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Reclaiming Roslavets: The Troubled Life of a Russian Modernist*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2016

Anna Ferenc
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Extract

It is evident by now that swift political changes have had an impact on music scholarship in Russia. A radical shift from rejection to appreciation of the music of Russian early 20th-century modernists was announced on the pages of Sovetskaia Muzyka in January, 1991, where the following admission appeared: ‘By silencing the activities of the musicians of the Russian avantgarde for a prolonged period of time, we have in essence artificially narrowed the complex panorama of our music history.’ In the case of Nikolai Andreevich Roslavets, the process of historical revision has included recent publication and re-publication by Muzyka of some of his piano and chamber music. At a time when paper shortage is critical in Russia, such an effort demonstrates a sincere commitment to acknowledging his work. Certainly, another welcome result of this new attitude has been access, though apparently still limited, to the Roslavets archives in Moscow. The valuable information contained therein provides biographical details which finally allow for a substantiated and more definitive statement on the life of this composer who figured so prominently among the Russian modernists.

Type
Research Article
Information
Tempo , Issue 182 , September 1992 , pp. 6 - 9
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1992

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References

1 , I. Nest'ev, ‘Iz istorii russkogo muzykal'nogo avangarda.’ [From the History of the Russian Musical Avant-Garde] Sovetskaia Muzyka 1 (1991), 75 Google Scholar.

2 Archive of the State Central Museum of Musical Culture in honour of Glinka. Repository no.373, file no.25, p.2.

3 Roslavets also had a talent for painting. A few of his landscapes have survived.

4 N.M. ‘Nikolai Roslavets. I. Tri sochineniia dlia peniia i fortepiano [Three Compositions for voice and piano] II. Grusmye peizazhi dlia peniia i fortepiano [Melancholy Landscapes for voice and piano]’ and ‘Nikolai Roslavets. I-re Sonate pour violon et piano.’ Muzyka 197 (1914), 542–544 Google Scholar.

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* See Tempo No.177, p. 45, for a review of the latter work's world première. (Ed.)

6 Central State Archive of Literature and Art [TsGALI]. Repository no.2009, file no.27, p.29.

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10 TsGALI. Repository no.2659, file no.93, p.4.

11 Ibid., p.6.

12 Ibid.

13 Belyi, Viktor. ‘ “Levaia” Fraza o “Muzykal'noi Reaktsii”’ ['Leftists' on ‘Musical Reaction] Muzykal'noe Obrazovmie 1 (1928), 46 Google Scholar.

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