Rostropovich, Mstislav

Rostropovich, Mstislav

(mĭs`tĭsläv' rŏs'trəpô`vyĭch), 1927–2007, Russian cellist, pianist, and conductor. He made his cello debut in 1940 and his conducting debut in 1968, toured with the Moscow Philharmonic, and taught at the Moscow Conservatory until his friendship with Aleksandr SolzhenitsynSolzhenitsyn, Aleksandr Isayevich
, 1918–2008, Russian writer widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential authors of the 20th cent., b. Kislovodsk.

Solzhenitsyn grew up in Rostov-na-Donu, where he studied physics and mathematics at Rostov State Univ.
..... Click the link for more information.  and his support for Soviet dissidents brought him into official disfavor in the early 1970s. Banned from many musical outlets, Rostropovich, his wife, the soprano Galina Vishnevskaya, and their children left the Soviet Union in 1974 and settled in the United States the following year. From 1977 to 1994 he served as the musical director of the National Symphony Orchestra, Washington, D.C. He was stripped of his Soviet citizenship in 1978, but it was restored in 1990, and that year he again performed (with the National Symphony) in his motherland. After 1991, when he flew to Moscow to support YeltsinYeltsin, Boris Nikolayevich
, 1931–2007, Soviet and Russian politician, president of Russia (1991–99). Born in Yekaterinburg (then Sverdlovsk) and educated at the Urals Polytechnic Institute, Yeltsin began his career as a construction worker (1953–68).
..... Click the link for more information.  during the August CoupAugust Coup,
attempted coup (Aug. 18–22, 1991) against Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev. On the eve of the signing ceremony for a new union treaty for the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, members of the Politburo and the heads of the Soviet military and security
..... Click the link for more information. , he lived in Russia, the United States, and France.

Rostropovich, Mstislav Leopol’dovich

 

Born Mar. 27, 1927, in Baku. Cellist. People’s Artist of the USSR (1966).

Rostropovich graduated in 1946 from the Moscow Conservatory, where he studied cello under S. M. Kozolupov. He was a participant in several all-Union and international competitions of performing musicians. In 1978, Rostropovich and his wife, G. P. Vishnevskaia, were deprived of Soviet citizenship for undermining the prestige of the USSR. [22–951–4; updated]