In this Book

Music and Musical Life in Soviet Russia: Enlarged Edition, 1917–1981

Book
by Boris Schwarz
1983
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summary
According to Stalin, Soviet music was to be "an art national in form and socialist in content." The degree to wich this dictum has been followed in modern Russian music is scrupulously recorded in the enlarged edition of Music and Musical Life in Soviet Russia. It contains Boris Schwarz' frank comentary on Soviet music, composers, concerts, competitions, and musical conditions in the Soviet Union. But the book as a whole is more than a musical history. It encompasses the growth of Soviet cultural life—not only composition and performane, but also ballet and opera, educational institutions and curricula, books and journals on music, and musical "politics."

Table of Contents

Cover

Half Title Page

pp. i-ii

Title Page

pp. iii

Copyright

pp. iv

Dedication

pp. v-vi

Contents

pp. vii-viii

Preface to the Enlarged Edition

pp. ix-x

Preface

pp. xi-xiv

Part I: Experimentation 1917-1921

1 The Musical Scene before the October Revolution

2 The Early Years of the Revolution

Part II: Consolidation 1921-1932

3 New Economic Policy and the Five Year Plan

4 Opera, Ballet, and Orchestral Music, 1920’s

5 The Institutes and Conservatories

Part III: Regimentation 1932-53

6 The Resolution of 1932

7 Opera, Ballet, and Orchestral Music, 1930’s

8 The Great Patriotic War, Soviet War Symphonies

9 The Zhdanov Era

10 Musicologists on Trial

Part IV: Liberalization 1953-64

11 From the Death of Stalin to the Twentieth Party Congress

12 The Cultural Honeymoon

13 Moscow, Autumn 1962

14 Research, Education and Publishing

15 Khrushchev confronts Culture

Part V: Collective Leadership 1964-70

16 After Khrushchev

17 The Avant-Garde and the Middle Group

18 1967 The Fiftieth Anniversary of the Revolution

19 1968-70 Reflection and Retrenchment

Part VI: Developments and Expansions 1970-81

20 From the Lenin Centennial to the Death of Shostakovich

21 Dissatisfactions, Directives, and Defections

Appendix: Conversation with Maxim Shostakovich

Addendum: New Dates

Notes on Sources

Selected Bibliography

Index

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