Mstislav Leopoldovich Rostropovich

"A thorough going Romantic" describes the musicality of Russian-born Mstislav (Slava) Leopoldovich Rostropovich (born 1927). While also active as a pianist and composer, he achieved international renown as a cellist and conductor.

Mstislav Rostropovich was born in Baku, the capital of the Soviet Republic of Azerbaijan, on March 27, 1927. The family was musical, his father being a professional cellist, his mother an accomplished pianist, and his sister a violinist with the Moscow Philharmonic. Rostropovich received his first lessons on both the cello and piano from his parents while quite young and, when the family moved to Moscow, he attended the Gnesin Institute where his father taught.

In 1943 he entered the Moscow Conservatory, studying with Semyon Kozolupov (cello) and Dmitri Shostakovich and Vissaryon Shebalin (composition), among others. He graduated with the highest distinction.

Rostropovich had won competitions for his cello playing in Moscow, Prague, and Budapest by the late 1940s. In 1956 he received a post as cello professoshipr at the Moscow Conservatory. By now an international career was well established, documented by numerous prizes and tours of Europe and the United States. His American debut took place at Carnegie Hall, New York, in April 1956. During the same period he met his future wife, Galina Vishnevskaya, then a soprano with the Bolshoi Opera. He occasionally served as her piano accompanist in song recitals. Their two daughters are both musicians.

Rostropovich brought to his performances a complete command of the cello and a display of emotional intensity that were at once apparent to the audience. His technique maintained both accuracy of pitch and fullness of tone through the entire range of the instrument, and he excelled in producing a wide variety of tone colors. Flaws in his playing were more often of a musical, rather than technical, nature, such as his occasional tendency to overplay and his lapses in phrasing continuity. His repertoire extended from Bach to the moderns, several of whom wrote works for him. The list includes Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Penderecki, Lutoslawski, and Britten.

Beginning in 1975 Rostropovich played a cello, the "Duport," created by Antonio Stradivari in 1711. The instrument was in perfect condition except for a mark on its lower body, said to have been put there by Napoleon who, after hearing Duport play, asked to examine the instrument and accidentally bumped it with his spur.

Although Rostropovich had been interested in conducting since childhood, his career in this art did not pick up until after 1968, when he made his debut at the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow with Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin. He credited much of his ability to the observations he was able to make while performing as a soloist under various conductors. While he once made the statement that "no performer's identity is as important as the composer's," he was criticized for exaggerated and sometimes sentimental interpretations, tendencies also found in his cello playing. He was therefore most comfortable with music where these qualities are more appropriate—emotional works of the Romantic and Post-Romantic periods. He had, though, surprising success with some of the more "difficult" moderns, including Penderecki, Lutoslawski, and C. Halffter.

A defender of personal freedoms, Rostropovich ran afoul of the Soviet State for coming to the aid of his friend Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who was refused admittance into Moscow after the publication in the West of The First Circle and Cancer Ward. Rostropovich first allowed the writer to stay with him for an extended period and then, when Solzhenitsyn won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970 and was still not allowed to publish in Russia, wrote a letter to the press on his friend's behalf. The letter, which attacked Soviet censorship of the arts, the suppression of human rights, and the incompetence of those in administrative positions in the arts, remained unpublished in Russia but was picked up by foreign presses. Then began an official harassment of the careers of both Rostropovich and his wife. Their passports were confiscated and all tours outside the country canceled. At home they were limited to lesser engagements in remote places and when performances were broadcast their names were removed from the list of credits. A letter from Rostropovich to Brezhnev went unanswered. Finally, the intercession of several prominent people in the United States, including Leonard Bernstein and Senator Edward Kennedy, persuaded officials to allow Rostropovich and his family a two-year absence from the country during which they would be based in Britain. Both he and his wife were stripped of their Soviet citizenship in March 1978.

A successful concert he had given in Washington, D.C., with the National Symphony Orchestra led to a post as music director with that orchestra beginning in 1977. He was also a regular guest conductor with the London Philharmonic Orchestra for several years and it was with this orchestra that he made the first recording of Shostakovich's opera, Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, his wife singing the role of Katerina. While with the London Philharmonic Orchestra he recorded the complete symphonies of Tchaikovsky, a composer he regarded more highly than do most musicians.

When he heard of the right-wing coup in the U.S.S.R. on August 19, 1991, Rostropovich flew immediately to Moscow. Continuing his dedication to freedom, he spent the next three days in the Russian parliament building while the coup collapsed around him. He called this time "the best days of my life." Those types of days became even more frequent. In May, 1997, wrapped in an emotional visit to his native Azerbaijan he offered his music or even his life to prevent new fighting in the region. During his five-day stay he offered to play for the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan for as long as it took to settle the long dispute over the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh. Leaving for Moscow, he said, "If there is a new outbreak of hostilities in the conflict zone, I will go there, stand between the forces and say: Better kill me."

Although not originally known as a composer, Rostropovich retained an active interest in writing music throughout his career. He dismissed his student works as "bad imitations of Prokofiev," but occasionally included some later pieces in his own cello recitals. His compositions include two piano concertos, a work for a string quartet, various piano and cello pieces, and a satirical cantata.

His composing career has given him several widely acclaimed distinctions. In June, 1994, he conducted his last subscription concert as music director at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. The program, Verdi Requiem, more or less personified its leader: big, impassioned and extroverted and topped off his 17 seasons as the conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra.

In October, 1995, he returned to Russia to fight for a new cause-the costly and controversial reconstruction of Moscow's Christ the Savior Cathedral. It was said, that hundreds of wealthy and well-dressed Russians paid $1,000 apiece to hear Rostropovich conduct and play cello in the Moscow Conservatory.

April, 1997 gave Rostropovich the distinction of being the last conductor to play the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Hall before the $105 million renovation and expansion transformed the Orchestra Hall into Symphony Center.

Rostropovich did not give up his cello. In March of 1997, he, at age 70, played works by Marcello, Beethoven, Bach, Rachmaninoff and Shostakovich at the music festival in Monaco, dedicated to the memory of Princess Grace.

Among his numerous awards and distinctions were the Stalin Prize (1951); the Gold Medal of the Royal Philharmonic Society, London (1970); honorary doctorates from Harvard (1974) and Cambridge (1975) universities; Officer of the French Légion d'honneur (1982); the Anti-Defamation League Award (1985); and was made an honorary knight in 1987.

Further Reading

As Rostropovich divided his career between the cello and conducting, so the curious reader must consult different sources for either branch of his activities. The monthly periodical The Strad followed his life as a cellist very closely, scarcely an issue being without some mention of him. The Washington Post contained updates on his conducting engagements with the National Symphony Orchestra. This newspaper is indexed separately as well as in the National Newspaper Index, the latter being perhaps the more current. Helena Matheopoulos devoted a chapter to Rostropovich the conductor in her book Maestro: Encounters with Conductors of Today (1982). Rostropovich himself described the harassment of his and his wife's careers in an article in the New York Times (March 6, 1975). See also Chicago Tribune, "Grand Finale," 04/26/97; "CSO Announces 1996-97 Schedule," 02/09/96; "Famed Conductor Performs For Cathedral In Moscow," 10/23/95; "Verdi Requiem Is Swan Song For Rostropovich," 06/17/94. New York Times "Music Festival In Monaco," March 16, 1997. LA Times "World in Brief, Azerbaijan, Rostropovich Offers Music, Life for Peace," May 4, 1997. □

MSTISLAV ROSTROPOVICH

Born: Baku, Azerbaijan, 27 March 1927

Genre: Classical

Mstislav Rostropovich is not only a great musician and a great artist, he is also one of the leading cultural voices of the twentieth century. A preeminent cellist, he has been the inspiration for and champion of dozens of major works for his instrument by some of the leading composers of his day. As a conductor, he has led many of the world's leading orchestras and served as music director of Washington, D.C.'s National Symphony. As an artist he has been an outspoken champion of cultural causes and human rights.

Rostropovich began studying the piano at the age of four with his mother, then added the cello, studying with his father Leopold, who had been a student of Pablo Casals in Paris, France. He enrolled in the Central Music School in Moscow, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), and made his public debut at age thirteen performing the Saint-Saëns Cello Concerto. He continued at the famed Moscow Conservatory, where he added conducting to his studies. He studied composition with Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich, and also met and befriended Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev.

As a wave of repression hit, Prokofiev and Shostakovich were banned from the conservatory and the country's musical life. But Rostropovich stayed loyal, helping Prokofiev work on his cello concerto and becoming close friends with Shostakovich. Over the next several years, Rostropovich—considered a rising star by the Soviet regime—toured extensively as a cellist, also making his debut as a conductor in Gorky in 1961, conducting Prokofiev's Symphony No. 5.

In 1955 he married star Bolshoi soprano Galina Vishnevskaya, who was a rising star, beginning not only a personal relationship but a major musical partnership as well. Rostropovich has frequently accompanied Vishnevskaya on the piano. Through the 1960s, the couple lived next door to Shostakovich in Moscow. In 1967 Rostropovich met dissident writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn and in 1969, when Rostropovich discovered his new friend in difficult circumstances, invited him to move in. Solzhenitsyn won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970 and the Soviet authorities pressured Rostropovich to evict the writer. Instead, Rostropovich wrote an open letter to the press, protesting, and overnight his stellar career was shut down.

New Start in the West

After Solzhenitsyn's arrest and expulsion from the USSR in 1974, Rostropovich applied to leave the country
and settled in Paris, where the family heard in 1978 that their Soviet citizenships had been revoked. Being banished was not an impediment to either Rostropovich's or Vishnevskaya's career. Their reputations had preceded them and they were treated as major artists in the West, invited to perform in the world's great concert halls and becoming bigger stars than they had been at home.

Rostropovich's musicianship is marked by its warm-hearted intensity, commanding tone, and formidable technique. He is a player who strongly resonates with the music he performs, and his musical appetite is large and inclusive. He has performed the entire cello repertoire and has been personally responsible for considerably expanding it through his numerous commissions from composers.

A champion of the music of colleagues, he has premiered numerous important additions to the cello repertoire. Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Benjamin Britten, Witold Lutoslawski, Aram Khachaturian, James MacMillan, and others have written cello works for him, and he has premiered numerous other pieces. His repertoire includes some fifty cello concertos.

As a conductor, Rostropovich also tirelessly promoted the work of his friends. He gave the premiere of the original version of Prokofiev's opera War and Peace and with his long association with the London Symphony, Rostropovich mounted major festivals dedicated to the music of Shostakovich, Prokofiev, and Britten. In 1977 he was appointed music director of Washington, D.C.'s National Symphony Orchestra, a post he held for seventeen seasons.

In 1990, seventeen years after leaving the Soviet Union, he led the National Symphony on an historic tour of Russia. The following year, during an attempted coup in August at the Russian Parliament, he flew to Moscow to be in the Parliament building in support of his friend, Russian President Boris Yeltsin. He was hailed as a national hero, and though he has been offered back his citizenship by the new Russian government, he has declined, preferring to travel on a Swiss visa.

After stepping down as music director of National Symphony in 1994, he became the orchestra's conductor emeritus, and he has continued to conduct there regularly. Released from his duties with the orchestra, he stepped up his cello career, producing a series of well-regarded recordings. His 1995 recording of Bach's solo Cello Suites is a landmark, selling more than 250,000 copies.

Rostropovich is one of the most decorated musicians alive today: He holds more than forty honorary degrees and has received 130 major awards from thirty countries, including the Lenin and Stalin Prizes, the French Legion of Honor, membership in the Academy of Arts of the French Institute, the Presidential Medal of Freedom in the United States, a Kennedy Center Honor, and the International League of Human Rights Award. His ability to express himself both through his music and as a "citizen of the world" make him one of the most important artists of his time.

SELECTIVE DISCOGRAPHY:

Bach: Cello Suites 1–6 (EMI, 1995). With David Oistrakh: Brahms: Double Concerto (Concerto in A Minor for Violin and Cello) (EMI, 1970). With Rudolf Serkin: Brahms: Sonata for Cello and Piano in E Minor, Op. 38 and Sonata in F, Op. 99 (Deutsche Gramophon, 1980).

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

M. Rostropovich and G. Vishnevskaya, Russia, Music, and Liberty: Conversations with Claude Samuel (New York, 1995).

douglas mclennan

Rostropovich, Mstislav Leopoldovich (1927– ) Soviet musician, who established a reputation as one of the century's best cellists. Leading composers such as Shostakovich, Prokofiev, and Britten dedicated works to him.