At his death on 27 April 2007, barely a month after his 80th birthday, the great cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich was as well known as a defender of human and artistic freedom as for his musicianship.
In a lifetime of countless memorable performances, Rostropovich gave the premieres of Prokofiev's second Cello Concerto in 1952, Shostakovich's two Cello Concertos in 1959 and 1966, Britten's Cello Symphony in 1964 and Bliss's Cello Concerto in 1970. Some of the other composers Rostropovich inspired to enlarge the cello and orchestral repertoire with works specially composed and dedicated to him include, Berio, Bliss, Khachaturian, Lutoslawski, Bernstein, Pärt, Dutilleux, Messiaen, Schnittke, Shchedrin and MacMillan.
Rostropovich was born in Baku, Azerbaijan in 1927. At the age of four he started piano lessons with his mother and shortly afterwards began to study the cello with his father. He continued under his father's tuition at the Central Music School in Moscow and then went on to the Moscow Conservatoire, where he studied cello with Semyon Kozolupov, and counted Shostakovich among his other tutors; in addition to his cello and piano studies he began to conduct. He was immediately recognised as a potentially great artist when he gave his first public concert in 1940, and in 1945 was a prize-winner in several competitions in the USSR; he also won international competitions in Prague (1949 and 1950) and Budapest (1949). In 1951 his performance of the Bach Cello Suites won him the highest distinction that then existed in the USSR, the Stalin Prize. When the war ended, his reputation soon spread outside the USSR, principally through his recordings, and when he began touring in the West, it was soon apparent that in Rostropovich the world had a natural successor to the great Pablo Casals, who had reigned as the supreme cellist for more than half a century. Rostropovich’s vast repertoire ranged from the baroque, through the classical and romantic periods, to the avant-garde. In repertoire of all eras, he was renowned for his commanding technique and his intense, visionary playing.
In 1955, Rostropovich married Galina Vishnevskaya, the leading soprano at Moscow’s Bolshoi Opera. Although her operatic talent was widely known on stage, it was her partnership with Rostropovich, in concerts and recorded recitals, that introduced her to international audiences as a leading interpreter of Russian songs. Rostropovich's pianistic ability came to the fore and he worked with his wife on a wide range of songs, including Mussorgsky's Songs of Dances of Death. The linked names of Rostropovich and Vishnevskaya represented one of the world's finest and most celebrated partnerships, and Rostropovich became highly regarded as a piano accompanist. He was equally a chamber music partner to such musicians as Emil Gilels and Leonid Kogan, Sviatoslav Richter, Vladimir Horowitz, Martha Argerich and David Oistrakh.
In 1961 Rostropovich made his conducting debut in Gorky and since then won outstanding acclaim as a conductor, appearing with most of the world's leading orchestras, as well as conducting and recording many operas, including Queen of Spades, Eugene Onegin, Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk and Tosca. He was Music Director of the National Symphony Orchestra of Washington from 1977 to 1994. In the U.K., he appeared regularly with the London Symphony Orchestra (he made his UK conducting debut in 1974) and with other leading British orchestras. The London Symphony Orchestra forged close links with Rostropovich through major festivals that made an enormous impact on London's musical life. Rostropovich, a close friend of Sergei Prokofiev, was the inspiration behind the LSO's Sergei Prokofiev: The Centenary Festival in 1991, featuring orchestral and chamber music, and the world premiere of a cello fugue dedicated to Rostropovich. In 1993, Rostropovich led the Festival of Britten with the LSO, appearing as both conductor and soloist. Other events with the LSO included Rostropovich's 60th Birthday series in 1987 and Shostakovich: Music from the Flames in 1988. Both on the cello and on the conductor's rostrum, Rostropovich was one of the leading interpreters of the music of Shostakovich (with whom he studied composition), Britten and Prokofiev.
Rostropovich's first recording for EMI Classics was the Miaskovsky cello concerto in 1956, and he remained closely associated with EMI Classics from that time on. For the label, he recorded works by Beethoven, Bloch, Borodin, Brahms, Dutilleux, Dvorák, Glinka, Haydn, Khachaturian, Lutoslawski, Mussorgsky, Prokofiev, Rimsky-Korsakov, Saint-Saëns, Schumann, Shostakovich, Richard Strauss and Tchaikovsky, and performed variously as cellist, conductor and accompanist. A selection of these recordings was released by EMI Classics in 1995 in The Rostropovich Edition.
Rostropovich, as cellist, conductor and piano accompanist, was one of the most sought-after recording artists in the world. In 1995, EMI Classics released his recordings of the Bach Cello Suites on CD, Laser Disc and VHS. In February 1995, EMI Classics recorded Rostropovich in Schnittke’s Concerto for three, in which he was joined by Yuri Bashmet and Gidon Kremer. In July 1996 EMI Classics recorded Rostropovich conducting the London Symphony Orchestra in the Tchaikovsky Rococo Variations, the Saint-Saëns Cello Concerto No.1, the Fauré Elégie, and Bruch's Kol Nidrei. The cellist on the recording is Rostropovich's pupil, the 13-year-old prodigy Han-Na Chang. It was his first recording conducting another cellist. In March 1997, EMI Classics released an historic collection of recordings made in Russia between 1950 and 1974, called “Rostropovich: The Russian Years.” This collection is not only a testimony to Rostropovich's uniquely productive collaborations with many of this century’s greatest composers, but also a tribute to an artist whose incredible technical and interpretative powers are captured here at their glorious and incomparable peak. In an April 2000 release, Maestro Rostropovich conducted Maxim Vengerov in works by Stravinsky, Shchedrin and Tchaikovsky. Together they create “an irresistible partnership,” wrote The Times with reference to their collaboration on previous occasions, “the young soloist seeming to draw wisdom from the presence of the great cellist-conductor and the elder statesman boyish once again.” Their most recent recording, the Beethoven Violin Concerto and Romances with the London Symphony Orchestra, was released on EMI Classics in 2005.
To celebrate Mstislav Rostropovich’s 80th birthday in March 2007, EMI Classics made his entire EMI discography as cellist, conductor, and pianist available via an international campaign in conjunction with iTunes. Exclusively available on the iTunes Store (www.itunes.com), this treasure-trove includes eleven currently unavailable albums, two of them never before issued on CD. Highlights include Richard Strauss’s Cello Sonata, recorded in 1974, the complete Tchaikovsky Symphonies and Overtures with Rostropovich conducting the London Philharmonic Orchestra, recorded in 1976, and the Shostakovich Cello Sonata with the composer at the piano, recorded in the late 1950s. In addition to over 500 individual tracks, EMI Classics offered an attractively-priced 80-track Special Edition Bundle presenting a compelling snapshot of Rostropovich’s musical career featuring a PDF booklet with an introductory note and historic photos from the EMI archives.
Mstislav Rostropovich was one of the world's most outspoken defenders of human and artistic freedoms. In 1974, after a period of four years during which the writer Solzhenitsyn resided in their home, Rostropovich and Vishnevskaya left the Soviet Union at their own request. He subsequently devoted much time and gave numerous performances to support humanitarian efforts around the world. In 1990, after an absence of 16 years, he made a triumphant return to the Soviet Union with the National Symphony Orchestra of Washington, giving concerts in Washington and Leningrad to enormous acclaim. During the coup of August 1991, the strength of his attachment to his native Russia compelled him to fly, without a visa, to Moscow, to spend those momentous days in the Russian Parliament building and on the streets, where he was hailed as a national hero. In that same year, he and his wife founded the Vishnevskaya-Rostropovich Foundation, which undertakes a wide range of projects to improve child health-care.
Mstislav Rostropovich held over 40 honorary degrees and was the recipient of more than 130 major awards and decorations by over 30 different nations. These included the German Order of Merit, the Gold Medal of the Royal Philharmonic Society, the Lenin Prize, the Annual Award of the League of Human Rights, the Premium Imperiale from the Japan Arts Association and the Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire.
This biography was provided by the artist or their representative.
