With S. V. Rachmaninov in the autumn of 1889, when he entered the class of A. I. Siloti, Rachmaninov’s cousin, with whom he studied at the Moscow Conservatory. I entered the sixth year, and Rachmaninov was at that time in the seventh year. I was fourteen and he was sixteen. He looked like a boy, walked in a black jacket with a leather belt. Even then he was restrained in his address, very laconic, as he had been all his life, shy, did not like to talk about himself and his work.

Rachmaninoff was significant and original. He was very tall and broad-shouldered, but thin; when he sat, hunched over. The shape of his head was long, sharp, his facial features were sharply marked, his rather large, beautiful mouth often folded into an ironic smile. Rachmaninov did not laugh often, but when he did, his face became extraordinarily attractive. His laugh was infectiously sincere.

Rachmaninoff at the piano is peculiar: deep, on the whole chair, knees wide apart, since his long legs did not fit under the piano. When playing, he always quite loudly either sang along or growled in the bass-profundo register.

Rachmaninoff's talent cannot be called otherwise than phenomenal. His hearing and memory were truly fabulous. I will give several examples of the manifestation of this phenomenal giftedness.

Together with Rachmaninov, we studied with Siloti, the latter one day at the next lesson (on Wednesday) asked Rachmaninov the well-known Variations and Brahms' fugue on a theme by Handel - a difficult and very long composition. In the next lesson of the same week (Saturday) Rachmaninoff played these Variations with perfect artistic perfection.

Me and my friend G. A. Alchevsky went to Rachmaninov from the lesson of M. M. Ippolitov-Ivanov. Rachmaninoff became interested in what we were composing. I didn’t have any interesting work with me, and Alchevskiy had just completed the first part of the Symphony in sketches. He showed it to Rachmaninov, who lost it and treated it with great approval. After this visit to Rachmaninoff, quite a long time passed, at least a year or a year and a half. Once, at one of the musical evenings that took place at my place, Rachmaninoff met with Alchevsky. Rachmaninoff remembered Alchevski's Symphony and asked if he had finished it and what was its fate. Alchevsky, who abandoned all his undertakings halfway, told him that he had not finished his Symphony and that there was only one first movement, which Rachmaninoff had already seen. Rachmaninoff said:

It's a pity, I really liked this Symphony then.

He sat down at the piano and played from memory almost the entire exposition of this rather complex work.

Once, when Rachmaninoff went to St. Petersburg for something, the Ballet Suite of Glazunov was performed there for the first time in one of Belyaev's Russian symphony concerts. Rachmaninoff listened to it only twice: at a rehearsal and in a concert. Rachmaninov liked this composition very much. When he returned to Moscow and was again with me at one of my musical evenings, he not only recalled its themes or individual episodes, but almost completely played this suite, with virtuoso completeness, like a piano piece, which he had learned to perfection.

Rachmaninoff's ability to capture in memory the entire texture of a piece of music and play it with pianistic perfection is truly amazing. The famous pianist Joseph Hoffman also had a musical memory of this kind. In Moscow, on one of Hoffmann's visits, the then young N.K. Medtner played his Es-dur prelude in front of him, which is distinguished by a rather significant complexity of the fabric. A few months later, my friend T. Kh. Bubek, while in Berlin, visited Hoffmann, whom he knew well from the family of his wife, E. F. Fulda. Hoffmann remembered Medtner's Prelude, which he liked very much, and played it to Bubek by heart.

Rachmaninoff told me:

You can't imagine what a wonderful memory Hoffmann has.

Hoffmann once, being in a concert by L. Godowsky, heard in his performance an arrangement made by Godowsky of one of the waltzes by I. Strauss. (As is well known, these arrangements by Godowsky are distinguished by an extremely refined texture). And so, according to Rachmaninov, when he was with Hoffmann, with whom, by the way, he was on close, friendly terms, Hoffmann, telling Rachmaninov that he liked Godowsky's transcription, played a number of excerpts from this arrangement. Rachmaninov talked about this while sitting at the piano, and did not notice that he himself immediately began to play these passages, remembering them as Hoffmann performed them.

A piece of music (piano, symphony, opera or other) by a classic or contemporary author would not be spoken of if Rachmaninoff had ever heard it, and even more so if he liked it, he played it as if this work had been learned by him. I have never met such phenomenal abilities in my life with anyone else, and I only had to read something similar about the abilities of W. Mozart.

With Alchevsky somehow we went to Rachmaninov during his creative depression of 1897-1899. Despite the fact that Rachmaninoff was very upset by the failure of his First Symphony, he nevertheless wrote a number of small works then; He introduced us to some of them. These were: Fughetta, which did not seem interesting to us, which Rachmaninov did not publish, then the excellent a cappella choir "Pantelei the Healer" to the words of A. Tolstoy and the wonderful, one of his best romances - "Lilac", later included in a series of romances op. 21.

And the strength of Rachmaninov's talent, of course, was revealed not only in the amazing quality of his memory, but also in his compositions, in his incomparable and unforgettable performing art both as a pianist and as a conductor.

Rachmaninov's course passed with phenomenal ease. Rachmaninoff and Scriabin studied composition at the same time, but Scriabin, who had a remarkable talent for composition, did not have such versatile musical abilities as Rachmaninoff. Both of them began to compose from an early age and composed with great enthusiasm, and therefore the somewhat dry work that Taneyev demanded from his students in the counterpoint class attracted them little. Instead, they composed what they wanted, and those tasks that Taneyev gave them were reluctant to complete and often simply did not go to his lessons. Taneyev was very upset by this, complained about Rachmaninoff the Siloti, tried to invite Scriabin and Rachmaninoff to work at his home, but all this did little to help. When the time for the exam approached, Scriabin, as a result, could write almost nothing, and with difficulty, only in consideration of his talent, he was transferred to the fugue class. Rachmaninoff also wrote an excellent Motet, which was performed by the choir at the spring act, and received the highest mark for this work - 5 with a cross. Something similar happened the following year in the fugue class.

He was an excellent musician, but as a teacher he did not have a special vocation and, of course, in no way could be compared with Taneyev. Both Scriabin and Rachmaninoff were both lazy in the fugue class and did nothing. Just before the spring exam, Arensky fell ill; and Rachmaninov told me that this saved him, because in the last two lessons, instead of the sick Arensky, Taneyev took care of them. Seeing that they did not know anything, Taneyev managed to explain to them the main principles of fugue construction in these two lessons. At the exam, a topic was given on which it was necessary to write a fugue in three days. I remember when I finished the fugue class, we had to write a triple fugue. I don't know what fugue was given the year Rachmaninoff was studying, but he told me that they were given a rather intricate subject, to which it was difficult to find the right answer. All who passed this exam: Scriabin, Rachmaninov, Nikita Morozov and Lev Konyus did not know how to get out of the situation. Rachmaninov told me that when he, having received an assignment, left the conservatory, Taneyev and Safonov walked ahead of him and talked about something. Evidently, Taneyev had previously shown Safonov the correct answer to the fugue; Safonov, in the middle of a conversation with Taneyev, suddenly whistled the theme of the fugue and the answer. Rachmaninoff, overhearing this whistling, learned what the answer should be. Fugue he wrote brilliantly, and for it also received 5 with a cross. Scriabin could not write a fugue; he was asked to write six fugues for the summer instead. In the autumn he somehow presented them; it was said, however, that he did not write them himself. By the way, they talked a lot about the fact that in the class of free composition Arensky allegedly did not appreciate Scriabin's talents, as a result of which they quarreled. (Scriabin left the composition class and graduated from the conservatory with only a pianist diploma.) This statement is not true. Arensky, of course, appreciated Scriabin's talent, but he made a legitimate demand to him that he write not only piano works, but also orchestral, vocal, instrumental, etc. Scriabin, who at that time was nothing but for the piano, he didn’t want to write (he joined the orchestra much later), refused to fulfill these requirements of the curriculum, and since Arensky could not help but insist on this, Scriabin preferred to give up classes in the composition class and graduate from the conservatory only in the piano class.

He moved in 1891 to the class of free composition, the course of which lasted two years; however, he was already such a complete composer that a two-year stay in the composition class turned out to be superfluous for him, and he completed this course in one year, creating in a very short time his final examination work, the one-act opera Aleko, the text of which, according to the poem A S. Pushkin "Gypsies", compiled by V. I. Nemirovich-Danchenko.

By the way, while still in the composition class, when Arensky suggested writing some work of a small form, Rachmaninov created the Musical Moment in e-moll as a class work - an excellent piece that soon became a very famous piece.

While still studying at the conservatory, he played the piano with amazing perfection. In student concerts, I remember three of his performances: in the year of my admission to the conservatory, on November 16, 1889, in the anniversary concert in honor of the fiftieth anniversary of the artistic activity of Anton Rubinstein, he played together with Maximov in four hands three numbers from Anton Rubinstein's Costume Ball; Subsequently, he twice played in student concertos with the orchestra - once (February 24, 1891) the first part of A. Rubinstein's Concerto in d-moll and another time (March 17, 1892) the first part of his then just written First Piano Concerto.

When Rachmaninov was supposed to move from the eighth year to the ninth, there was a conflict between Safonov and Siloti, as a result of which Siloti left the Moscow Conservatory. At the transitional exam, I remember, Rachmaninoff was asked the first movement of Beethoven's Appassionata and the first movement of Chopin's Sonata in b-moll. When it turned out that Ziloti was leaving the conservatory, Zverev proposed at the artistic council, in view of Rachmaninov's exceptional talent and performance completeness, without transferring him to the ninth year, to consider that he had completed the full course of the conservatory in piano, which was unanimously accepted by the conservatory council.

Thus, after one year of study in the class of free composition and after graduating from the piano class of only eight courses at the conservatory, Rachmaninoff was recognized as having completed the full course in both specialties, and he was awarded a large gold medal.

To the exceptional talent of Rachmaninov, Safonov did not like him and was clearly unfriendly to him and his compositions. When Rachmaninov was already very popular in Moscow as a pianist and composer, even then he stubbornly did not invite him to participate in symphony concerts.

Teachings at the conservatory and after graduating from it, Rachmaninoff as a pianist performed works by various composers and repeatedly performed with them in public.

He played his unpublished compositions on October 17, 1891, together with I. Levin, "Russian Rhapsody". In addition, in 1892, together with D. Crane and A. Brandukov, he performed the Elegiac Trio (without opus), which also remained unpublished during Rachmaninoff's lifetime. This Trio (single-part) was found relatively recently. It was performed by me together with D. Tsyganov and S. Shirinsky on October 19, 1945.

Soon, completely surrendering to creativity, Rachmaninoff stopped publicly playing anything other than his own compositions. We often met with him at home, and usually during these meetings Rachmaninov sat at the piano and played. I happened to hear a lot from him here, besides his writings. I especially remember how once he played me a series of numbers from Schumann's Kreisleriana. After Scriabin's death, Rachmaninoff decided to give concerts in memory of Scriabin. He played several times with the orchestra his Piano Concerto and, in addition, Klavierabend, including a number of large and small works by Scriabin. It is especially curious that he played Scriabin's Fifth Sonata, already largely close to Scriabin's later works, for which, generally speaking, Rachmaninoff did not treat with great sympathy.

Three or four days before the first concert of Scriabin's compositions, Rachmaninov visited me, said that the planned program seemed to him a little short, and asked me to advise him on some composition that could be played. I asked if he knew Scriabin's Fantasy? He said he didn't know. Then I took out the sheet music and showed it to him. Rachmaninoff lost it. Fantasy - one of Scriabin's extremely difficult compositions and rather long - he liked it very much, and he decided to play it in his concerto, which he did in three or four days.

Entering into the taste of performing not only his piano works, Rachmaninoff decided to play Liszt's Concerto Es-dur in one of Koussevitzky's symphony concertos * . [This concert took place on March 20, 1917 at the Zon Theatre.] A day or two before the concert, he came to me with Koussevitzky (he had only one piano at home at that time), and we lost the Concerto. Rachmaninoff was worried, because he was not used to playing other people's compositions in public, and in order to calm down, he decided to play the first part of his Third Concerto in the first part of the concerto, which he played many times with Koussevitzky, and in the second part - Liszt's Concerto.

After we lost the Liszt Concerto (I also had Alchevsky), Rachmaninoff began to consult about what he would play for an encore. Whatever piece we named, he immediately played it as if he had been specially preparing for it. We called the play: "Campanella", rhapsodies, etudes. He just didn’t know the etude “Round Dance of the Dwarfs”: he played it by notes and decided to play this composition for an encore; indeed, he played it and the Twelfth Rhapsody in concert with exceptional perfection, characteristic only of him. He played the Liszt Concerto that evening phenomenally, and this time he played his Third Concerto unusually colorless, as, apparently, he was completely absorbed in the thought of the upcoming performance of the Liszt Concerto.

Time has already begun the First World War, and Rachmaninov decided to give a concert in favor of the victims of the war. This concert took place at the Bolshoi Theatre. Rachmaninoff played three concertos: Tchaikovsky's Concerto in b minor, his own Concerto in c minor and Liszt's Concerto in Es major. Conducted by E. Cooper.

That Rachmaninoff lived for a number of years in the family of his aunt V. A. Satina and in 1902 married one of her daughters, Natalya Alexandrovna. After his marriage, Rachmaninov settled in a small apartment on Vozdvizhenka.

Sergei Vasilyevich lived very modestly for a time, and his means were very limited. He received compensation from Gutheil for his writings. Payment for concerts at that time was still rare, and in order to somewhat support the financial situation of the family, Rachmaninov accepted the position of music inspector at the Catherine and Elizabeth Institutes. This work took a little time; the remuneration was very modest: he received in both institutes fifty rubles a month. Then, despite his pronounced dislike for pedagogical work, he was forced to give private piano lessons (one lesson every day), and he took ten rubles for a lesson. All this relatively modest earnings provided him and his family with the opportunity to live. Gradually, Rachmaninoff, performing as a pianist with his compositions, began to have more and more success and already refused private lessons. His financial situation began to become more and more secure and, in the end, well-provided.

At the institutes in those days, the teaching of music played a rather important role and was of a serious nature. To a large extent, this was due to the fact that all the best young musicians, immediately after graduating from the conservatory, entered one or another institute as music teachers, since teachers, according to the then existing laws, were exempted from military service. I knew very well how music was organized at three institutes: Nikolaevsky, where I taught for many years, at Catherine's and Elizabeth's. I taught at Yekaterininsky for several years, and at Yelizavetinsky for a year or two.

At the Catherine Institute, I was attracted by Scriabin, who at that time was a music inspector there. After him, Rachmaninov was invited as a music inspector; at the same time, Rachmaninoff became the musical inspector of the Elizabethan Institute. The Catherine Institute was considered the most aristocratic of the Moscow institutions. Mostly children from wealthy noble families studied there. At that time, Olga Stepanovna Kraevskaya, an intelligent, energetic, but domineering woman, was at the head of the institute at that time.

The guardian of the Catherine Institute was Alexander Alexandrovich Pushkin, the eldest son of the great poet. It was a cavalry lieutenant general, rather tall, walking with yellow general's stripes on his pantaloons and with a strongly rattling saber on his belt. On solemn occasions, there were musical evenings at the Catherine Institute, at which he was present. During the intermission, tea was served at the boss's; Teachers were also invited to tea. Here I had to see Pushkin several times. His face was remarkably similar to his father's. He did not utter any significant or interesting words in front of me, and, it seems, he did not represent anything special, but his appearance and external resemblance to his father made a strong impression on me, and I, as they say, could not take my eyes off him .

The Institute was an educational institution of a slightly different type. There the composition of the students was less aristocratic than in Ekaterininsky. If I am not mistaken, girls from wealthy merchant families also studied at the Elizabethan Institute; in any case, that somewhat prim tone that was at the Catherine Institute was not in him. The head of the institute was Olga Anatolyevna Talyzina. Her mother (née Arseniev) almost became the bride of the young Leo Tolstoy. Olga Anatolyevna was a beautiful woman, still quite young, but with early and beautifully gray hair. She never married. Olga Anatolyevna was undoubtedly in love with Rachmaninoff and looked after him very much.

At the institute, I met Rachmaninoff only at parties and examinations; In the days when I was studying there, Rakhmaninov also came to Elizavetinsky as an inspector, and we often went home together with him. I lived in Borisoglebsky Lane on Povarskaya, and he lived on Vozdvizhenka. We took a cab together, drove through the Kremlin and usually stopped near the Chudov Monastery, where a window was made in the wall through which the monk sold wonderful sprouts. They were made in various sizes; we bought the biggest ones. They were white, wonderfully baked and unusually tasty.

In 1903, the anniversary of the Catherine Institute was to be celebrated. By the anniversary of the institute, it was necessary to compose a cantata for choir and piano. One of the pupils wrote rather weak words, and, on the recommendation of Rachmaninov, I was commissioned to write music for this cantata. The cantata was performed at the anniversary. In connection with the anniversary, all sorts of awards were expected, but then a difficult story broke out at the institute: one of the pupils drowned in the pond of the institute, and no one received any awards.

Rachmaninov went abroad for a year and transferred the inspectorate at the Catherine Institute to Vladimir Robertovich Vilshau, and Alexander Fedorovich Gedike was the inspector at the Elizabethan Institute after him. After Rachmaninoff left these institutes, I also left and remained a teacher only at the Nikolaev Institute.

The directorate of Ippolitov-Ivanov had to invite a professor of special instrumentation to the conservatory. Ippolitov-Ivanov wanted to arrange Vasilenko for this position. I remember a group of council members - myself, Morozov and two or three others - proposed the candidacy of Rachmaninoff, who was rejected during the ballot and Vasilenko was elected. I remember with what pleasure Mikhail Mikhailovich read the submitted notes, repeating: "Vasilenko, Vasilenko ..." Kashkin, who was a member of the arts council of the conservatory, was insulted for Rachmaninov.

Soon after this, the directorate of the Moscow branch of the Russian Musical Society * decided to invite Rachmaninoff to conduct symphony concerts, since he was very popular in Moscow at that time. Margarita Kirillovna Morozova and Sakhnovsky - both members of the directorate at that time - went to Rachmaninoff and asked me, as a friend of Rachmaninov, to go with them. Rachmaninoff received our delegation dryly and flatly refused the offer made to him. He motivated his refusal by the fact that he was going to fully engage in creativity and go abroad for this, which, as already mentioned, he soon did. I think that a hidden resentment towards the conservatory also played a significant role in this refusal.

For years, a certain Princess A. Lieven, a wealthy Moscow aristocrat, headed the Ladies' Benevolent Prison Committee in Moscow. She gave one or two concerts a year for the benefit of this committee. They usually involved Chaliapin, whom Rachmaninoff accompanied, while Rachmaninoff and I played two pianos. These concerts took place several times. The ingenious performance of Chaliapin, together with the absolutely amazing piano accompaniment of Rachmaninov, left an unforgettable impression on everyone who was in these concerts. Rachmaninoff and I played in these concerts his First Suite and a number of other major and minor works for two pianos: Arensky's Suite, Saint-Saens' Dance of Death, Bizet's Minuet and others. Sometimes these concerts were arranged with an orchestra. In one of these concerts, with the participation of the orchestra, Rachmaninov was to play his Second Concerto from a manuscript for the first time. When composing the Concerto, he quickly and easily wrote the second and third parts, but the first was not given to him for a long time. He had it in several versions, but he could not stop at one. As a result, only the second and third parts were ready by the day of the scheduled concert. Therefore, at the first performance, Rachmaninoff played only two parts, which immediately made a huge impression on both the audience and the musicians and were an exceptional success. Shortly thereafter, Rachmaninoff wrote his Suite for two pianos op. 17 and dedicated to me as his frequent double piano partner. In one of the musical meetings that constantly took place in my house, Rachmaninov wanted to show the musicians his new Suite. When we finished the rehearsal, Rachmaninoff went into the hallway, took out a manuscript rolled up in a tube from his coat pocket and said:

Finally, I wrote the first part of the Concerto, and I want to try it with you.

She was played; it immediately made an irresistible impression on me, and I persuaded Rachmaninov that same evening to play to the assembled musicians not only the Suite that was to be performed, but also the first movement of the Concerto. He agreed, and after the Suite we played it.

That a work of art does not immediately receive, even from the most qualified connoisseurs, the correct assessment. When Rachmaninoff performed the first part of his Second Concerto, this frequent occurrence was repeated.

The musicians immediately highly appreciated the excellent Rachmaninoff Suite, but did not show much enthusiasm for the first part of the Concerto. According to the general opinion, it seemed to be inferior to the second and third parts of the Concerto. I had a dissenting opinion and immediately appreciated this part. And indeed, if the best part of this wonderful work is to be noted, then, of course, the first one will have to be named. Soon Rachmaninov publicly played the entire Concerto, but the majority, despite its brilliant performance, remained of the same opinion, including Siloti, who also found that the first movement was weaker than the others.

Concerto op. 18 and Suites op. 17 Rachmaninoff soon wrote an excellent Cello Sonata. He also played it for the first time in one of the concerts organized by the Ladies' Benevolent Prison Committee with A. A. Brandukov, to whom this Sonata is dedicated.

The fiasco of the First Symphony Rachmaninoff began his career as a conductor. He was invited by Mamontov as the second conductor in his opera. Performances of Mamontov's opera took place at the Solodovnikov Theater (where the branch of the Bolshoi Theater was located). These performances played a very important role in the artistic life of Moscow.

He was a peculiar figure. He was a major financial businessman, a builder of railways, among other things, the Moscow-Arkhangelsk railway, a talented person, an amateur sculptor himself, on whose estate Abramtsevo, which once belonged to Aksakov gathered artists and musicians. The young Serov painted some of his masterpieces there, in particular the famous portrait of a girl with peaches. Repin and a number of other artists also wrote there. Mamontov heard in St. Petersburg and attracted Chaliapin to his theater.

As you know, he began his career as a chorister in an operetta in Tiflis*. Then they paid attention to him, and he was invited to the Mariinsky Theater. But there he was not appreciated. He sang Ruslan. Whether because he was a beginner singer, or for some other reason, he sang it unsuccessfully, and, as he himself told me, this failure made such a depressing impression on him that he has never taken on this part since then. . In the opera Ruslan and Lyudmila, he subsequently sang the part of Farlaf several times. After this failure, he was not given prominent roles at the Mariinsky Theater; he received a small remuneration and did not play a prominent role in the theater. Mamontov with his flair, seeing Chaliapin on stage and hearing his singing, immediately realized what a wonderful nugget he was dealing with; he invited him to his opera in Moscow, paying a penalty for him to the directorate of the Mariinsky Theater. Chaliapin's brilliant artistic career began in Mamontov's opera, here he created a number of his best roles - Ivan the Terrible in The Maid of Pskov, Boris Godunov (moreover, he sang Godunov and Varlaam several times in one performance) and many other wonderful characters. Subsequently, as you know, Chaliapin moved to the stage of the Moscow Bolshoi Theater, and Mamontov suffered a collapse; he went bankrupt, got on trial for some alleged abuses in his financial transactions. According to the court, he was acquitted, but his role as a patron of the arts, along with the impoverishment of material resources, ended, and he modestly ended his days.

Here, Mamontov invited Rachmaninov to this opera as the second conductor. Solodovnikov's theater burned down just at that time*. [This theater was not lucky: it subsequently burned down one more time.] After the fire, Mamontov’s opera until the repair of the premises was temporarily located in the so-called (after the name of the actor who kept the entreprise there) Paradise Theater (on Bolshaya Nikitskaya), which, after the October Revolution, at one time called the Theater of the Revolution. The Paradise Theater was not suitable for opera performances due to its size and acoustics. Rachmaninov's first performance as a conductor of the Russian Private Opera took place there. Rachmaninov's position was difficult. He did not yet have any name and authority as a conductor, and orchestral musicians, as usual, took him with hostility. Rachmaninoff, with his strong willed nature, quickly managed to take the orchestra in his hands, but at first it was hard for him. He told me that when he (I think it was an open dress rehearsal) began to play the introduction, I don’t remember which opera, he heard that the bassoonist, instead of his part, began to play some kind of nonsense, taking advantage of the fact that the performance was public and the orchestra couldn't be stopped. However, such actions in relation to the young conductor were to be stopped soon. Firstly, they felt what a talented conductor they were dealing with, and imbued him with artistic respect, and secondly, Rachmaninov showed great firmness and did not stop at fines for such acts of musicians, and, thus, he rather quickly managed to establish discipline in the orchestra. Nevertheless, this work in a private theater was not particularly interesting for him, since the conductors who served there were not at all inclined to share their duties with a young novice comrade.

Rachmaninov's talent as a conductor should have attracted attention, and already in 1904 he was invited as a conductor to the Bolshoi Theater. There, Rachmaninov first of all made a small revolution. Until then, in our opera houses, the conductor sat in front of the prompter's booth; he was clearly visible to the singers, but the orchestra was placed behind him. Meanwhile, in the great opera houses of Europe and America, the conductor has long been placed so that the orchestra is in front of him. Rachmaninov, having come to the Bolshoi Theater, immediately did just that. This caused sharp attacks from the singers, who announced that they could not see the stick and could not sing like that. conductors, including Altani, also protested, but Rachmaninoff persisted. The singers very quickly, however, got used to the new location of the conductor. The contact between conductor and orchestra becomes, of course, more lively.

The opera that Rachmaninoff conducted at the Bolshoi Theater was the opera Rusalka by A. S. Dargomyzhsky. The success of Rachmaninov as a conductor at the Bolshoi Theater was absolutely exceptional; those two seasons when he conducted there and constantly sang Chaliapin, Nezhdanova and a number of other outstanding singers can be called the golden age of the Bolshoi Theater. The impression of staging operas conducted by Rachmaninov was unforgettable.

At that time he created two one-act operas: one to the text of Pushkin's "The Miserly Knight" and the other - "Francesca da Rimini" - to the libretto of Modest Tchaikovsky based on the dramatic episode of the fifth song "Hell" from Alighieri Dante's "Divine Comedy". While still working on them, he assumed that Chaliapin would sing the part of the Miser in The Miserly Knight and the part of Lanciotto Malatesta in the opera Francesca da Rimini. Having finished the operas, he invited Chaliapin to his place to show them to him. There were three of us: Rachmaninoff, Chaliapin and myself.

Amazingly reading notes from a sheet. This brilliant artist was lazy and did not like to learn new roles and new pieces of the chamber repertoire. I remember once he became interested in Medtner's romances. I was not at the same time, but Medtner himself told me that when he showed Chaliapin his pieces (very difficult), Chaliapin sang them so amazingly from a sheet that he could only dream that his pieces could be so performed in a concert. Despite the fact that Chaliapin liked Medtner's songs very much, he did not learn them and did not sing them in public.

Rachmaninoff showed us his two operas, Chaliapin sang the part of the Miser and the part of Lanciotto Malatesta and made a great impression on us, despite the fact that he sang from sight. However, he was too lazy to learn Miser; this part was somehow not given to him, and he refused to perform in these operas. This refusal was the reason for the quarrel between Rachmaninov and Chaliapin, which lasted for many years. At the first performance of the part of the Miser in The Miserly Knight, as well as the part of Malatesta in Francesca da Rimini, Baklanov sang.

Rachmaninoff at the Bolshoi Theater lasted two seasons, but then he decided to devote himself entirely to creative work and left the Bolshoi Theater, especially since conducting was always very physically tiring for him. In 1906, as already mentioned, he went abroad and settled in Dresden, where he lived until the spring of 1909. Of the major works he wrote in Dresden, the Second Symphony op. 27, First Piano Sonata op. 28 and the symphonic poem "Isle of the Dead". When in the autumn of 1906 I was invited abroad to participate with Koussevitzky in his concerts in Berlin and Leipzig, my wife and I went to Dresden to see the famous art gallery there and meet Rachmaninov. They lived in a remote part of Dresden, in a house called the Garten-villa, in a mansion that was placed inside a courtyard and garden. It was small and very cosy. My wife and I spent several very pleasant hours there in the warm atmosphere of the Rachmaninoff family. We only stayed in Dresden for one day, so the meeting with the Rachmaninoffs was short.

The year Rachmaninoff with his wife and two daughters - Irina and Tatiana - returned to Moscow to his apartment on Strastnoy Boulevard, where his father-in-law Satin lived on the floor below. Upon his return to his homeland, Rachmaninoff, who was then already very famous, began to perform quite a lot as a pianist in Moscow and other Russian cities. His concerts were always accompanied by outstanding success and gave him good earnings. The Moscow Philharmonic Society invited Rachmaninoff to conduct symphony concerts, of which there were ten in a season. Rachmaninoff was the conductor of the symphony concerts of the Philharmonic Society for one or two seasons. As I have already said, Rachmaninoff brought with him from abroad two new scores: the Second Symphony and the symphonic poem "Isle of the Dead". In Russia in 1909 Rachmaninoff created the Third Piano Concerto op. 30, which I first heard from our mutual friend V.R. Vilshau in his small apartment on First Meshchanskaya.

1910 Concerto was performed in one of the symphony meetings of the Moscow Philharmonic Society. Brandukov during these years acted as one of the conductors of the symphony meetings of the Moscow Philharmonic Society. Once Rachmaninoff played his Second Concerto under his direction; this accompaniment was extremely unsuccessful, because, despite the fact that A. Brandukov was an excellent musician and an excellent cellist, he still had absolutely no conducting skills and experience. Rachmaninoff was on friendly terms with Brandukov, and yet, remembering his performance with the latter, he categorically told him that he would not play the Third Piano Concerto if Brandukov was conducting. The cellist E. E. Plotnikov, who at that time served as a conductor in Zimin's private opera, was urgently invited as a conductor. Despite the fact that the accompaniment of the Third Concerto is very difficult and the composition was unknown to him (Plotnikov had to prepare for performance in two or three days), he did his job well and accompanied perfectly satisfactorily. Of course, this performance cannot in any way be compared with Rachmaninov's subsequent performances of the Third Concerto conducted by Koussevitzky, but the accompaniment was so good that even at the first performance this Concerto was an outstanding success.

In September 1910, in Ivanovka, Rachmaninov wrote a series of Preludes op. 32. Preludes in G-dur and gis-moll, apparently not yet recorded, were performed by him as an encore in April 1910, when his Third Concerto was performed for the first time in Moscow in a concert of the Moscow Philharmonic Society.

In 1913, in Ivanovka, Rachmaninov finished his poem "The Bells" to the text of Edgar Allan Poe in the translation of Balmont. This poem was first performed in one of Siloti's concerts in St. Petersburg. I knew this composition very well, because, on the recommendation of Rachmaninoff, Gutheil ordered me to make its piano transcription. I was extremely interested in the performance of the poem, and by the day of the concert I went to St. Petersburg. Conducted by Rachmaninov himself. Participated in the performance: orchestra and choir of the Mariinsky Theatre, soloists E. I. Popova, A. D. Alexandrovich And P. Z. Andreev. Petersburg performance was very good, and the poem was an outstanding success; even St. Petersburg musicians, who were usually extremely unfriendly to Rachmaninov's work, shrugged their shoulders in bewilderment and said with condescending surprise that the composition was good. After the performance of the poem, they gathered at Siloti, who then lived in an excellent apartment on the Kryukov Canal.

The Bells were also performed in Moscow with extremely great success. Soloists E. A. Stepanova, A. V. Bogdanovich and F. V. Pavlovsky took part here.

Can't be called anything other than genius. Due to the fact that in his younger years Rachmaninoff devoted most of his time to composition, he did not study the piano much, although he loved the piano playing, he even liked to play exercises, and he usually played the very common exercises of Ganon. He had amazing hands - large, strong, with long fingers and at the same time unusually elastic and soft. His hands were so large that he could quite easily play double thirds in two octaves with one hand. His boundless, incomparable virtuosity, however, was not the main thing in his performance. His pianism was distinguished by an unusually bright, peculiar individuality, which is extremely difficult to imitate. Rachmaninov did not like semitones in his performance. He had a healthy and full sound in the piano, boundless power in the forte, never turning into roughness. Rachmaninov was distinguished by an extraordinary brightness and strength of temperament and some kind of severity of performing appearance. Its rhythm was absolutely exceptional; the growth of dynamics and rhythm in no performer made such an irresistible impression as in Rachmaninoff.

A less brilliant performer was Rachmaninov as a conductor, but, in a strange way, the personality of Rachmaninoff as a conductor was somewhat different from that of a pianist. The performance of Rachmaninoff the pianist was distinguished by great rhythmic freedom. He often used rubato, which sometimes seemed somewhat paradoxical and completely unimitable. With his performance of this or that work, especially when he played things that were not his own, in some places one could disagree, since the stamp of his personality was too bright, especially in the rhythmic freedom of performance. But it powerfully conquered the listener and did not give the opportunity to critically treat him. Rachmaninov the conductor was in the rhythmic sense much stricter and more restrained. His conductor's performance was distinguished by the same force of temperament and the same force of influence on the listener, but it was much stricter and simpler than the performance of Rachmaninoff the pianist. As much as Nikish's gesture was beautiful and theatrical, Rachmaninov's gesture was stingy, I would even say primitive, as if Rachmaninoff was simply counting the beat, and yet his power over the orchestra and listeners was completely irresistible. The performance of such works as Mozart's Symphony in g-moll, Tchaikovsky's Francesca da Rimini, Scriabin's First Symphony, Rachmaninoff's Second Symphony and much more left an absolutely unforgettable impression. His performance as an opera conductor was just as incomparable. The operas I have heard conducted by Rachmaninoff have never been performed again in such a way that they can be compared with Rachmaninoff. As I said, Rachmaninoff did not like to conduct; this physically tired him, and in recent years, living abroad, Rachmaninoff performed relatively rarely as a conductor, it seems, only with his new works.

As a person produced a dual impression. To people who knew him little, who were distant to him, he gave the impression of a stern, somewhat dry, perhaps arrogant person. Meanwhile, this restrained severity towards people was largely a consequence of the shyness of his nature. With those people who were close to Rachmaninov, whom he loved, he was exceptionally charming.

Having received a systematic general education, Rachmaninoff was nevertheless a very well-read, developed person, knew French, German, and later - abroad - and English well, and was naturally smart in a peculiar way, had his own definite original judgment about everything. He was a touching family man, somewhat old-fashioned warehouse. In the family - his wife, sister and all the household - they adored him and looked after him. Sergei Vasilyevich loved both daughters very much. Going to bed, the girls came to their father to say goodbye. I did not notice any manifestations of religiosity in Sergei Vasilyevich, I did not hear that he went to church. However, when he said goodbye to the children, he touchingly baptized them with his big beautiful hand.

Being tall and seemingly strong in build, Rachmaninoff was not physically strong. His back often hurt; he was distinguished by a certain suspiciousness and, when he felt bad physically, fell into gloomy melancholy. He often doubted his abilities, was disappointed with the composer's work, which was dearer to him than anything in the world. During periods of heavy doubt, the warm family atmosphere with which he was surrounded made his life much easier.

They were close to Rachmaninoff. He liked to visit me, loved my sisters, and later, when I got married, he treated my wife very warmly. His coming to me was always a great joy for me and my loved ones and brought an atmosphere of natural cordiality and simplicity. Most of the evening Rachmaninoff usually spent at the piano. He liked to sit at the instrument; while talking, he recalled this or that piece of music and immediately played it. He knew and played unusually much and played everything with exceptional perfection. These evenings were an incomparable pleasure.

Rachmaninov to play several rubbers in screw. Either at his place or at mine, we sometimes gathered and played three or four rubbers. He played brilliantly and was very funny. There were no sharp arguments during the game, as is often the case among the players; failures of one kind or another were treated cheerfully, and these two to two and a half hours of play passed extremely pleasantly.

Rachmaninoff was comfortable, there was a good home table. I remember once, for some reason, a lot of people gathered on the day of a family holiday; Chaliapin came and announced that he would treat us to Italian pasta. Indeed, in some very complicated way, he prepared an unusually tasty dish, revealing the unexpectedly extraordinary abilities of the cook.

Like all big people, there were features of childishness. He loved all sorts of gizmos like toys: some unusual pencil, a paper stapler, etc. I remember someone gave him a vacuum cleaner, he demonstrated the excellent qualities of this device to all his friends and was happy like a child.

At that time, already making good money, Rakhmaninov, one of the first private people in Moscow, not from the circle of the rich, bought a car and became a virtuoso driver in a very short time.

When the air loops of the arrived French pilot Pegu were demonstrated for the first time in Moscow on Khodynka, Rakhmaninov invited me and my wife to go with him to watch these flights. We went in Rachmaninoff's car - he, his wife Natalya Alexandrovna and my wife and I. Sergei Vasilyevich demonstrated to us his chauffeur virtuosity.

There was a family estate Ivanovka in the Tambov province, which the whole family cherished and loved him extremely. I, unfortunately, did not have to be there; my wife and I agreed several times to go on a visit to Ivanovka, and each time, for one reason or another, this could not take place.

Gödike was there once. Rachmaninoff wrote The Bells just at that time. Together with him, Rachmaninoff then showed Alexander Fedorovich one act of his unfinished opera Monna Vanna.

Satinyh was burdened with large debts, mortgaged and re-mortgaged three times and, in the end, had to be sold under the hammer, which would have been a heavy blow for the family. Rachmaninov decided to save the estate. He, by common consent, took it along with his debts. For a number of years, denying himself a lot, he used almost all his earnings, which at that time were already quite large, to pay off the debts that lay on the estate. He finally succeeded in clearing the estate of debts and bringing it into a fairly comfortable state, which he was very proud of, naively imagining himself a good farmer, which he, of course, was not. In the summer, Rachmaninov took his car to the village and showed his chauffeur qualities in the open.

After the October Revolution, at the end of 1917, Rachmaninov, having received a concert offer to Sweden and permission to leave, went there with his family and never returned to his homeland.

For ten whole years, Rachmaninoff was mainly engaged in wide concert activities as a pianist, playing along with his own and other people's works, and won the position of the first pianist in the world, thanks to which he became quite rich. As a composer, he did not have much success in the West, since at that time they were mainly fond of modernist trends, and the work of Rachmaninov, who continued the realistic line of Tchaikovsky, was very far from these trends. His music, which always reaches a wide audience, almost did not find a sympathetic response from the critics of the modern West in the overwhelming majority. This and, more importantly, the separation from the native soil caused this time the longest creative break in Rachmaninov's life. For ten years after leaving his homeland, he wrote almost nothing, except for a few transcriptions. He was very upset by his separation from his homeland. I was strongly impressed by the following story by the Moscow musician and conductor of the Jewish theater L. M. Pulver. The Moscow Jewish Theater traveled abroad in the twenties and was in Paris. There, Pulver somehow entered a music store, began to examine the notes on the counter and suddenly noticed that Rachmaninov was standing next to him. Rachmaninoff recognized him; they greeted him, and Rachmaninoff began to question him about Moscow and Moscow affairs, but after a few words he sobbed and, without saying goodbye to Pulver, ran out of the store. Usually Rachmaninoff was not particularly expansive in expressing his feelings; from this one can conclude how painfully he felt the separation from his homeland.

Years Rachmaninoff again creatively revived and wrote a number of excellent works: Piano Variations on a Theme of Corelli, the Fourth Piano Concerto, "Three Russian Songs", Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, a wonderful Third Symphony and his swan song of exceptional power and tragic depth - "Symphonic Dances" for the orchestra.

Rachmaninoff, which came a few days before his seventieth birthday, which we wanted to widely celebrate, is the result of cancer that developed at lightning speed.

Proximity, friendship with Rachmaninoff is one of the best memories of my life. I always hoped to meet him again in my life. His death hit me hard.

Alexander Borisovich Goldenweiser is a prominent teacher, talented performer, composer, music editor, critic, writer, public figure - in all these qualities he has performed for many decadessuccessfully. He has always had a relentless pursuit of knowledge. This also applies to music itself, in which his erudition knew no bounds, this also applies to other areas of artistic creativity, this also applies to life itself in its various manifestations. The thirst for knowledge, the breadth of interests led him to Yasnaya Polyana to see Leo Tolstoy, made him follow literary and theatrical novelties with the same enthusiasm, the ups and downs of matches for the world chess crown. "Alexander Borisovich, Feinberg wrote, “always keenly interested in everything new in life, literature and music. However, being a stranger to snobbery, no matter what area it may concern, he knows how to find - despite the rapid change in fashion trends and hobbies, enduring values ​​- everything important and essential. And this was said in those days when Goldenweiser turned 85 years old!

Goldenweiser- one of the founders of the Soviet school of pianism - personified the fruitful connection of times, passing on to new generations the precepts of his contemporaries and teachers. After all, his path in art began at the end of the last century. Over the years, he had to meet with many musicians, composers, writers, who had a significant impact on his creative development. However, based on the words of Goldenweiser himself, here one can single out key, decisive moments.

“My first musical impressions,” Goldenweiser recalled, “I got from my mother. My mother did not possess an outstanding musical talent; as a child, she took piano lessons in Moscow for some time from the notorious Garras. She also sang a little. She had excellent musical taste. She played and sang Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, Chopin, Mendelssohn. Father was often not at home in the evenings, and, being alone, mother played music for whole evenings. We children often listened to her, and when we went to bed, we got used to falling asleep to the sound of her music.

And later - study at the Moscow Conservatory, which he graduated in 1895 as a pianist and in 1897 as a composer. Siloti and Pabst are his piano teachers. While still a student (1896) he gave his first solo concert in Moscow. The young musician mastered the art of composing under the guidance of Ippolitov-Ivanov, Arensky, Taneyev. Each of these illustrious teachers in one way or another enriched Goldenweiser's artistic consciousness, but Taneyev's studies and later close personal contact with him had the greatest influence on the young musician.

Goldenweiser (in a striped sweatshirt) talking to Tolstoy

Another significant meeting: “In January 1896, a happy accident introduced me to the house of Leo Tolstoy. Gradually I became a close person to him until his death. The influence of this closeness on my whole life was enormous. As a musician, L.N. for the first time revealed to me the great task of bringing musical art closer to the broad masses of the people.. (About his communication with the great writer, he would write a two-volume book “Near Tolstoy” much later.) Indeed, in his practical activities as a concert performer, Goldenweiser, even in the pre-revolutionary years, strove to be a musician-educator, attracting democratic circles of listeners to music. He arranges concerts for a working audience, speaking in the houses of the Russian Sobriety Society, in Yasnaya Polyana he conducts original concerts-talks for peasants, and teaches at the Moscow People's Conservatory.

This side of Goldenweiser's activity was significantly developed in the first years after October, when for several years he headed the Musical Council, organized at the initiative of Lunacharsky: “At the end of 1917, I learned that under the “Workers’ Cooperative” ... a “non-trade” was organized Department. This department began to organize lectures, concerts, and performances to serve the broad masses of the population. I went there and offered my services. Gradually the business grew. Subsequently, this organization came under the jurisdiction of the Moscow City Council and was transferred to the Moscow Department of Public Education (MONO) and existed until 1921. We formed departments: music (concert and educational), theatrical, lecture. I headed the concert department, in which a number of prominent musicians participated. We organized concert teams. Obukhova, Barsova, Raisky, Sibor, Blumenthal-Tamarin participated in my brigade ... Our brigades served factories, factories, Red Army units, educational institutions, clubs. We traveled to the most remote areas of Moscow in winter on sledges, and in warm weather on dray shelves; sometimes performed in cold, unheated rooms. Nevertheless, this work gave all the participants great artistic and moral satisfaction. The audience (especially where the work was carried out systematically) reacted vividly to the performed works; at the end of the concert, they asked questions, submitted numerous notes ... "

The pianist's pedagogical activity continued for more than half a century. While still a student, Alexander Borisovich began teaching at the Moscow Orphan's Institute, then he is a professor at the Moscow Philharmonic Society Conservatory. In 1906, Goldenweiser linked his fate forever with the Moscow Conservatory. He trained over 200 musicians. The names of many of his students are widely known - Feinberg, Ginzburg, Tamarkin, Nikolaev, Bashkirov, Berman, Blagoy, Sosina ... As Feinberg wrote, “Goldenweiser treated his students cordially and attentively. He presciently foresaw the fate of a young talent that had not yet matured .. How many times we were convinced that he was right, when in a young, seemingly imperceptible manifestation of creative initiative, he guessed a great talent that had not yet been discovered. Characteristically, Goldenweiser's pupils went through the whole path of professional training - from childhood to graduate school. In particular, this was the fate of Ginzburg.

If we touch on some methodological points in the practice of an outstanding teacher, then it is worth quoting the words of Blagoy: “Goldenweiser himself did not consider himself a theoretician of piano playing, modestly calling himself only a practicing teacher. The accuracy and conciseness of his remarks were explained, among other things, by the fact that he was able to draw the attention of students to the main, decisive moment in the work and, at the same time, extremely accurately notice all the smallest details (the details of the composition, evaluate the significance of each detail for understanding and embodying the whole. Differing in the ultimate Concretely, all of Alexander Borisovich Goldenweiser's remarks led to serious and deep fundamental generalizations.” Many other musicians, among them the composers Evseev, Kabalevsky, Nechaev, Fere, and the organist Roizman, went through an excellent school in Goldenweiser's class.

Meeting with pianist Egon Petri. Seated: Tatyana Goldfarb, Heinrich Neuhaus, Nina Emelyanova, Egon Petri. Standing: Yakov Zak, Roza Tamarkina, Alexander Goldenweiser. 1937. Central House of Art Workers

And all this time, until the mid-50s, he continued to give concerts. There are solo evenings, performances with a symphony orchestra, and ensemble music with Izai, Casals, Oistrakh, Knushevitsky, Tsyganov, Kogan. Like any great pianist, Goldenweiser had an original handwriting. “We are not looking for physical strength, sensual charm in this game, - Alschwang noted, - but we find subtle shades in it, an honest attitude towards the author performed, good-quality work, a great genuine culture - and this is enough for some of the master's performances to be remembered by the audience for a long time. We do not forget some interpretations of Mozart, Beethoven, Schumann under the fingers of Goldenweiser.” To these names one can safely add Bach and Scarlatti, Chopin and Tchaikovsky, Scriabin and Rachmaninov. “A great connoisseur of all classical Russian and Western musical literature,” Feinberg wrote, “he possessed an extremely wide repertoire... One can judge the enormous range of skill and artistry of Alexander Borisovich by his mastery of the most diverse styles of piano literature. He equally succeeded in the filigree Mozart style and the impetuously refined character of Scriabin's creativity.

As you can see, when it comes to the Goldenweiser-performer, one of the first is the name of Mozart. His music, indeed, accompanied the pianist for almost his entire creative life. In one of the reviews of the 30s we read: “Goldenweiser’s Mozart speaks for himself, as if in the first person, speaks deeply, convincingly and captivatingly, without false pathos and stage poses... Everything is simple, natural and truthful... Under Goldenweiser’s fingers, all the versatility of Mozart, a man and musician - his sunshine and sorrow, agitation and meditation, audacity and grace, courage and tenderness. Moreover, experts find Mozart's beginning in Goldenweiser's interpretations of the music of other composers.

Chopin's works have always occupied a significant place in the pianist's programs. “With great taste and a wonderful sense of style,” emphasizes A. Nikolaev, “Goldenweiser is able to bring out the rhythmic elegance of Chopin's melodies, the polyphonic nature of his musical fabric. One of the features of Goldenweiser's pianism is a very moderate pedalization, a certain graphic nature of the clear contours of the musical pattern, emphasizing the expressiveness of the melodic line. All this gives his performance a peculiar flavor, reminiscent of the links between Chopin's style and Mozart's pianism.

Shouldto mention the works of Goldenweiser as a composer. He wrote three operas (“A Feast in the Time of Plague”, “Singers” and “Spring Waters”), orchestral, chamber-instrumental and piano pieces, and romances.

So he lived a long, hard-working life. And never knew peace. "He who devotes himself to the art- the pianist liked to repeat, - must always strive forward. Not going forward means going backwards.” Alexander Borisovich Goldenweiser always followed the positive part of his thesis.

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Alexander Borisovich Goldenweiser(1875-1961) - Russian Soviet pianist, composer, teacher, publicist, music critic, public figure. Doctor of Arts (1940). People's Artist of the USSR (1946). Laureate of the Stalin Prize of the first degree (1947).

Biography

He was born on February 26 (March 10), 1875 in Chisinau (now Moldova) in the family of lawyer B. S. Goldenweiser.

His first musical impressions came from his mother, Varvara Petrovna Goldenweiser, who had a fine artistic taste and loved to sing and play the piano. At the age of five, having learned to disassemble notes under the guidance of his older sister Tatyana, he began to play the piano on his own little by little. When he was eight years old, the family moved to Moscow, where he began serious music lessons with V.P. Prokunin, a collector of Russian folk songs, one of the students of P.I. Tchaikovsky.

In 1889 he was admitted to the Moscow Conservatory in the class of A. I. Siloti, where he was surrounded by musicians who largely shaped his views on art, on the role of an artist in public life and on the tasks of a teacher.

He graduated from the Moscow Conservatory in 1895 in the piano class of P. A. Pabst (previously studied with A. I. Siloti), in 1897 - in the composition class of M. M. Ippolitov-Ivanov. He also studied composition with A. S. Arensky and counterpoint with S. I. Taneyev (1892-1893).

He began teaching in 1895. In 1895-1917, he was a piano teacher at the Nikolaev Orphan, Elisabeth and Ekaterininsky Women's Institutes, in 1904-1906 - at the Music and Drama School of the Moscow Philharmonic Society (now the Russian Institute of Theater Arts - GITIS). He also taught at the Prechistensky working courses, at the People's Conservatory, Alferovskaya gymnasium (art history)

In 1906-1961 he was a professor at the Moscow Conservatory in the piano class, in 1936-1959 he was the head of the piano department. In 1918-1919 - Assistant Director, 1919-1922 and 1932-1934 - Deputy Director (Vice-Rector), in 1922-1924 and 1939-1942 - Director (Rector) of the Conservatory.

In 1931 he organized the "Special Children's Group" at the Moscow Conservatory.

From 1936 to 1941 - artistic director of the Central Music School at the Moscow Conservatory.

A. Goldenweiser is the founder of one of the largest Soviet pianistic schools, an active participant in the restructuring of music education and the development of a modern system for training musicians in the USSR, and the author of many articles and reports on these issues. Among the students: S. E. Feinberg, T. P. Nikolaeva, R. V. Tamarkina, G. R. Ginzburg, D. B. Kabalevsky, D. A. Bashkirov, L. N. Berman, D. D. Blagoy , F. I. Gottlieb, A. L. Kaplan, I. V. Malinina, M. S. Lebenzon, L. I. Roizman, V. G. Fere, M. D. Chkheidze, L. D. Imnadze, S V. Evseev, N. Usubova, N. G. Kapustin and more than 200 others.

During the Zhdanovshchina period (en: Zhdanov Doctrine), he spoke from the standpoint of defending traditional musical values.

He has performed as a soloist and ensemble player. In 1907, he performed as part of the Moscow Trio, replacing the pianist D. S. Shor. He gave concerts until 1956, including in ensembles with E. Izai, D. F. Oistrakh, L. B. Kogan, S. N. Knushevitsky, the quartet. Ludwig van Beethoven.

Moscow (encyclopedia)

Goldenveizer Alexander Borisovich

Goldenweiser Alexander Borisovich(1875, Chisinau 1961, the village of Nikolina Gora, near Moscow), pianist, teacher, composer, People's Artist of the USSR (1946). His father is a lawyer and writer. Goldenweiser lived in Moscow from 1883. He graduated from the Moscow Conservatory in 1895 as a pianist, in 1897 as a composer. Among teachers S.I. Taneev, A.S. Arensky and M.M. Ippolitov-Ivanov. An important role in the creative formation of Goldenweiser was played by friendly communication with S.V. Rakhmaninov, A.N. Scriabin, N.K. Medtner. L.N. had a strong influence on his worldview. Tolstoy (since 1896), which was reflected in Goldenweiser's book "Near Tolstoy" (vol. 12, M., 192223). He did a lot of work in educational and charitable societies, including Prechistensky free classes for adult workers and workers, the Moscow Society for Assistance in the Arrangement of General Educational Folk Entertainment. In 191819 he headed the Musical Council under the Artistic and Educational Department of the Moscow City Council. From 1901 he appeared in print as a music critic. He gave concerts until 1956, often performed in ensembles, including violinists D.F. Oistrakh, L.B. Kogan, cellists S.N. Knushevitsky, M.L. Rostropovich, P. Casals, with the L. van Beethoven Quartet and others.

In 18971918 he taught at the Nikolaev Orphan's Institute, the Elizabethan and Catherine's Institutes, in 190406 at the Moscow Philharmonic School. From 1906 professor at the Moscow Conservatory (in 192224 rector, in 193942 director). In 193136 he was the artistic director of the "Special Children's Group" organized by him at the Conservatory, in 193641 the artistic director of the Central Music School. Created his own piano school. Among the students S.E. Feinberg, G.R. Ginzburg, A.L. Kaplan, R.V. Tamarkina, T.N. Nikolaev, D.A. Bashkirov, L.N. Berman, I.V. Malinina, D.A. Paperno.

State Prize of the USSR (1947). He was buried at the Vagankovsky cemetery. The Goldenweiser Apartment Museum (17 Tverskaya Street), where furnishings, archives, personal items, etc. are preserved, has been a branch of the Central Museum of Musical Culture named after M.I. Glinka.

Compositions: Diary. First Notebook (18891904), 1995; Diary. Notebooks two sixth, M., 1997.

Literature: A.B. Goldenweiser. Articles, materials, memories, M., 1969; In the class of A.B. Goldenweiser, M., 1986.

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• - genus. February 26, 1875 in Chisinau; 1889 entered the Moscow Conservatory, from which he graduated in the class of piano. in 1895 and in the class of composition in 1897. He performed as a pianist in symphony concerts and many others ...

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• is a modern lawyer. His pen belongs to the following works: "Social Legislation in the German Empire", 1890; "Social currents and reforms of the 19th century in England"; "...

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• - Soviet pianist, teacher, composer, music writer and public figure, People's Artist of the USSR, Doctor of Arts ...

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• - Russian actor, Honored Artist of the Russian Federation. In 1964-66 at the Moscow Drama Theatre. K. S. Stanislavsky ...
• - Russian pianist and composer, People's Artist of the USSR, Doctor of Arts. Founder of one of the largest Soviet piano schools. Professor at the Moscow Conservatory. USSR State Prize...

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KUSIKOV Alexander Borisovich