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Estonian Music and Culture 8 Lepo Sumera (1950-2000) emerged from this group as the most serious composer. He worked as a recording engineer at the Estonian Radio (several composers have done that job, including Arvo Pärt, that is a unique possibility for a composers to learn to work with orchestra and different ensembles). From 1978 he has been a teacher of composition at the Estonian Academy of Music and for the last year he was a professor and head of the electronic music studio. In 1988-92 he was the minister of culture, after that the chairman of the Estonian composers’ Union. Already in Soviet time he participated in different composers’ summer courses abroad and travelled much. His most significant works are for orchestra: symphonies, piano concerto, chamber music, electro-acoustic works (including live-electronics – music combining living performance and electro-acoustical means). During the 1970s he used free dodecaphony, chromatic modes and collage techniques, from 1981 (the 1st symphony) he wrote in a style that could be described as postminimal – diatonic modes, long sections of motivic repetition, but complex multilayered textures; in the end of the 1980s his music acquires again more chromaticism and harmonic colours. Erkki-Sven Tüür (1959) came to Tallinn from the island Hiiumaa, to study flute at the Tallinn Music School, in 1984 he graduated Tallinn Conservatoire as a composer, after that he studied privately with Lepo Sumera. His attitude to different composition techniques is rather free, he himself comments that he is not afraid of eclecticism, but tries to study the possibilities of different styles, including modernist sounds of the 1960s that were considered very out in the 1970s. For him, structural principles and the combination of various materials are important in composing, hence often used abstract titles of pieces – a series of Architectonics, Crystallisatio and others. However, in his vocal works the meaning of text is very important – an oratorio Ante finem saeculi (1986), Requiem in memoriam Peeter Lilje (1994). He was the initiator of new music festivals in Tallinn Nyyd, that first took place in 1991 and has continued every second year. From the end of the 1980s he has spent much time abroad and many of his compositions have been commissioned by orchestras and ensembles from different countries. In the end of the 1980s music and singing was closely related to the national political movements, particularly the summer of 1988 was full of spontaneious gatherings. At the song festival field, people sang together with popular rock groups and many of the new songs were composed using patriotic texts. Particularly some songs by Alo Mattiesen became extremely popular. In this summer, not only national and patriotic pop songs, but also meetings of choral groups and folk music festivals attracted masses. This enthusiasm continued for several years and became known as the Singing Revolution. After Estonia became independent in 1991, the revolutionary enthusiasm slowly quieted down. However, song festivals have continued in their traditional way after every five years. Also, traditional music is popular and it has become a kind of music related to alternative way of life, opposed to commercial culture. There are several groups of young people, who sing authentic songs in the regilaul style, others use them as source material for their own arrangements. An important scene for those people is Viljandi Festival of Traditional Music. After Estonia became independent, many musicians have entered international musical life – both performers and composers. Most composition students have spent some time abroad, participating in different summer courses, master classes, etc. An important event for new Estonian music was the foundation of the Studio for Electro-acoustical Music at the Academy of Music in the mid-1990s and the corresponding curricula for e-music and sound engineering. Most composers combine new technology with traditional means in their work (Helena Tulve, Toivo Tulev, Margo Kõlar and others).