of the ensemble's existence, Sviatoslav met musicians of the famous Estonian ancient music ensemble Hortus Musicus in Kyiv. Close communication with them gave S. Krutikov invaluable knowledge about ancient music, which he tried to use when working with his own groups.
The ensemble later moved to the Kyiv House of Scientists. Sviatoslav worked with the ensemble from 1982 to 1987, and then, due to his move to the Crimea, he left it under the leadership of one of its members, Tetiana Tregub. The ensemble continues its work to this day, but it was renamed Silva Rerum (Latin for "forest life"), named after the famous music collection of the same name.
Sviatoslav wanted the beauty of the music of ancient times to be enjoyed in different parts of the country. So in 1987, Sviatoslav organized another ancient music ensemble in the Crimea, called Camerata Taurica. The original members of the ensemble were: Yuriy Lopatin, Tetiana Voyachek, Tetiana Chystiakova (violinist and violin master), Oleh Andreev, and Serhiy Kaydash. Later, Natalia Taran, Nazim Amedov, and others joined... The group worked in the House of Culture at the Nikitsky Botanical Garden. All musical instruments were purchased at the expense of S. Krutikov, except for the first viola da gamba, or were made by the members of the group. The musicians received the status of a professional self-supporting group and began to be invited to various festivals and concerts. In addition, the ensemble organized concerts that took place regularly in the Armenian church in Yalta. The Camerata Taurica ensemble became a gem of Yalta: listeners came from all over the Crimea to attend its performances, deliberately chose Yalta for their vacation, and even brought their friends there. Later, the group toured Kyiv, Prague, Heidelberg, and Karlsruhe. The repertoire of Camerata Taurica covered almost all eras of ancient music: The Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and the early Baroque. But this happened already in the Artek period (from 1991 to 1994), when the Nikitsky Botanical Garden could not support the group, which did not bring much income, and Sviatoslav accepted the offer of the director of Kiparisnyi (one of the Artek camps) to move under his auspices.
In 1994, Krutikov returned to Kyiv. After participating in the International Festival "Ukraine and the World of Baroque" (1994), the leadership of the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy invited Sviatoslav to work at the university. Sviatoslav created the Creative Laboratory of Ancient Music at the KMC of the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy. The purpose of the laboratory is to perform ancient music, manufacture and reconstruct various ancient instruments, and conduct research on the discovery, decoding, and identification of music texts of ancient music. The students and postgraduate students of the Academy were enthusiastic about this idea, but, unfortunately, it was not possible to create such a laboratory due to the lack of funds to purchase the necessary equipment. In 2000, S. Krutikov felt the need to move from working in a team to individual creativity, and he focused on composing and artistic work, and he invited the same Tetyana Tregub to lead the ensemble. Now Tetyana Tregub leads two early music ensembles, Silva Rerum and the Ancient Music Ensemble of the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy.
Artistic creativity
Svyatoslav has wanted to paint incredibly since childhood, but he was completely helpless. Nevertheless, when he first came to Crimea, fascinated by the southern beauties close to his heart, Svyatoslav made his first ink drawing. This was immediately followed by several more landscapes with views of Crimea. Over time, he developed his own style of stroke and filling. The famous Moscow artist Yurii Kononenko became Krutikov's teacher. Sviatoslav and Yurii were interested in experimenting with different techniques. The very experienced and incredibly gifted Kononenko professed the following principle in his pedagogy: "I undertake to teach how to make technically flawless surfaces, and the taste, semantic, emotional components are the responsibility of the student."
Sviatoslav gradually focused on creating abstract works. He compares his painting style to improvisation in music. During the creative process, Sviatoslav simply gives his hand and feelings free rein. He prefers non-figurative partly because photography, in which he used to cultivate the abstract, close-up details that looked like abstractions, became quite enough for him to document events, and with his involvement in painting, he found a way to quench his thirst for realism in it. But to create your own world and reflect your own fantasies, abstraction is suitable like nothing else.
For the first time, the public got acquainted with Krutikov's works in the Crimean Republican Museum of Local Lore during the International Exhibition "Zen Sholom", where he showed his miniatures - up to A5 size. The exhibition was also attended by E. Dobrovinsky (then a resident of Israel), V. Babanin, O. Kadnikov, G. Kogonashvili, and D. Filov. During a trip to Germany, S. Krutikov exhibited in the Heidelberg gallery of Werner Schaub "FORUM für KUNST" ("Forum for Art").
In 2007, the National Union of Composers of Ukraine, thanks to Anna Shcherbakova, a gallery owner of the union, hosted a personal art exhibition of S. Krutikov "Vade Mecum" (translated from Latin as "Guide" (literally - "Follow me!"). During the opening of the exhibition, dedicated to his teachers B. Liatoshynskyi and Y. Kononenko, a concert was held. Two musical works by S. Krutikov, "Stops on the Way in Four Prayers" for flute quartet and alto saxophone and "Five Memories" for harpsichord, were performed. Then the leadership of the National Union of Cinematographers of Ukraine proposed to hold a creative film evening of Krutikov as a film composer with a simultaneous art exhibition of his works at the Cinema House. The evening was opened by a performance by Sviatoslav's former band from Mohylianka and was a great success.
In 2009, another exhibition of Sviatoslav Krutikov's artistic works "Stops on the Way" was held at the Olena Zamostyan Gallery of the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, featuring paintings, graphics and photographs. This exhibition included the premiere of a film with his music, Paradise Lost, and a performance by the same group (Creative Laboratory).
In 2011, the American Library of the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy hosted a presentation of Krutikov's artistic and musical works as part of the lecture "Ar(t)sfenamine".
