Woronoff, Wladimir

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Woronoff, Wladimir

Woronoff, Wladimir, Russian-born Belgian composer; b. St. Petersburg, Jan. 5, 1903; d. Brussels, April 21, 1980. He studied violin as a child. He left Russia after the Revolution and settled in Belgium in 1922, where he took lessons in composition with Souris in Brussels. In 1954 he destroyed most of his early works, including the ballet Le Masque de la mort rouge, Suite de Bruxelles for Orch., and Concert lyrique for Piano and Orch.; he revised most of his remaining scores. His catalogue of extant works after this self-auto-da-fé includes La Foule for Bass, Chorus, and Orch. (1934; rev. 1965), Annas et le Lépreux for Low Voice and Piano (1946), Les 12,3 fragments from the poem by Alexander Blok, for Low Voice and Orch. or Piano (1921-63), Strophes concertantes for Piano and Orch. (1964), Lueur tournante for Narrator and Orch. (1967), Tripartita for Viola and Chamber Orch. (1970), and Vallées for 2 Pianos (1971).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire