Alexander Mosolov
Encyclopedia
Alexander Vasilyevich MosolovMosolov's name is transliterated variously and inconsistently between sources. Alternative spellings of Alexander include Alexandr, Aleksandr, Aleksander, and Alexandre; variations on Mosolov include Mossolov and Mossolow (as in German). was a significant Russian
Russians
The Russian people are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Russia, speaking the Russian language and primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries....

 composer of the early Soviet era, known best for his early futurist
Futurism (music)
Futurism was a 20th century movement in art which encompassed painting, sculpture, poetry, theatre, music, architecture and gastronomy. Filippo Tommaso Marinetti initiated the movement in his Manifesto of Futurism, published in February 1909. Futurist music rejected tradition and introduced...

 piano sonata
Piano sonata
A piano sonata is a sonata written for a solo piano. Piano sonatas are usually written in three or four movements, although some piano sonatas have been written with a single movement , two movements , five or even more movements...

s, orchestral episodes, and vocal music.

Mosolov studied at the Moscow Conservatory
Moscow Conservatory
The Moscow Conservatory is a higher musical education institution in Moscow, and the second oldest conservatory in Russia after St. Petersburg Conservatory. Along with the St...

 and achieved his greatest fame in the Soviet Union and around the world for his 1926 composition, Iron Foundry. Later conflicts with Soviet authorities led to his expulsion from the Composers' Union in 1936 and imprisonment in the Gulag
Gulag
The Gulag was the government agency that administered the main Soviet forced labor camp systems. While the camps housed a wide range of convicts, from petty criminals to political prisoners, large numbers were convicted by simplified procedures, such as NKVD troikas and other instruments of...

 in 1937. Following an early release, which had been argued for by his Conservatory teachers, Mosolov turned his attention to setting Turkmen and Kyrgyz folk tunes for orchestra. His later music conformed to the Soviet aesthetic to a much greater degree, but he never regained the success of his early career.

Mosolov's works include five piano sonatas, four string quartets, twelve orchestral suites, eight symphonies, and a substantial number of choral and voice pieces.

Biography

Mosolov was born to an upper-middle class family in Kiev, in the Russian Empire. His mother, Nina Alexandrovna, was a professional singer at the Bolshoi Theater and a graduate of the Kiev school of music, and she gave Mosolov his first musical lessons. The family moved to Moscow in 1904. Mosolov's father, Vasiliy Alexandrovich, died a year later when Mosolov was five years old. After his father's death, Mosolov's mother married a successful painter and teacher, Mikhail Leblan. Young Mosolov was greatly impacted by the cosmopolitan lifestyle into which he was raised; both German and French were spoken in the home and the family took trips to Berlin, Paris, and London.

Mosolov attended high school until 1916, and in 1917 worked in the office of the People's Commissioner for State Control. Through this, he personally delivered mail to Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician who led the October Revolution of 1917. As leader of the Bolsheviks, he headed the Soviet state during its initial years , as it fought to establish control of Russia in the Russian Civil War and worked to create a...

 three times, which had a profound impact on the young Mosolov. At the start of the Bolshevik Revolution, Mosolov volunteered in the Red Army
Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army started out as the Soviet Union's revolutionary communist combat groups during the Russian Civil War of 1918-1922. It grew into the national army of the Soviet Union. By the 1930s the Red Army was among the largest armies in history.The "Red Army" name refers to...

's First Cavalry Regiment and fought on the Polish and Ukrainian fronts. He received the Order of the Red Banner
Order of the Red Banner
The Soviet government of Russia established the Order of the Red Banner , a military decoration, on September 16, 1918 during the Russian Civil War...

 on two occasions. He suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder
Post-traumatic stress disorder
Posttraumaticstress disorder is a severe anxiety disorder that can develop after exposure to any event that results in psychological trauma. This event may involve the threat of death to oneself or to someone else, or to one's own or someone else's physical, sexual, or psychological integrity,...

 due to the war and was medically discharged in July 1921. Mosolov entered the Moscow Conservatory
Moscow Conservatory
The Moscow Conservatory is a higher musical education institution in Moscow, and the second oldest conservatory in Russia after St. Petersburg Conservatory. Along with the St...

, where he studied under Reinhold Glière
Reinhold Glière
Reinhold Moritzevich Glière was a Russian and Soviet composer of German–Polish descent.- Biography :Glière was born in Kiev, Ukraine...

 until 1925; in that year he began composition studies under Nikolai Myaskovsky
Nikolai Myaskovsky
Nikolai Yakovlevich Myaskovsky was a Russian and Soviet composer. He is sometimes referred to as the "father of the Soviet symphony".-Early years and first important works:...

. He also studied piano under Grigoriy Prokofiev and Konstantin Igmunov. He graduated from the Conservatory in 1925 after presenting his graduation piece, the cantata Sphynx, based on the Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish writer and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s...

 poem of the same name. That same year, he was granted membership in the Association for Contemporary Music (ACM).

Despite forays into composition, Mosolov's primary emphasis at this time was with performance, as he was an accomplished pianist. After the performance of his First String Quartet at the Frankfurt Festival of the International Society for Contemporary Music
International Society for Contemporary Music
The International Society for Contemporary Music is a music organization that promotes contemporary classical music.ISCM was established in 1922, in Salzburg. Its core activity is the World Music Days Festival, held every year at a different location. The festival includes cutting edge productions...

 (ISCM) on June 30, 1927 was met with critical acclaim, Mosolov shifted his focus to composition. He was appointed secretary of the Russian section of the ISCM in 1927 and 1928. In 1928 and 1929, Mosolov was commissioned by the Bolshoi Theater to compose a futurist imagination of what Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

 would be like in 2117 for a speculative ballet called The Four Moscows. Leonid Polovinkin, Anatoly Alexandrov
Anatoly Alexandrov
Anatoly Alexandrov may refer to:*Anatoly Nikolayevich Alexandrov , Soviet composer and People's Artist of the USSR*Anatoly Petrovich Alexandrov , Soviet/Russian physicist and academician...

, and Dmitri Shostakovich
Dmitri Shostakovich
Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich was a Soviet Russian composer and one of the most celebrated composers of the 20th century....

 were also involved, each to compose Moscow in 1568, 1818, and 1918 respectively, but nothing ever came of the project.

After the onset of socialist realism
Socialist realism
Socialist realism is a style of realistic art which was developed in the Soviet Union and became a dominant style in other communist countries. Socialist realism is a teleologically-oriented style having its purpose the furtherance of the goals of socialism and communism...

 as the official aesthetic of the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 in 1932, Mosolov traveled to Central Asia, where he researched and collected samples of Turkmen
Music of Turkmenistan
The music of the nomadic and rural Turkmen people is closely related to Kyrgyz and Kazakh folk forms. Important musical traditions in Turkmen music include traveling singers and shamans called bakshy, who act as healers and magicians and sing either a cappella or with instruments such as the...

, Tajik
Music of Tajikistan
Tajik music is closely related to Central Asian forms. The classical music is shashmaqam, which Uzbeks also developed classical music of Tajiks and made their distinctive own....

, Armenian
Music of Armenia
Armenia is situated close to the Caucasus Mountains, and its music is a mix of indigenous folk music, perhaps best-represented by Djivan Gasparyan's well-known duduk music, as well as light pop, and extensive Christian music, due to Armenia's status as the oldest Christian nation in the...

, and Kyrgyz
Music of Kyrgyzstan
Kyrgyzstani music is nomadic and rural, and is closely related to Turkmen and Kazakh folk forms. Kyrgyz folk music is characterized by the use of long, sustained pitches, with Russian elements also prominent....

 songs. Mosolov became the first composer to create a symphonic suite on a Turkmen folk song. His settings of folk songs were met with criticism from Soviet arbiters. Rather than simply set the melodies in an orchestral setting, Mosolov used dense textures and polytonality that disregarded the style of socialist realism. In 1932 and in desperation, he wrote a letter to Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

 pleading for Stalin's influence. In his letter, Mosolov wrote, "Since 1926, I am an object of permanent badgering. Now, this has become insufferable. I must compose, and my works must be performed! I must test my works against the masses; if I come to grief, I'll know where I must go." He went further to ask for Stalin to "influence the proletarian musicians
Russian Association of Proletarian Musicians
The Russian Association of Proletarian Musicians or RAPM was a musicians' creative union of the early Soviet period.In 1932 it was disbanded, together with other unions, such as RAPP, by The Decree on the Reformation of Literary and Artistic Organizations on April 23, 1932....

 and their myrmidons, who have badgered me during the whole last year, and to allow me to work in the USSR" or "authorize my departure abroad, where I, with my music, could be more useful for the USSR than here, where I am harassed and badgered, where I'm not allowed to display my forces, to test myself.""Я терплю травлю с 1926 года. Сейчас я больше ждать не хочу. Я должен сочинять и исполняться! Я должен проверять свои сочинения на массе; пусть это будут провалы, но я увижу, куда мне идти и как мне перестраиваться."
(Since 1926, I am an object of permanent badgering. Now, this has become insufferable. I must compose, and my works must be performed! I must test my works against the masses; if I come to grief, I'll know where I must go.)
"1. Либо воздействовать на ВАПМ и подвапмовцев в смысле прекращения моей травли, тянущейся уже целый год, и дать мне возможность работать в СССР. 2. Либо дать мне возможность уехать за границу, где я своей музыкой принесу гораздо больше пользы СССР. Чем здесь у нас, где меня гонят, травят, не дают возможность выявлять свои силы и проверять себя."
(Either influence the proletarian musicians and their myrmidon
Myrmidon
Myrmidon may refer to:* Myrmidons, an ancient nation of Greek mythology* Myrmidon , the eponymous ancestor of the mythological Myrmidons* The Myrmidons, a lost tragedy by Greek playwright Aeschylus* Myrmidon Books, independent publisher...

s, who have badgered me during the whole last year, and to allow me to work in the USSR or authorize my departure abroad, where I, with my music, could be more useful for the USSR than here, where I am harassed and badgered, where I'm not allowed to display my forces, to test myself.)


On February 4, 1936, Mosolov was expelled from the Composers' Union
Union of Soviet Composers
The USSR Union of Composers or Union of Composers of the USSR , , was a professional organisation of composers in the Soviet Union...

 for treating waiters poorly and taking part in a drunken brawl in Press House, a local restaurant. After this, Mosolov traveled voluntarily to the Turkmen
Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan , formerly also known as Turkmenia is one of the Turkic states in Central Asia. Until 1991, it was a constituent republic of the Soviet Union, the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic . Turkmenistan is one of the six independent Turkic states...

 and Uzbek
Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan , officially the Republic of Uzbekistan is a doubly landlocked country in Central Asia and one of the six independent Turkic states. It shares borders with Kazakhstan to the west and to the north, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to the east, and Afghanistan and Turkmenistan to the south....

 republics to collect folk songs as a form of rehabilitation. His attempts were unsuccessful, and he was arrested on November 4, 1937 for alleged counter-revolutionary activities under Article 58
Article 58 (RSFSR Penal Code)
Article 58 of the Russian SFSR Penal Code was put in force on 25 February 1927 to arrest those suspected of counter-revolutionary activities. It was revised several times...

, Paragraph 10 of the Soviet criminal code and sentenced to eight years in the Gulag
Gulag
The Gulag was the government agency that administered the main Soviet forced labor camp systems. While the camps housed a wide range of convicts, from petty criminals to political prisoners, large numbers were convicted by simplified procedures, such as NKVD troikas and other instruments of...

. He served in the prison from December 23, 1937 until August 25, 1938. Glière and Myaskovsky had sent a letter to Mikhail Kalinin
Mikhail Kalinin
Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin , known familiarly by Soviet citizens as "Kalinych," was a Bolshevik revolutionary and the nominal head of state of Russia and later of the Soviet Union, from 1919 to 1946...

, the chairman of the Central Executive Committee of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, arguing for Mosolov's release citing his turn towards realism, his "outstanding creative ability," and the fact that neither teacher had seen in Mosolov any anti-Soviet disposition. On July 15, 1938, Mosolov's sentence was commuted to a five-year exile—he could not live in Moscow, Leningrad
Leningrad
Leningrad is the former name of Saint Petersburg, Russia.Leningrad may also refer to:- Places :* Leningrad Oblast, a federal subject of Russia, around Saint Petersburg* Leningrad, Tajikistan, capital of Muminobod district in Khatlon Province...

, or Kiev
Kiev
Kiev or Kyiv is the capital and the largest city of Ukraine, located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River. The population as of the 2001 census was 2,611,300. However, higher numbers have been cited in the press....

 until 1942. His quick release, having only served eight months of his eight year sentence, was possible because he had been imprisoned not on political charges but on an overblown accusation of "hooliganism" brought by Mosolov's enemies in the Composers' Union.

When World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 broke out, Mosolov composed Signal, an opera which dealt with the war. However, the compositions of Mosolov's later life were so uncharacteristic of his earlier style that one scholar noted that it was "impossible to discern the former avant-gardist in the works written from the late thirties onward". Mosolov lived in Moscow and continued to compose until his death in 1973.

Musical style

Mosolov's earliest music implies that Mosolov was influenced by German romanticism, but this influence waned as he began studying under Myaskovsky and Glière. In an early piece, "Four Songs," Op. 1, Mosolov explored the use of ostinato. Widespread use of ostinato became the defining signature of Mosolov's music: Iron Foundry is built of many ostinati working in tandem to create the sound of a factory, it is used in the Second and Fifth Piano Sonatas, etc.

Dissonance "in the extreme" and chromaticism are also Mosolov's signatures, though he stops short of the structured twelve-tone technique of Schoenberg. Instead of tone rows, Mosolov uses thickly-clustered, heavily chromatic chords to make his point. Folk music also saw use by Mosolov. As the first composer of a symphonic suite on a Turkmen folk song, Mosolov adopted the use of folk music before it was mandated under Socialist realism. His Second Piano Sonata incorporated Kyrgyz melodies, and his "Three Children's Scenes" utilized a city street song. However, instead of carefully setting the music for orchestra, Mosolov handled the music "like thematic grist for his compositional mill." This use of folk tunes continued after his Stalinist "rehabilitation." However, Mosolov's early works were marked by dense textures and polytonality that was lost after his expulsion and persecution.

Works

For a complete list, see List of compositions by Alexander Mosolov.


Among Mosolov's more notable pieces are his Four Newspaper Advertisements and Three Children's Scenes, written in 1926. In Four Newspaper Advertisements, Mosolov set four brief announcements in the newspaper Izvestiya to music. The topics of the four short pieces range from a lost dog to the announcement of a name change. In contrast, the text to Three Children's Scenes was written by Mosolov himself, and is much darker. The first, called "Mama, give me a needle, please!" is a short song in which the protagonist tortures a cat; the singer even mimics the screams of the cat, and the song ends with a sung shout of "A wicked creature!"

Mosolov's most famous composition, Iron Foundry
Iron Foundry
Factory: machine-music , Op. 19, commonly referred to as the Iron Foundry, is the most well-known work by Soviet composer Alexander Mosolov and a prime example of Soviet futurist music. It was composed between 1926 and 1927 as the first movement of the ballet suite...

, was originally the final movement of a ballet suite
Suite
In music, a suite is an ordered set of instrumental or orchestral pieces normally performed in a concert setting rather than as accompaniment; they may be extracts from an opera, ballet , or incidental music to a play or film , or they may be entirely original movements .In the...

 titled, Steel. The work premiered in Moscow on December 4, 1927, in a concert held by the ACM to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the Revolution
October Revolution
The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...

. Its Western debut was at the ISCM
International Society for Contemporary Music
The International Society for Contemporary Music is a music organization that promotes contemporary classical music.ISCM was established in 1922, in Salzburg. Its core activity is the World Music Days Festival, held every year at a different location. The festival includes cutting edge productions...

 festival in Liège on September 6, 1930, and it came to America two months later when the Cleveland Symphony Orchestra held a performance. Although it was originally praised as "a mighty hymn to machine work" and as a piece that glorified industrialization and "the worker", as the years passed the piece began to receive criticism from increasingly conservative Soviet authorities. Some critics argued that the workers, ironically enough, didn't enjoy such music, while others argued that the workers, "for whom machine oil is mother's milk," were roused and inspired by music of their time. One critic found in the music "no organized will to victory, in fact very little besides the petty-bourgeois
Petite bourgeoisie
Petit-bourgeois or petty bourgeois is a term that originally referred to the members of the lower middle social classes in the 18th and early 19th centuries...

 anarchy", while conceding that it was "striving to find an individual idiom"; another called it a "grossly formalistic perversion of a contemporary topic". Today, only Iron Foundry remains from Steel: the manuscripts were lost in 1929, the same year that Mosolov came under increased fire from Soviet authorities.

Sources

Leningrad Association of Contemporary Music, October and the New Music (1927). Quoted in Mosolov, Alexander. Alexander Mosolov to Joseph Stalin, May 1932. In Russkiy avangard i tvorchestvo Aleksandra Mosolova 1920–1930-kh godov, by Igor Vorobev. St. Petersburg: Kompozitor, 2004.

External links

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