IN DIALOGUE WITH TRADITION: THE SPECIFICS OF TAN DUN’S CREATIVE METHOD

The article examines the works of Chinese and American composer Tan Dun. The purpose of the study is to reveal the specifics of the creative method and style from the standpoint of the composer’s ideological attitudes and principles of creativity. The research methods are the systemic approach, methods of comparative, hermeneutic, and musicological analysis. Using a number of the author’s works created over the past 20 years as an example, various parameters of musical language and composition are considered. It is established that the techniques of musical development of Western European music - personification, contrasting comparison of images, plot dramaturgy - are realised with the help of expressive means that characterise Eastern thinking. It is concluded that the composer’s creative processes cannot be considered only from the position of a dialogue of cultures, since in such a context the Eastern and Western traditions are compared and juxtaposed. In the composer’s works one can observe an inseparable “fusion” of elements, syncretism, which helps to conduct a dialogue with tradition as some “habitual” solutions in music. The study of Tan Dun’s creative method in the noted direction can significantly deepen the understanding of the specifics of his individual style in the context of cultural, historical and social processes of our time.