Biography Azat Bikchurin

Azat Bikchurin: “In Kurai, the whole story of the Bashkir people” is a well -known performer - about a unique Bashkir instrument, the music code and the audience mentality, the musician makes Kurai right on the stage. Photo: From the personal archive in March this year, the state ensemble of kuraista appeared on the basis of the Bashgosfilarmony. Kurai is perhaps the most famous national musical instrument, and the history of its appearance goes into the gloomy depths of centuries.

The age of his forerunner - a bone flute with a rectangular barrel, a rectangular canal and eleven holes - dates from the 4th - 2nd centuries BC. However, there was a time when Kurai, now recognized as the territorial brand of Bashkortostan, was almost on the verge of disappearance, and musicians who possess the ability to play only with a simple instrument could be counted on the fingers.

Needless to say, how significant is not just preservation, but rethinking, the development of musical traditions of the game in Kurai, about which the Russian ethnographer Sergey Rybakov wrote in the 19th century: “The sounds of this instrument - quiet, melancholy and sincere - well reproduce the moderation of Bashkir melodies.” Love at the genetic level - Azat, why and how did you become interested in kuray?

For example, everyone knows the quote from Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: “What Russian does not like fast driving! According to my grandmother’s stories, my grandfather loved to play him very much. Unfortunately, I have never seen him: my grandfather died in the Great Patriotic War, but, probably, his love for Kuraya was transmitted to me. And also, I think, it happened because every morning, when I was going to school, a half -hour concert was going on the radio, and a curiosity sounded in it.

When I was ten years old, I went to a music school, in the class of playing in Kurai. The foundations of the game received from my first teacher Ravil Safargaleevich Hasanov, for which he is very grateful. Then he entered the Uchinsk Music School, later at the Ufa Institute of Arts. The traditions of playing the instrument were threatened with complete disappearance.

The initiator of preserving the foundations of performing art was Gata Suleimanov, who opened the Kurai class at the Ufa School of Arts in the year. Thanks to him now, in every children's music school there is a kurai class, and in art schools - a department. The Institute of Arts has a faculty of Bashkir music, a department of traditional musical performances, on which, in addition to playing Kurai, students master the basics of the game on Kil-Cube, Bayan, Bashkir dombra.

Then, in the year, the question arose acutely. Initially, Kurai was made from reeds, which grows in the Southern Urals, but it is very fragile and short -lived. And in the year, Vakil Shugayupov created a wooden tool. And it happened like this: in the bathroom he had a veneer, which fell into a bathtub filled with water and curled up from the water into a tube. Vakil dried her, glued the seams, jumped ...

Vakil, who is called Bashkir Stradivari, was the first to create a wood tool. Is it only for musical accompaniment of performances? There I happened to play the episodic role of one of the four stray musicians. It was a very popular production, melodies from it liked youth. I worked in the theater for about ten years, and these were very vivid moments of my life: the scene, trips abroad - with the performance "Kodas" we went to Shanghai, and with the production of Narkes and the Last of the Gaine clan - to the Festival to Turkey.

How is Kurai perceive there - as exotic, or do they have similar tools? I think it depends on the mentality. For example, in China, viewers are very restrained in terms of emotions, it is difficult to understand how they accept your performance. The warmest technique is arranged, of course, spectators from Bashkiria regardless of nationality. When you come to other regions, those who lived in Bashkiria come to the concert to revive their memories.

Kurai according to the type of instrument refers to open longitudinal flute. In Bulgaria, for example, there is a similar one - a square. With the Bulgarian musician Theodosis Pasov, playing on him, we participated in the project of Grzeha Piotrovsky in Poland. There is a similar instrument among Kazakhs - Sabizg, in Altai, for Khakass - Shor, for the Mongols - TsUUR, in Turkey - her, among the Iranians - Ny.

There were similar in Ukraine, in the Caucasus, but lost over time. Polish geologists came to the Burzyansky district, ours went to Poland. And in the year I was invited to the festival in this country. One Polish geologist introduced me to Grzech Piotrovsky. In the morning we went home to Grzeh, he started me in his small music studio and asked: "Play something, I will write you down." I played, and he almost immediately decided: "I will invite you to my nearest concert." Since then, our cooperation has begun.

Sometimes every year, sometimes twice a year I came to Poland. Gzhekh is a musician, a saxophonist, organizer of the Worldorchestra project, he invited musicians from different countries to his concerts. It was in Poland and thanks to Grzeh that my first concert with an orchestra took place.He suggested that I organize such a performance in Bashkiria, and in the year the first concert of a curaist with a symphony orchestra took place in the republic.

The same concert was repeated in the year. For this, I am very grateful to Grzehu and the composer of the Urals Idelbaev: the main repertoire consisted of his works. Instead of the media and the Internet - what requirements are imposed on the curaist himself? They were long -awaited guests in any house, at any holiday. The Kuraist knew more melodies, he also knew the history of his people, which made his figure especially significant.

Now a curaist is primarily a performer. There is such an unofficial Curaist Code, created by the musician Yulain Gainetdinov: the Kuraist must be careful about nature, his traditions, his history. There is an opinion among the people that the one who holds Kurai in his hands is capable of only good deeds. The history of the people is the source of a rich poetic heritage: for example, we do not have a single mountain with which any story, song would not be connected.

Many folk works are devoted to the uprising of Pugachev and Salavat Yulaev or the Patriotic War of the year. The phonotex of the Institute of Arts stores about ten thousand notes of folklore expeditions in which Zagir Ismagilov, Gata Suleimanov, Ayrat Kubagushev, Farit Kamaev participated. This is a storehouse of folklore of Bashkiria, I think few can boast of such a rich phonotec.

What do you say about Kurai? Curaist, unlike dancers and runners, use a deep, abdominal type of breathing more. This helps to increase the volume of the lungs. Since childhood, I had problems with the lungs - allergic asthma, every spring I suffocate from pollen of flowers. I think that Kurai helps me alleviate my condition. And Chinese techniques, yoga, for example, are built on breathing exercises.

And my ophthalmologist says that when musicians from the wind orchestra come to the medical board, everyone's eyes are unusually clean. He does not claim anything, but he says that this is what distinguishes the oven. Now, for playing with orchestras, musical instruments have begun to modernize - add holes. There are five holes on the classic Bashkir kurai.

Now they play on the instrument with a family, or even with eight holes. The People's Artist of the Republic of Belarus Ishmurat Ilbakov came up with a chromatic instrument and called it Ishkurai - translated "like a koupe". This modernization made it possible to perform not only Bashkir traditional music, but also world hits - the “lone shepherd” of James Last, for example, classics - very rarely.

By the way, I played with the National Symphony Orchestra a little Mozart’s nightgish. Diamond for the song - how do you feel about the creation of the state ensemble of curaists? What tasks do you think? The ensemble of kuraiists, in my opinion, should become a musical visiting card of Bashkiria and represent the republic far beyond its borders, not only in Russia, but also in other countries.

However, so that he can fulfill these tasks, it takes time. Now - the initial stage of its development, musicians need to be worn to each other, the composers should include in this process - compose works for this team. Perhaps I myself will join the ensemble, while I decide. In the music of Kurai - all the joys and sorrows of the people, military campaigns, love of nature, love and lyrical melodies - everything!

Do you know one? At first, of course, I explain that such a reed grows only in the Southern Urals, it is usually confused with a hogweed. But the hogweed, the plants are poisonous, have partitions, and Kurai is completely hollow inside. It is called the people among the people, and in the scientific-the Ural sizes. The legend is this: “Once upon a time, the boy lagged behind his tribe, got lost in the forest.

After several days of wandering, hungry, exhausted, he heard beautiful sounds. He went to them and saw a reed, whose upper part was broken: under a slight blow of the wind, he made these beautiful sounds. The boy sat down and began to listen. At some point, he dawned on him-he took out a knife, cut off the reed and made a musical instrument from him. The melody that he played came to his parents and fellow tribesmen.

They saved the boy. And the musical instrument has spread among the people. ” I tell, and in front of everyone I begin to make a curiosity from the reed, and then I play on it and give dear guests - Steven Sigal, for example, gave ... But the real story. Exactly 99 years ago, in Paris, an international exhibition was held in Paris, our country took part in it. The delegation included famous artists from different republics, Fedor Chaliapin, for example.

And our fellow countryman Yumabai Isyanbaev, who fascinated the French audience just by the fact that he went on stage with the Kuya reed, made an instrument in front of everyone and played the Bashkir folk melody on it. After the concert, crowds of curious Frenchmen were torn for the scenes - to look at the outlandish tool. They wanted to find some whistling device, but found only emptiness inside the kuya.They even tried to convict Isinbaev that he hid something in his mouth!