A Half Century of Stillness: Andrew Shenton Reimagined Pärt’s Für Alina for its 50th Anniversary
The release is available on all major streaming services including Spotify and Apple Music.
Fifty years later, pianist and Pärt scholar Andrew Shenton marks the anniversary of this seminal work with twelve contemplative reimaginings that explore its inner architecture without altering its essential material. Pärt: Für Alina Covers is both tribute and meditation — a deep listening project designed for reflection, resonance, and transformation.
Recorded on a Steinway Model D (chosen for its depth of resonance and clarity in sustaining overtones), the album expands the sonic possibilities latent within the original score while remaining faithful to its pitch world and spiritual ethos.
The Origin: Tintinnabuli and Stillness
After a prolonged period of artistic silence in the early 1970s, Pärt developed what he called tintinnabuli (Latin for “little bells”). The technique binds two voices into a single compound sound: one outlines the notes of a triad, while the other moves stepwise around it. The result is music of radical simplicity and profound depth, where silence and resonance carry equal expressive weight.
Für Alina, composed in February 1976, is the first fully realized work in this style. Just fifteen measures long, it unfolds in quiet homophony, without chromaticism or modulation. Its slow tempo, spacious phrasing, and soft dynamics create an atmosphere of intimate introspection. Over time, it has become one of the most iconic miniatures in late 20th-century music.
The Reimagining
Andrew Shenton — editor of The Cambridge Companion to Arvo Pärt and author of Arvo Pärt’s Resonant Texts — has long studied the spiritual and structural foundations of Pärt’s music. In this anniversary project, he approaches Für Alina not as an arranger seeking reinvention, but as a performer investigating resonance.
“My aim was to preserve the integrity and aesthetic of the original,” Shenton explains, “without introducing new pitches or fundamentally altering the work. I wanted to explore what happens when resonance is extended, mirrored, layered, or refracted — always remaining within Pärt’s sonic world.”
Using techniques Pärt himself has employed — retrograde motion, octave displacement, proportional expansion — Shenton creates twelve distinct listening experiences. Each track remains rooted in the original material while subtly transforming texture, space, or reflection.
Designed for contemplative listening, meditation, and immersive stillness, these covers echo Pärt’s own belief that music serves as “a bridge between us.
Track Overview
1. Solace – A direct, unembellished rendering at a spacious tempo, honoring the score’s instruction: “calm, sublime, listening to oneself.”
2. Mirror – The piece unfolds forward and then backward, like opening and closing wings, returning to the resonant low B.
3. Dulcet – The retrograde version is superimposed over the original, with adjusted note values so harmonies sound together in gently fused chords.
4. Reverie – A spacious interpretation that emphasizes lingering resonance after the opening low tones fade.
5. Echo – A simple canon beginning at beat three, with the second voice an octave lower, widening the keyboard’s resonant field.
6. Cluster – Pitches are compressed into a lower register, intensifying harmonic density and deepening the tonal gravity.
7. Euphony – The original pitches sound alongside their lower-octave counterparts, enriching the overtone spectrum.
8. Symbiosis – An exact retrograde is layered over the original without rhythmic alignment, creating shifting interactions.
9. Waves – A three-part canon in which successive voices diminish in volume, like ripples gradually dissolving.
10. Shadow – Transposed into A minor, revealing a darker, velvet-hued resonance anchored in the piano’s lowest register.
11. Mosaic – An extended meditation combining multiple versions consecutively: original, contracted, octave displacement, and retrograde.
12. Ghost – The percussive attack is removed; resonance is reversed and subtly manipulated, leaving an ethereal afterimage of sound.
Pärt: Für Alina Covers speaks to audiences drawn to:
- The contemplative minimalism of Arvo Pärt
- The sonic aesthetic associated with ECM-style piano recordings
- Sacred and spiritual contemporary music
- Deep listening and mindfulness practices
- The “slow music” movement
At once scholarly and deeply personal, the project bridges analysis and performance, intellect and intuition.
Release Information
Title: Pärt: Für Alina Covers
Performer / Arranger: Andrew Shenton, piano
Label: Kelham
Release Date: January 19, 2026
Format: Digital release on major streaming platforms
Studio: Futura Productions, Roslindale, Massachusetts
Piano: Steinway Model D
Engineer: John Weston
Editor: Mike Burke
Producer: Andrew Shenton