The developmenT of The Tsar ’ s and paTriarchal choirs ’ reperToire in russia of The 16 th — 17 th cenTuries

Вестник ЮУрГУ. Серия «Социально-гуманитарные науки» 2020, т. 20, No 1 The professional activity of the singing masters of the Tsar’s and patriarchal (until 1589 — metropolitan) choirs was considered by the authorities and contemporaries as one of the types of state court service [11]. The sources of the 16th — 17th centuries brought to us many concrete descriptions of how this activity was carried out [e.g.: 9; 12; 13] 1. The masters not only accumulated the old traditions of “Moscow singing”, but they themselves were active successors of these traditions and formed a special musical direction — the Moscow School in Russian church singing art of that time. The external reflection of their art development was manifested primarily in the repertoire and in the musical peculiarities of chants performed during church services and court ceremonies. The repertoire of the main choirs of the medieval Russia was formed in accordance with the requirements of the Divine Service “Ustav” (Statute) and the mechanism for development of the chanting art itself, political trends of the time and the events of national importance. The emergence of new Russian Holidays, accompanied by intensive creative activity of hymnographers and “raspevshiks” (composers of chants), was of special importance here. Having achieved metropolitan Peter’s canonization (1339) as an All-Russian Saint, Moscow, on the basis of the scale of its political ambitions, began to build the All-Russian pantheon by taking new canonization measures (St. Sergius of Radonezh, St. Cyril of Beloozersk, St. Dimitry of Prilutsk, St. Stephan of Perm) [31, p. 95—98, 121—125]. When the uniting of the Russian lands around Moscow came to its end, the process of the nationwide canonization could be most clearly seen in the decisions of the Сhurch Сouncils in 1547 and 1549, which raised about 40 Saints to the All-Russian rank at once. Metropolitan Macariy’s deeds, for example, dated by February, 26, 1547 ordered to “sing and celebrate the new wonder-workers in the Cathedral church of the ruling town of Moscow... and in all towns of the Great Russian Tsardom” [1, v. 2, p. 203]. The political

1 A significant part of the information about patriarchal choir in the 17 th century comes from the "Chinovniki"-handwritten books describing the course of important church services. significance of that act is obvious. In the church chant art it promoted the creation of new series of works, as well as the acceptance of the local versions of chants as "competent" for the repertoire of the central choirs. At the same time the locally revered ascetics were also preserved, they had to be "honored and sung to in Moscow" [1, v. 2, p. 203], which defined the original peculiarity of that part of the repertoire. The following years saw the rising number of Russian holidays. By the middle of the 17 th century the Russian hymnographers and raspevshiks had created more than 150 cycles of chants for them [29, p. 338].
The important state events, as well as the main events in the Tsar's and the patriarchal courts influenced and modified the repertoire of the main Russian choirs. Special orders of the All-Russian metropolitans (patriarchs) or Tsars in connection with such events clarified what should be performed in Moscow during liturgical and non-liturgical rites and how it should be done. Then, the deeds sent to various towns introduced some amendments to the repertoire of the local choirs. On the basis of the metropolitan's deed dated by September, 29, 1564 on the occasion of the war "with Lithuania" the choirs "sang molebens (prayers) on all days… both for everlasting health and salvation" of Tsar Ivan Vasilievich and his family; on July, 30, 1655 on the occasion of victory in Vil'no (Vilnius) it was ordered, with affixation of the form, to sing Mnogoletie (Proclamation of the Many Years) for all the members of the Tsar's family, the "Christian army", to all the Christians [1, v. 1, p. 302; 6, v. 4, p. 40].
Enthronement ceremonies of the heads of the state and the church, weddings of Tsars, birth of heirs-Tsareviches, etc. stimulated the establishment and development of not only certain rites, but also the Russian panegyrical choral music. In this way, in connection with the enthronement of Boris Godunov on behalf of patriarch Iov on March, 15, 1598 the choirs were given a detailed description of the Rite of Mnogoletiya, even specifying the "raspev" (musical content) of chants ("the diaki sing Demestvennaya (musical style) chant: "To the Orthodox Tsar") [1, v. 2, p. 1-6]. Similar instructions came after the enthronement of False Dmitry, Vasily

88
Bulletin of the south ural state university. ser. social sciences and the Gumanities, 2020, vol. 20, no. 1 Shuisky and other Tsars [1, v. 2, p. 92, 100-101; v. 4, p. 367-368). In a special message of 1652 Tsar Aleksey Mikhailovich questioned Nikon "how to" sing "Mnogoletni" and how they were sung in the patriarchal choir [1, v. 4, p. 76]. Expressions of wishes for long life were also included into a non-liturgical rite of Zazdravnaya chasha (the Toast cup). Amongst the chants, which could be heard especially frequently in non-liturgical rites, we shall mention "slavniki" (doxastikons). They were sung "at the tables" (receptions), during solemn walks. Apparently, that was the reason why there were various versions of chants for them.
Describing the repertoire of the main choirs of Russia in the 16-17 th centuries in terms of melodic diversity, we shall first of all point at the fact that those choirs used all styles of the Old Russian church chant art.
Znamenny chant, which was the basis of the repertoire since the old times, by the 16 th century had become a common thing. It was not particularly mentioned in the sources. In the ceremony of the Grand Knyaz' (Duke) Vasily Ivanovich's Wedding (1526) it is simply mentioned that the singing diaki "sing Mnogoletie" to the Knyaz and the Knyaginya (Duchess); similar records can be found in the Ceremony of Ivan the Terrible's Coronation (1547) [8, p. 87; 6, v. 1, p. 47]. At the Ceremony of Patriarch Iov's Enthronement (1589) during the processions "around the town" the patriarchal diaki and podiaki were singing "selected sticherons of the Lord's Holydays" [28, v. 2, p. 316]. The extant part of the Tsar's library for the singing diaki mostly consists of the manuscripts written by the singers themselves, more than a quarter of which belong to Znamenny raspev. These were extensive collections, separate notebooks and sheets of paper, mainly written at the end of the 16 th -first half of the 17 th centuries. They contain chants of all possible genres 1 . Many of the Znamenny chants are recorded with the designation of the author's version of the melody (it will be dwelt upon further). Books and notebooks with "various Znamenny chants" are mentioned in the Inventory of the musical library of the Tsar's choir, which was formed in 1682 [17, p. 129-132]. In the 17 th century, when the choirs could perfectly perform the chants of various styles, references to the latter, including Znamenny chant as well, become frequent in the documental descriptions of the diaki's singing activity. For example, it was mentioned that in January 1650 Bogdan Zlatoustovsky was rewarded by the Tsar with cloth for having "sung" "the Znamenny Holyday" for the choir of Savvo-Storozhevsky monastery; in 1654 Feodor Konstantinov and Nestor Ivanov were rewarded by the patriarch with money for singing "Znamenny litiya" (part of the service) in the patriarch's "home" settlement; on February, 11,1667  According to M.V. Brazhnikov, the basis of the "Bolshoi raspev" (the Great chant style) consisted of "folk-song melody chant"; the scholar associated the emergence of the style with the Moscow school of an outstanding "raspevschik" Feodor Krest'anin [4, p. 112-114]. In "Tsarstvennaya kniga" (the Tsar's Book) it is said, that on the day of the Grand Knyaz' Vasily Ivanovich's death, on December, 4, 1533, "his singing diaki of the major stanitsa were told to stand in the doorway of the room and to start singing 'Svyaty Bozhe' (Holy God) of the Great chant style" [32, p. 33]. Taking into consideration the fact, that "Tsarstvennaya kniga" was written in the 1570-s [2, p. 36], this reference to Bolshoi raspev is, perhaps, the oldest. In 1589 "at the table" on the occasion of Patriarch Iov's enthronement the patriarchal choir sang "Mnogoletie bolshoe" (Great Mnogoletie), and during Iov's trips to the town -"bolshoi sticheron of praise for Mother of God," [28, v. 2, p. 323, 327]. The sources of the 17 th century abound in such records, and quite often various versions of chants from Bolshoi raspev are mentioned: "the bolshoi Greek" (kondak "To the vayvode-protector"), "Bolshoe Mnogoletie" and others [33, p. 85, 145, 196  The earliest of the trustworthy references to Demestvo (a specific style of church music with sophisticated rhythm and melody) is contained in the part of the Moscow Svod (collection) of chronicles of 1479, the basis for which was made and edited in the beginning of the 1470-s. Here, in the article about "the death of Knyaz' Dmitry Yurievich Krasny", it is said, that on the night of September, 19, 1441, having come to consciousness, the dying Knyaz' "began to sing Demestvo": "Chant the Lord", "Hallelujah", "hymns in praise of the Virgin Mary" [18, p. 261]. Three decades passed since that time till the moment the Svod was made. We can hardly assert, that Demestvo existed in the beginning of the 1540-s, especially considering the fact that the oldest of the known lists of chants marked with the word 1 There are more than 240 manuscripts in the Collection of the Russian State Archive of Ancient Acts [20].

Proclamation of the Many Years.
Miniature of the 16 th century Искусствоведение 89 Вестник ЮУрГУ. Серия «Социально-гуманитарные науки» 2020, т. 20, № 1 "Demestvo" dated of the end of the 15 th -the beginning of the 16 th century [30, p. 102]. Apparently, in the second half of the 15 th century the formation of the style was still in progress. Until the 1570-s Demestvenny style chants were put down by a usual Znamenny neumatic notation, then Demestvennaya neumatic notation was created and introduced [16, p. 11].
Throughout the 16 th century Demestvo became firmly fixed in the repertoire of the main Russian choirs in various versions. Thus, in a manuscript, which was evidently written by one of the patriarchal singing diaki in the beginning of the 17 th century and included into the Tsar's musical library, we come across the chants, written in Demestvennaya notation with the following indications: "The Thrice Holy Demestvennoie", "Radilovo, Demestvom" or simply "Demestvo". The chants of Putevoi style took a special place in the repertoire of the Russian main choirs' singers. The early stages of the development of this style are similar to the stages of Demestvo. In the last quarter of the 15 th century there appeared the first chants of Put' (Putevoi style), which were put down by a usual Znamenny chant neumatic notation; in the first half of the 16 th century scribes' indications of the style began to appear; the recognition of the intonation peculiarities of Put' in the 1580-s led to the appearance of "Putevaya" neumatic notation. But, the latter in the middle of the 17 th century it began to fall out of use and had vanished by the end of the century [3, p. 6-9] 1 . The Put' chants can be frequently seen in the library of the Tsar's singing diaki, for instance, Mnogoletie to Boris Godunov and Vasily Shuisky, or stichera in honour of the Moscow metropolitan Peter in the lists of the beginning of the 17 th century [20, № 1614, fol. 13-14; № 1703, fol. 1; № 1715, fol. [1][2][3][4]. The complete collections "Sticherarions in Put' " were written by Yury Bukin and Yury Fedorov [17, p. 130], who served in the court choir in the first half of the 17 th century. Such Sticherarions, as a rule, duplicated the repertoire of the main Znamenny chant; their appearance is an evidence of the huge quantitative growth of the Put' chants amount, their mastery suggests great skillfulness of singers.
In the system of the Old Russian professional polyphony "demestvo" and "put" stood for the corresponding parts ("lines") of voices, and in combinations with the other parts -"niz" and "verkh" (lower and upper in voices in chorus) -made up "the line demestvenny chant". The greatest development of this kind of polyphony took place in the last third of the 16 th century when Demestvennaya neumatic notation was accepted as a main means of written form. Probably Demestvenny two-voice polyphony (the second quarter of the 16 th century), but there is no proof of that yet. When examining the structure of the Tsar's and the patriarchal choirs we mentioned, that in the early 17 th century in those stanitsas (groops) there was a singing specialization, which was conditioned by the practice of line chants performance. The chanters were divided into nizhniki, putniki, vershniki and demestvenniki. The inventory of the Tsar's library of 1682 abounds in books and notebooks on line Demestvo. Some of them were written by the singing diaki, which allows us to identify the period of their appearance -the first half of the 17 th century 1 . Three Sticherarions in Put' and Niz, a Demestvennik "in all lines", Triodions in Put' and Niz, selected three-line chants were written by Mikhail Osipov; a Sticherarion in Put' and Niz, Triodions and Sticherarions of three-line stichera, a Demestvennik and selected stichera in Niz and Put' were written for the library by Bogdan Zlatoustovsky; a Sticherarion and Triodions in Verkh and Put', an Obikhod in Verkh, a Sticherarion "of the old chant" in Verkh, selected chants in Verkh and Put' and some others were rewritten by Ivan Nikiforov; a Sticherarion was "taken in collection after" Ivan Semenov, notebooks with Repentant Verses in Put' and Niz, "writings" of Grigory Panfilov, as well as manuscripts of other singers were also included there [17, p. 129-132] 2 .
We know about two Line-Demestvenniks of the first half of the 17 th century, made for the patriarchal choir. One of them contains predominantly parts of "Put' against Demestvo" for three-voice and four-voice chants of Obikhod; apart from the other, it includes Mnogoletia to the Tsar (of "great" and "small" paspevs) and to the patriarch, the Thrice Holy "Vladimirskoe" ("from the old teachers"), "Hallelujah of Radilov" of a very extensive melody and others [20, № 1696, fol. 26, 33, 35, 65]. The second collection is "Demestvennik book, that is the four-voice singing" -mostly contains parts of "Niz" or "Niz against Demestvo". In its composition the manuscript was similar to the previous one, but it was much more complete; we shall note various versions of Mnogoletie to Tsar Aleksey Mikhailovich and patriarch Ioasaf, St. Sophia's chant variant of the Cherubic hymn, the patriarchal diaki's version of the stichera "The chosen one among people", "Radilov's Hallelujah", chants of "Peschnoe deystvo" (Furnace act) [24, fol. 218-221, 245-252, 280-281, 325-337).
However, in the descriptions of the 17 th century "Chinovniks" Demestvenny line chant is not mentioned as an obligatory for cathedral services and rites, and is only connected with some of them, which sometimes were of special significance. In 1621/22 after Holyday of the Meeting of Vladimir Icon of the Blessed Theotokos the patriarchal singers, who accompanied the patriarch, sang "chant in lines"; in "Peschnoe deystvo" the youths "sang in furnace in voices", and on Christmas they also performed "the three-line hymnody"; on the Epiphany during a walk "to the water" (river) the Tsar's and the patriarchal singing diaki sang "heirmoses in lines", etc. The following stages of development of the Russian professional polyphony also influenced the repertoire of the main choirs of Russia. Znamenny chant polyphony, formed in the second half of the 17 th century, which in the 1670-80-s was written down by znamennaya neumatic notation in the form of scores, regulated the rhythmical balance of previously poorly coordinated voices. It became a certain bridge between the musical creative work of the Middle Ages in Russia and Partesny (polyphonic) style which came to Russia with its musical staff notation and corresponding theory of music [34, p. 1, 6, 10].
The documents of 1693 say, for example, that the patriarchal singing diaki "sang znamenny stichera in four voices" during the celebration of "the Floriferous week ", and on Thursday of the Holy Passion Weekslavniks (doxasticons) "znamenny in four voices", on Saturday they "sang while passing by the church, great three-line threnode 'Saint Lord' ", then during the service in the presence of Tsar Ivan Alekseevich "the first stichera they sang in the four-voice Znamenny chant, the others were the three-line stichera" [7, p. 29, 41, 54, 56]. In 1701 the patriarchal singing diak Osip Efimov was paid for "writing for the Holidays" of the Znamenny "new-dialect chant in four voices" [21, № 179, fol. 135]. But in the second half of the 17 th century a process of gradual establishment of Polyphonic Partesny style was going on, the main bearers of which were the Ukrainian "singers" (spevaks), who were admitted to the court choirs. Originally every success in mastering the new art by the Russian singers was rewarded. In 1683 the first stanitsa of "courtiers" podiaki headed by Ivan Verigin for singing partesny "Hristos rozhdaetsya" ("The Christ is being born") were rewarded with money [21, № 111, fol. 161-162]. Similarly, the repertoire of chants was gradually converted from the Old Russian neumatic notations to the note-line staff notation. In the 1680-90-s, for instance, a significant amount of "lined" paper was bought for rewriting "note chants" made by the patriarchal singers [21, № 127, fol. 336, 386 etc.; № 129, fol. 361, 366; etc.].
The description of the works of the Old Russian church chant art in the repertoire of the main choirs in the 16 th -17 th centuries is not restricted to the abundance of styles. Often within the framework of each style various raspevs (singsongs) of chants were made for one and the same verbal hymnographic text, getting their names from the places of appearance and existence, or from their authors. The penetration of those chants into the repertoire under discussion was carried out in different ways. The main factors were the growth of the state unity and strengthening of the all-Russian cultural relations, which led to the central integration of all local achievements for professional artistic creative work. It is no coincidence that the chant collections of the late 16 th -early 17 th centuries started to include various chants, written one by one with marks "another version", "another interpretation", "another melody" etc., or with corresponding indications of the tradition, school and author. Performance of this or that chant could be Вестник ЮУрГУ. Серия «Социально-гуманитарные науки» 2020, т. 20, № 1 conditioned by the will of the choir leaders, singers and listeners. The integration process presupposed exactly that kind of mutual penetration into the church choir repertoires of chants, and not a development of some unified "average" their variant. Presence of all those chants in the repertoire of the main Russian choirs also had an important ideological meaning, emphasizing the role of Moscow as a national political and cultural center. But of a special place was taken by chants in the works of authorship 1 .
The manuscripts from the library of the Tsar's singing diaki prove that a special honour was paid by the Moscow masters to the chants created by a famous representative of the Moscow school of the Old Russian music Feodor Krest'anin or Hristianin (died about 1607). The master started his work in the oprichnaya (pertaining to oprichnina, a special administrative elite under the Tsar) Aleksandrovskaya Sloboda serving Tsar Ivan the Terrible, and then served in the court of the Russian Tsars as a priest of the Domestic Cathedral of the Annunciation, but his duties first of all included teaching of young diaki of the Tsar's choir. Teaching the Tsar's singers, more and more deeply comprehending the art, Krest'anin, like other didascaloi, began creating musical razvods (interpretations) of complex neumatic notation formulae and separate lines of chants, and then started to create his own chants. He also explained to pupils the musical content of brief encrypted neumatic "nachertaniya" (drawings) of formulae, decoding them with help of the extended interpretations-razvods, written by simplier neumas. All this gained acknowledgment by the contemporaries. The works of the outstanding master, which were originally performed by the Moscow singing diaki, became widespread in the lists of the first half of the 17 th century. Perhaps, there was not a single Old Russian chant book, for which Feodor Krest'anin had not created his versions of some chants [13, p.

70-122 etc.].
Together with Feodor Krest'anin in Aleksandrovskaya Sloboda there was Ivan Nos. There he sang "Triodions" and also "stichera and doxasticons to many Saints", "Krestobogoroditchens" and "Bogoroditchens" (hymns to the Mother of God) from Menaia (Menology)". Consequently, the raspevs of the chants from the Menaia (Menology) and Triodion Sticherarions belonged to Nos. He served directly in the chambers of Tsar Ivan as a Tsar's krestovy diak. Undoubtedly, the Tsar's choir performed his chants, and the master himself was held in esteem by the court people (for example, in the staff list for the salary he was the only one mentioned with the patronymic as Ivan Yuriev Nos) [13, p. 123-127].
Dwelling upon the raspevshiks (composers) and didascaloi whose chants were sung by the main Russian choirs we have to mention Ivan the Terrible, who name is connected with two cycles. The first one is devoted to the memory of Saint metropolitan Peter (1308-1326), specifically honoured in Moscow. Probably for sticheron "Most Blessed Father" the Tsar acted as hymnographer or the author of the whole text. For 1 Below there are the names of the raspevsiks (old Russian composers) whose works in the repertoire of the main choirs of Russia have been discovered or with a high degree of probability could be included in it. another three ones -as an editor of the poetical and musical text, having in its basis an ancient "podoben" (standard-pattern) and already existed sticherons, going back to it. The next cycle of chants, marked by the name of Ivan the Terrible, is devoted to the Holiday of Meeting of the state patronizing Vladimir Icon of the Blessed Theotokos. Some stichera were similar to podoben "O divnoe chudo" ("Oh, marvelous miracle"), therefore the musical text of the chants is related to each other and this general source pattern. It is difficult to assume that having created both cycles, Ivan the Terrible, being a lover of singing, would not wish to hear them performed by his court choir and would not sing them himself [13, p. 8-45].
Among the masters of Moscow school, closely connected with the Tsar's choir, or the people serving in it, there should be mentioned an anonymous Singing Diak, who at the turn of the 16 th -17 th centuries wrote down the pieces of different authors, as well as his own chants. His comments to the writings demonstrate his purely professional approach to his business: "keep to this level of masterhood when singing the whole Sticherarion"; "singing without fita (formula) -0,03 roubles, and with fita -0,1 rouble"; "keep the masterhood to 32 altyns (0,96 roubles)", etc. [20, № 1574, fol. 58; № 1584, fol. 2, 4; etc.] In other comments Diak acts as asapprentice of Fedor Krest'anin, deeply respecting him as "the teacher", or "the master", but at times he was always ready to demonstrate and even set off his art: ]. The Diak mastery was revealed in creating razvods as musical interpretations for certain complex neumas, neumatic formulae and lines of chants, marked with the word "my", and whole chants with indications "my chant in razvod", "my chant", or simply "mine". We shall mark out his chants to Theotokos stichera "Under the shelter of yours" and "Rejoice, sunny cloud", to glorification of the Mother of God, to the stichera of the most solemn part of the Matins -to Polyelaios -"Praise the name of God", to the Easter Hymn to Theotokos "Shine, shine, new Jerusalem" [20, № 1577, fol. 1; № 1588, fol. 1; № 1578, fol. 1; № 1585, fol. 1; № 1589, fol. 1].
There exist some references to one more singing diak. His works were written down (the early 17 th century) with comments "Mikhail's interpretation", "Mikhail's". This is a Put' style raspev of a sticheron in honour of the Mother of God "Eternal light" and the Easter sticherons "Holy Easter", "Myrrh-bearing wifes", "Glorious Easter", "The day of Resurrection"; the other manuscript contains "Mikhail's" version of the fragment "from the Epiphany heirmoses" [20, № 1729, fol. 1; № 1579, fol. 3]. In the inventory of the Tsar's library, 1682, the manuscripts of "Mikhail Osipov's writing" are frequently mentioned. This allows us to assume, that "Mikhail's interpretation" is a work of the singing diak Mikhail Osipov, who served in the Tsar's choir in 1617-1650 [12, p. 316-317].
The sons of Feodor Krest'anin, Feodor and Ivan, can also be called the Moscow masters of chanting as they were influencing in a certain way the singing art of the Tsar's diaki. The Anonymous Singing diak, who was mentioned above, in his manuscript commented on some lines of heirmoses: "This is taken from Stenya, who lives in Kazan. He sang heirmos under Hristianin's supervi-sion… Young Feodor gave him Fitnik (selection of fita formulas) written by him… As we have it written here -on July, 15, 7110 (1602)" [20, № 1579, fol. 1-2]. In a number of notes the master's sons are mentioned as followers of their father: "This chant is taken from Hristianin, neumatic interpretation is of his son Feodor"; "son Feodor sang this way… son Ivan sang like this… the Master himself sang this way…" [20, № 1579, fol. 1, 8; № 1591, fol. 1]. Most probably, the "young" Feodor was the elder son of the master. In 1584-1585 he was a deacon of the same Kremlin Cathedral of the Annunciation, where Krest'anin served as a priest. In January 1585 Tsar Feodor gave him cloth for he had sung Mnogoletie while on service on Christmas [6, v. 1, p. 197]. In the above-mentioned notes over 1607 his chant was saved, devoted to "the Three Hierarchs", -"Under the pure shelter of yours" [20, №1579, fol. 8]. The second son of Krest'anin, Ivan Fedorov, a son of the priest, in 1584-1585 served in the 6th, "minor" stanitsa of the Tsar's choir, among adolescent singing diaki who were just beginning their careers. Since 1617 the master's son is already mentioned among the singers, who "taught the young singing diaki to sing". In the Tsar's choir he served till 1635, taking part in the performances of chants during the ceremonies of national significance, for example, at the coronation ceremonies of Vasily Shuisky and Mikhail Romanov, at the "enthronement" of patriarch Filaret, during "the Tsar's delightful event" -a wedding, christening of his heirs, etc. [12, p. 332-333].
The tradition of creating the works of chants by the monarchs themselves existed in the 17 th century as well. In contrast to Ivan the Terrible, Tsar Aleksey, apparently, did not write hymnographic verbal texts. His musical raspev was created for the old and the most solemn chant, honouring the Mother of God "Dostoyno est' yako voistinu" [5, fol. 185]. We also dispose of writings of gospel stichera "Mary's tears" with corrections made by the Tsar [19, fol. 12,13]. Tsar Aleksey rewrote for himself and his choir quite a lot of chant manuscripts 1 . In the Tsar's chambers there appeared a new version of the chant "Dostoyno est' yako voistinu" honouring the Mother of God. Marked as "of the Tsar's chant", it, probably, belongs to Tsar's elder son Feodor, as it is followed by the chant of "blessed memory of Alexei Mikhailovich" [5, fol. 183].
The Tsar's singers knew "Varlamov's stichera of Crucifixion" from the works of the local singing centres [20, № 1683, fol. 80-87], that means "created" by the famous master Varlaam (Vasily) Rogov from the Novgorod land. Doxasticon "Oh, how many goodnesses" with a comment "Interpretation by Lukoshkov, Despite the fact, that in the Inventory of the Tsar's "musical" library over 1682 the content of manuscripts is almost unrevealed, nevertheless, this source supplements our information on the diversity of chants in the repertoire of the central choirs. Here is a "Sophia" (Novgorod Saint Sophia Cathedral) line version of chants from the ceremony for "Transfer of holy gifts to the altar"; in separate notebooks "Dostoino est' " was written with a mark "slobodskaya", apparently, in the chant, which had appeared in Aleksandrovskaya Sloboda, where during Ivan the Terrible's reign the Tsar's choir stayed and Feodor Krest'anin and other masters of chanting worked; here we can also find "Сrucifix stichera of old raspev "in niz" (lower voice), theotokion "Every creature is happy" in Great and Small interpretations, Liturgy of Ioann Zlatoust (John "the Goldenmouth") of "Kiev chanting" and others [17, p. 130-131].
Undoubtedly, many of the above-mentioned chants were included into the repertoire of the patriarchal choir as well 1 . At the same time, in the manuscripts of the patriarchal singers we can find their own chants. In the library of the Tsar's diaki there are "patriarchal" singers' versions of chants writings of the beginning of the 17 th century "Christ is risen" in "Demestvo" and "You are the Tsar" in "Putevoy" styles -[20, № 1604; 1608). "Demestvennik" (collection of Demestvo style chants) of the middle of the 17 th century contains a "interpretation by the patriarchal diaki" of the chant "The chosen one among people" [24, fol. 280-281]. Interestingly enough that in 1701-1703 by a special order diak Osip Efimov from Novgorod wrote the Holiday canons of the "patriarchal" raspev in "niz" (line) in 104 notebooks [21, № 190, fol. 97-98]. Studying patriarchal Chinovniks, one can quite frequently come across the general references to singing performed by diaki and podiaki "as melody variant " ("sang stichers as raspev, and others -as modus composition"), which demonstrates the variation of the chant repertoires and the inclusion of this or that version of a chant in the course of the service [33, p. 242, 264, 267, 284, 289, 290 etc.].
It has already been mentioned, that the ways various chants penetrated into the repertoire of the Russian central choirs were different. The simplest one was the migration of chant books 2 , somebody's staying in Moscow,1 Recall that often the Tsar's and patriarchal choirs had to sing together, which contributed to the mutual enrichment of their repertoires. 2 For example, in the early 1680s the Tsar's krestoviy diak Andrei Gerasimov bought a musical neumatic collection from Tarakh Voskresenets, the "domestic" (head) of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery' choir. Among the singsongs of the chants of which there were: Greek, "proizvolitel'ny" (from myself), "klirosny" (created by choristers), monastic The Greek chant and a number of other chants of the Orthodox East became extremely popular in the second half of the 17 th century Russia. At that time the absolute monarchy forming like never before began reviving the political idea "Moscow is the third Rome", proclaiming the succession of the power of the Byzantine emperors to the ruling dynasty, and the Russian church -the last stronghold of the true Christianity. The appearance of the Greek chant is also connected with the arrival of for writing "Greek interpretations" and "lining" it, which confirms the presence of a polyphonic singing of the Greek chant in the choir repertoire (for example, in August 1699 "Trezvony" chant book of the "Greek four-voice singing" was written) [21, № 170, fol. 165; № 173, fol. 161 etc.]. Besides an "ordinary" Greek chant, its variants also became popular. In the Tsar's "musical" library there was a book "Heirmoses of Meletius singing" [17, p. 130]. The Russian Tsardom awareness of its domination and its uniting role in the Orthodox world made it possible to include stichera of Antiochian and Bulgarian chants into the choir repertoire [25, fol. 129, 178, 199, 253].
Thus, the formation of the main choirs' repertoire in the 16 th -17 th centuries, except the obligatory requirements of Statute imposed on the church chant art owing to its functional purpose, was defined, first of all, by rules of intonational development, stylistic evolution of the art, dominating political ideas of the time and the major events in the state. The repertoire of the main Russian choirs was a result of a huge creative activity of chant masters.
It is worth mentioning that the ideological content of the choirs' repertoire was always multivalent and, first of all, concordant with the historical ambitions of the country. Its part in the 16 th -17 th centuries was developing directly and purposefully under the decrees of the higher authority and expressed the ideas of centralization and firmness of autocracy. The special importance here was attached to the works stimulating the formation of high spirituality of the Russian people. Through praising the feats of self-sacrifice for the sake of the Motherland, the love towards it, identified with loyalty to virtues of Orthodoxy, and through the reflection of the stages of liberation struggle against invaders the feelings of patriotism and civicism were brought up; through mentioning and covering of events of the remote past not only of the country, but also of the world history, historicism of thinking was being developed in the Russian people of the Middle Ages, allowing to realize the greatness of everything the country had gone through, greatness of the state; and finally, through worshiping of such qualities of ascetics as courage, loyalty to the duty, love, kindness, unselfishness, etc. moral education was also carried out. All this alongside the artistic value of the works of chant, did not allow the Old Russian choral music to become isolated in the functional frameworks of Divine Service singing, but put it forward to become one of the greatest phenomena of the world culture.