Estonian composer and musicologist Tarmo Lepik (1946–2001) has cemented his place in Estonian music history with his novel, oriented, choral songs and colorful chamber music. The body of Lepik’s oeuvre is formed by choral music. His musical idiom is governed by avant-garde methods: clusters, glissandos, whispers. In technically rather complicated songs, one may encounter melodies with big leaps as well as melodies with narrow range, melting into a moving sound field. The musical structure carries the main importance in Lepik’s works – order dominates, metres and techniques are mathematically thought through. Compared to a conventional treatment, his folkloric, thematic works are more abstract. He processes elements of folk tunes using modern techniques.
Tarmo Lepik studied choral conducting, music theory and composition under Veljo Tormis. Lepik worked as a senior technician at the Estonian Radio Computation Centre and a teacher of music theory at then Georg Ots Tallinn Music School. His works have been published by SP Muusikaprojekt, and his author-CD has been released (Matrix Audio, 2004).