Hilarion Alfeyev

About the composer

Grigoriy Valerievich Alfeyev was born on 24 July 1966 in Moscow. From 1972 to 1982 he studied violin, piano and composition at the Moscow Gnessins School and from 1983 to 1986 at the Moscow State Conservatoire. From 1984 to 1986 he served in the Soviet military. In January 1987, after serving in the military, he became a monk. He entered the Monastery of the Holy Spirit in Vilnius, Lithuania, where he was tonsured as a monk on 19 June, ordained a deacon on 21 June and ordained priest on 19 August in the same year. Until 1991 he served as a parish priest in Lithuania, including two years as dean of Annunciation Cathedral in Kaunas. In 1989 graduated from the Moscow Theological Seminary and in 1991 from the Moscow Theological Academy with the degree of Master of Theology. In the late 1990’s Hilarion became known as one of the leading theologicans of the Russian Ortodox Church. In 2002 he became a bishop. Only when he was nearly forty, after a twenty-year artistic hiatus, he wrote in a relatively short time large-scale works, including the first ever Russian St. Matthew Passion and the first ever Russian Christmas Oratorio. Shortly after he became one of the most frequently performed contemporary Russian composers.