Arvo Pärt - Orient Occident (2002)

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Arvo Pärt - Orient Occident (2002)

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Nominated for a Grammy (2002) for best Classical Album, Orient Occident represents the newest and, more importantly, epic portrayal of historical music to date. Regardless of any award, this album will continue its reputation as the most important record of new music in 2002, for the very fact that in the world of new music, Arvo Pärt is a puritan's feast. On the threshold of being a globally resonating composer, Pärt remains full of powerful ideas in film, stage, oratorio and orchestral music. Pärt's talent surmises the infinite variety of spiritual symbolism. He is a composer deeply rooted in the ancestrally religious past of his native Estonia. Further removed from Roman Catholic preaching, the Eastern European Orthodox church took to a more enlightening approach―renunciation. Pärt has, indeed, spent much of his time clarifying his search for richness in life's meaning. His work is as timeless as the art of work is meaningless. This meaningless struggle has dispirited Pärt's yearning soul, and with his newest music we are drawn to his misty, remote retreat. In Orient Occident, not only does Pärt recreate a shameless force of magnitude as a great work (three great works to be exact: "Wallfahrtslied", "Orient & Occident", and "Como Cierva Sedienta"), he has reorganized his approach making this change a revelatory turn from past familiar traits. Having rediscovered himself half dozen times before this year, Pärt introduces a lustrous version of his suffering, and a handsomely classical departure than previously heard. Pärt's climactic reinvention of his artistic path makes this album a sumptuous account of a composer charged with a silent worship.