Larisa L. Gerver

Larisa Lvovna Gerver (née Kalman until 1987) was born in 1946 in Chirchik, Tashkent Region. In 1965, she graduated from the Hamza Hakimzade Niyazi Tashkent Music College, and in 1969, she completed her studies at the Gnesin State Musical and Pedagogical Institute (now the Gnesin Russian Academy of Music) in the class of A. G. Chugaev. Under his supervision, she wrote her Candidate of Sciences dissertation, titled «On Certain Forms of Manifestation of the Typical in the Instrumental Music of Viennese Classicism» (1985). Since 1970, she has been a faculty member at the Gnesin Institute (now the Gnesin Russian Academy of Music), becoming an Associate Professor in 1990 and a Professor of the Department of Analytical Musicology in 2000.

In the 1980s, L. L. Gerver studied under R. V. Duganov, Candidate of Philological Sciences, who taught the theory and history of literature at the Gnesin Institute. R. V. Duganov served as an unofficial consultant for her doctoral dissertation, «Music and Musical Mythology in the Works of Russian Poets: The First Decades of the 20th Century» (1997). The text of the doctoral dissertation was published as a monograph under the same title in 2001. 

L. L. Gerver’s primary research interests include the technique of musical composition and the musical methods of organizing literary texts. A number of her articles explore the poetry of the romance (art song) genre, which she examines as a unified text compiled by the composer. Her recent publications focus on the analysis of music (primarily 16th-century Italian madrigals) and certain literary texts (the poetry and prose of Velimir Khlebnikov and Daniil Kharms) from a metro-tectonic perspective. She also studies the so-called «plans» — graphic compositions by G. E. Conus, who recorded the results of his analyses using numbers, lines, and a specifically arranged full musical score of a piece.

MAIN PUBLICATIONS

I. Monographs:

• Gerver, L. L. Music and Musical Mythology in the Works of Russian Poets (The First Decades of the 20th Century). Moscow: Indrik, 2001, 248 p.;
• Gerver, L. L. Inganno and Other Secrets of Polyphonic Technique in the Second Half of the 16th — Early 17th Century. Moscow: Gnesin Russian Academy of Music, 2018, 240 p.

II. Educational Manuals:

• (Gerver, L.) Haydn’s and Mozart’s Musical Games, or A Simple Way to Compose Music Without Knowing the Rules: An Educational Game Manual. Moscow, 2003.

III. Articles:

1. Gerver, L. L. (Kalman). «Thematic and Functional Plans in Sonata Form». In Issues of Polyphony and Analysis of Musical Works: Collected Papers. Moscow: Gnesin State Musical and Pedagogical Institute, 1976, pp. 6-21;
2. Gerver, L. L. (1987). Muzykal’no-poeticheskie otkrytiya Velimira Khlebnikova [Musical and Poetic Discoveries of Velimir Khlebnikov]. Sovetskaya muzyka, (9), 100-110;
3. Gerver, L. L. (1991). Legko li analizirovat’ Motsarta [Is It Easy to Analyze Mozart?]. Sovetskaya muzyka, (12), 59-64;
4. Gerver, L. (1993). Skryabin i Khlebnikov. «Bozhestvennaya poema» i poema «Angely» [Scriabin and Khlebnikov. «The Divine Poem» and the Poem «Angels»]. Muzykal’naya akademiya, (4), 185-190;
5. Gerver, L. L. (1996). Ars combinatoria v muzyke Motsarta [Ars combinatoria in Mozart’s Music]. In Motsart. Problemy stilya [Mozart. Problems of Style] (Iss. 135, pp. 68-77). Moscow: Gnesin Russian Academy of Music;
6. Gerver, L. L. (1996). Muzykal’naya kul’tura Khlebnikova [Khlebnikov’s Musical Culture]. In Vestnik Obshchestva Velimira Khlebnikova (pp. 213-234). Moscow: Gileya;
7. Gerver, L. L. (1997). Kakie voprosy predlagayet nam khorovaya polifoniya Gendelya [What Questions Does Handel’s Choral Polyphony Pose to Us?]. In Problemy izucheniya i ispolneniya polifonicheskoy muzyki. Sbornik statey pamyati A. G. Chugayeva (pp. 79-101). Tver;
8. Gerver, L. L. (1997). «Instrumenty igry» Bloka, Khlebnikova i Mayakovskogo [«Instruments of Play» by Blok, Khlebnikov, and Mayakovsky]. In Yazyk kak tvorchestvo (pp. 66-79). Moscow: Institute of Russian Language, RAS;
9. Gerver, L. L. (2000). «Simfonicheskaya uvertyura», snovideniye ili mif? — zametki na polyakh «Yegipetskoy marki» Mandel’shtama [«Symphonic Overture», Dream or Myth? — Marginalia on Mandelstam’s «The Egyptian Stamp»]. In Muzyka i nezvuchashcheye (pp. 167-185). Moscow: Nauka;
10. Gerver, L. L. (2002). Dva etyuda o fuge [Two Studies on the Fugue]. Muzykal’naya akademiya, (1), 123-131;
11. Gerver, L. L. (2003). Izbrannyye stikhi Psaltiri, perelozhennyye na muzyku Dmitriyem Bortnyanskim [Selected Psalms Set to Music by Dmitry Bortniansky]. In Bortnyanskiy i yego vremya (pp. 77-96). Moscow;
12. Gerver, L. L. (2005). «Ten’ neproglyadnaya» i «svet v nebesnoy vyshine»: k sravneniyu sovokupnogo poeticheskogo teksta v romansakh Musorgskogo i Rimskogo-Korsakova [«Impenetrable Shadow» and «Light in the Heavenly Heights»: Towards a Comparison of the Cumulative Poetic Text in the Romances of Mussorgsky and Rimsky-Korsakov]. In Russkaya muzyka. Rubezhi istorii: Materialy mezhdunarodnoy konferentsii [Russian Music. Frontiers of History: Proceedings of the International Conference] (pp. 78-99). Moscow: Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory;
13. Gerver, L. L. (2006). Ars combinatoria i polifonicheskaya tekhnika Frescobaldi [Ars combinatoria and the Polyphonic Technique of Frescobaldi]. In Ot Gvido do Keydzha. Polifonicheskie chteniya [From Guido to Cage. Polyphonic Readings] (pp. 87-108). Moscow: Ippolitov-Ivanov State Musical Pedagogical Institute;
14. Gerver, L. L. (2007). Ob odnoy laboratornoy rabote Mozarta [On One of Mozart’s Laboratory Works]. In E. V. Vyazkova (Ed.), Protsessy muzykal’nogo tvorchestva [Processes of Musical Creativity], Issue 9, Collection of Works No. 169 (pp. 70-100). Moscow: Gnesin Russian Academy of Music;
15. Gerver, L. L. (2000/2006). Block, Alexandr. In Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart (Vol. 3, pp. 107-110). Kassel: Bärenreiter;
16. Gerver, L. L. (2000/2006). Brusov, Valerij. In Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart (Vol. 3, pp. 944-946). Kassel: Bärenreiter;
17. Gerver, L. L. (2016). Chlebnikov, Velimir. In L. Lütteken (Ed.), MGG Online. Kassel, Stuttgart, New York (Original work published 2000). https://mgg-online.com/mgg/stable/13042;
18. Gerver, L. L. (2016). Dostoevskij, Fëdor Michajlovič. In L. Lütteken (Ed.), MGG Online. Kassel, Stuttgart, New York (Original work published 2001). https://mgg-online.com/mgg/stable/12503;
19. Gerver, L. L. (2016). Lermontov, Michail Jur’evič. In L. Lütteken (Ed.), MGG Online. Kassel, Stuttgart, New York (Original work published 2003). https://mgg-online.com/mgg/stable/12962;
20. Gerver, L. L. (2008). Poeziya romansovogo tvorchestva Rakhmaninova [The Poetry of Rachmaninoff’s Romances]. In Muzykal’noe obrazovanie v kontekste kul’tury: voprosy teorii, istorii, metodologii [Musical Education in the Context of Culture: Issues of Theory, History, and Methodology] (pp. 118-145). Moscow: Gnesin Russian Academy of Music;
21. Gerver, L. L. (2009). Muzykal’nye igry Mozarta K. Anh. 294d [Mozart’s Musical Games K. Anh. 294d]. In Mozart v dvizhenii vremeni [Mozart in the Movement of Time: Proceedings of the Conference] (pp. 225-234). Moscow: Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory;
22. Gerver, L. L. (2011). Ars combinatoria in the Choral Polyphony of Handel and Mozart: A Comparative Study. In: J. S. Bach, G. F. Handel, D. Scarlatti: Problems of Studying the Creative Heritage. Moscow: Gnesin Russian Academy of Music, pp. 63-79;
23. Gerver, L. L. (2012). «Confession: Orthodox». In: Velimir Khlebnikov in the New Millennium. Moscow: IWL RAS (A. M. Gorky Institute of World Literature), pp. 47-79;
24. Gerver, L. L. (2012). The Time of the «Symphony» in the Works of Andrei Bely and Daniil Kharms. In: Velimir Khlebnikov in the New Millennium. Moscow: IWL RAS, pp. 246-252;
25. Gerver, L. L. (2014). The Semantic Pendulum of the Biblical Song Magnificat anima mea Dominum and J. S. Bach’s Magnificat. In: Materials of the Conference «Musicology in the 21st Century. Musical Cultures of Russia and Germany: Dialogues and Parallels». Moscow, pp. 7-18;
26. Gerver, L. L. (2014). The Poetry of Romance Composition: Rachmaninoff and Medtner (Notes on the Topic). In: Rachmaninoff and the 21st Century. Past and Present. To the 140th Anniversary of S. V. Rachmaninoff. Journal of Moscow Conservatory, 1/2014, pp. 54-67;
27. Gerver, L. (2015). Das System der Fux’schen Gattungen und einige rhythmische Besonderheiten in Skrjabins Klavierstücken. MusikTheorie. Zeitschrift für Musikwissenschaft, pp. 123-138;
28. Gerver, L. (2015). Dmitri Shostakovich’s 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op. 87: Description of Manuscript Sources. In: Shostakovich. New Collected Works in 150 Volumes, Vol. 113. Moscow, pp. 219-224, 249-254, 283-292, 292-302;
29. Gerver, L. L. (2015). Daniil Kharms: Three Musical Incidents. Journal of Moscow Conservatory, Vol. 6, No. 2 (June), pp. 156-175;
30. Gerver, L. L. (2018). Fux’s System of Species and the Peculiarities of Scriabin’s Rhythm. In: Taneyev and Scriabin. Teacher and Student. Proceedings of the International Scientific and Practical Conference dedicated to the 150th Anniversary of the Moscow Conservatory. Moscow: Moscow Conservatory Research Center, pp. 49-69;
31. Gerver, L. L. (2016). Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms as a «Song of Degrees». Journal of Moscow Conservatory, No. 4, pp. 12-22;
32. Gerver, L. L. (2018). The Technique of Inversion in Polyphonic Theory and Practice of the Second Half of the 16th-18th Centuries: Syllables and Sounds. Journal of the Society for Music Theory, No. 1 (21), pp. 1-31;
33. Gerver, L. L. (2020). Revisiting the Rules of Imitation in the Madrigals of Luca Marenzio and Carlo Gesualdo. Opera musicologica, Vol. 12, No. 5, pp. 95-106. DOI: 10.26156/OM.2020.12.5.006;
34. Gerver L. L. An Author’s Guide to the Book «Inganno and Other Secrets of Polyphonic Technique of the Second Half of the 16th — Early 17th Century». Musical Academy, 2019, no. 1 (765), pp. 17-40. (In Russ.);
35. Gerver L. Writing a Madrigal as Conversion of Verses into a Symmetrical Musical Structure (L. Marenzio, C. Gesualdo). In: Technique of Musical Composition. Musical Composition: from Intention to Opus. Materials of the 3rd International Academic Conference, April 9-11, 2019. Eds. I. Susidko, T. Tsaregradskaya, P. Lutzker, N. Pilipenko, Yu. Agisheva. Moscow, Gnessins Russian Academy of Music, 2019, p. 15;
36. Gerver L. L. Features of the Chronotope in Lorenzo da Ponte’s «Così fan tutte». In: Opera in Musical Theater: History and Modernity. Materials of the International Scientific Conference, November 11–15, 2019. Ed. I. P. Susidko. Moscow, Gnessins Russian Academy of Music, 2019, vol. 1, pp. 229-238. (In Russ.);
37. Gerver L. L. What New Information Can the Manuscripts of Shostakovich’s Works Reveal About His Polyphonic Technique? Musical Academy, 2020, no. 1, pp. 58-83. (In Russ.) DOI: 10.34690/36;
38. Gerver L. L. Fugue for Choir and Soloists Ensemble in Joseph Haydn’s Late Masses. Sovremennye problemy muzykoznaniya (Contemporary Musicology), 2021, no. 1, pp. 57-77. (In Russ.) Available at: https://elibrary.ru/item.asp?id=47302665;
39. Gerver L. L. On the Structural Features of 16th-Century Madrigals Based on Fixed-Form Texts. Sovremennye problemy muzykoznaniya (Contemporary Musicology), 2022, no. 2, pp. 4-47. (In Russ.) DOI: 10.56620/2587-9731-2022-2-004-047;
40. Gerver L. L. Taneyev’s Counterpoint Lessons in the Music Notebooks of Sergei Vasilyevich Evseev. Journal of Moscow Conservatory, 2022, vol. 13, no. 4, pp. 768-797. (In Russ.) DOI: 10.26176/mosconsv.2022.51.4.05;
41. Gerver L. L. Continuing the Acquaintance with Daniil Kharms’s Musical Cases: Ideas and Realizations. Musical Academy, 2023, no. 1, pp. 166-193. (In Russ.) DOI: 10.34690/297;
42. Gerver L. L. The Idea and Its Graphic Expression: Metro-tectonic Plans of Bach’s Fugues in the Georgy Conus Archive. Musical Academy, 2025, no. 2, pp. 6-45. (In Russ.); DOI: 10.34690/459;
43. Gerver, L. (2025). «Word and Number as Factors of Musical Form in 16th-Century Madrigals». In The Legacy of Yuri Kholopov and Contemporary Musicology: A Collection of Articles, edited by E. A. Izotova and M. I. Katunyan (Ed.-in-Chief), 175-192. Moscow: Moscow Conservatory Research Center;
44. Gerver, L. L. (2026). «Examples of Symmetrical Composition in the Texts of Velimir Khlebnikov and Daniil Kharms». In The Universe of Velimir Khlebnikov: On the 140th Anniversary of His Birth, edited by V. N. Terekhina, A. P. Zimenkov, and A. A. Rossomakhin (Ed.-in-Chief). Moscow: A. M. Gorky Institute of World Literature (IMLI RAS); A. M. Gorky Literary Institute. 

Achievements and Awards:

Certificate of Honor from the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation for significant contributions to the development of culture and many years of fruitful work. Order No. 127-vn dated April 11, 2013.