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Name: Dmitry Shostakovich
Date of birth: September 25, 1906
Zodiac Sign: Libra Place of birth: Leningrad
Date of death: August 9, 1975 (68 years old)
Activity: composer
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Biography of Dmitry Shostakovich
Childhood and family of Dmitry Shostakovich
Dmitry Shostakovich was born in St. Petersburg in 1906.
His parents were originally from Siberia, where the grandfather (on the paternal side) of the future composer was exiled for participating in the people's Will movement.
The boy's father, Dmitry Boleslavovich, was a chemical engineer and a passionate music lover.
Mother Sofya Vasilyevna, studied at the conservatory at one time, was a good pianist and teacher of piano playing for beginners.
In the family, besides Dmitry, two more girls grew up.
Mitya's older sister, Maria, later became a pianist, and the younger Zoya became a veterinarian.
When Mitya was 8 years old, the First World War began.
Listening to the constant conversations of adults about the war, the boy wrote his first musical work "Soldier".
Dmitry Shostakovich on the cover of Time magazine
In 1915, Mitya was sent to study at the gymnasium.
During the same period, the boy became seriously interested in music.
His mother became his first teacher, and a few months later little Shostakovich began studying at the music school of the famous teacher I. A. Glyasser.
In 1919, Shostakovich entered the Petrograd Conservatory.
His piano teachers were A. Rozanova and L. Nikolaev.
Dmitry graduated from the conservatory in two classes at once: in 1923 in piano, and two years later in composition.
Creative activity of the composer Dmitry Shostakovich
Shostakovich's first significant work was Symphony No. 1 , a graduate thesis of the conservatory.
In 1926, the symphony premiered in Leningrad.
Music critics started talking about Shostakovich as a composer who could make up for the loss of Sergei Rachmaninoff, Igor Stravinsky and Sergei Prokofiev who emigrated from the country by the Soviet Union.
The famous conductor Bruno Walter was delighted with the symphony and asked Shostakovich to send him the score of the work to Berlin.
On November 22, 1927, the symphony premiered in Berlin, and a year later in Philadelphia.
The foreign premieres of Symphony No. 1 made the Russian composer world famous.
Inspired by the success, Shostakovich wrote the Second and Third Symphonies, the operas "The Nose" and " Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District "(based on the works of N. V. Gogol and N. Leskov).
Shostakovich.
Waltz
Critics received Shostakovich's opera "Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District" almost with delight, but "the leader of the peoples" did not like it.
Naturally, a sharply negative article immediately comes out - "Confusion instead of music".
A few days later, another publication appears - "Ballet Falsehood", in which Shostakovich's ballet "Light Stream"is subjected to devastating criticism.
Shostakovich was saved from further troubles by the appearance of the Fifth Symphony, which was commented on by Stalin himself: "A business like creative response of a Soviet artist to fair criticism."
The Leningrad Symphony by Dmitry Shostakovich
The war of 1941 found Shostakovich in Leningrad.
The composer began work on the Seventh Symphony.
The work, called the Leningrad Symphony, was first performed on March 5, 1942 in Kuibyshev, where the composer was evacuated.
Four days later, the symphony was performed in the Hall of Columns of the Moscow House of Unions.
The Leningrad Symphony by Dmitry Shostakovich
On August 9, the symphony was performed in besieged Leningrad.
This work of the composer became a symbol of the struggle against fascism and the steadfastness of the Leningraders.
The clouds are gathering again
Until 1948, the composer did not have any troubles with the authorities.
Moreover, he received several Stalin prizes and honorary titles.
But in 1948, in the Resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b), which referred to the opera of the composer Vano Muradeli "The Great Friendship", the music of Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Khachaturian was recognized as "alien to the Soviet people".
Obeying the party dictate, Shostakovich "realizes his mistakes".
In his work, works of a military patriotic nature appear and "friction" with the authorities stops.
Personal life of Dmitry Shostakovich
According to the memoirs of people close to the composer, Shostakovich was timid and insecure in communicating with women.
His first love was a 10 year old girl Natasha Kube, to whom thirteen year old Mitya dedicated a small musical prelude.
In 1923, the aspiring composer met his contemporary Tanya Glivenko.
A seventeen year old boy fell madly in love with a beautiful, well educated girl.
The young people began a romantic relationship.
Despite the ardent love, Dmitry did not think of making proposals to Tatiana.
In the end, Glivenko married another of her fans.
Only three years after that, Shostakovich suggested that Tanya leave her husband and marry him.
Tatiana refused – she was expecting a child and asked Dmitry to forget about her forever.
Realizing that he cannot return his beloved, Shostakovich marries Nina Varzar , a young student.
Nina gave her husband a daughter and a son.
They were married for more than 20 years, until Nina's death.
After the death of his wife, Shostakovich married two more times.
The marriage with Margarita Kayonova was short lived, and the third wife, Irina Supinskaya, took care of the great composer until the end of his life.
The composer's muse was still Tatyana Glivenko, to whom he dedicated his First Symphony and Trio for piano, violin and cello
The last years of Shostakovich's life
In the 70s of the XX century, the composer wrote vocal cycles for poems by Marina Tsvetaeva and Michelangelo, 13, 14 and 15 string quartets and Symphony No.
15.
The composer's last work was a Sonata for viola and piano.
At the end of his life, Shostakovich suffered from lung cancer.
In 1975, the illness brought the composer to the grave.
Shostakovich was buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery in Moscow.
Dmitry Shostakovich Awards
Shostakovich was not only scolded.
From time to time, he received government awards.
By the end of his life, the composer had accumulated a significant number of orders, medals and honorary titles.
He was a hero of Social Labor, had three Orders of Lenin, the Order of Friendship of Peoples, the October Revolution and the Red Banner of Labor, the Silver Cross of the Republic of Austria and the French Order of Arts and Literature.
The composer was awarded the titles of Honored Artist of the RSFSR and the USSR, People's Artist of the USSR.
Shostakovich received the Lenin and five Stalin Prizes, State Prizes of the Ukrainian SSR, the RSFSR and the USSR.
He was a laureate of the International Peace Prize and the J. Sibelius Prize.
Shostakovich was an honorary Doctor of Music from Oxford and Everton Northwestern Universities.
He was a member of the French and Bavarian Academies of Fine Arts, the English and Swedish Royal Music Academies, the Academy of Arts "Santa Cecilia" in Italy, etc.
All these international awards and titles speak about one thing – the worldwide fame of the great composer of the XX century.
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