The birthday of cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich has
sparked a series of celebrations, including gala concerts in London and New York
with the London Symphony Orchestra. For the London concerts, beginning on 14
March, Rostropovich has selected music by three major composers of the 20th
century with whom he was especially close: Britten, Prokofiev and Shostakovich.
The New York concerts, beginning 21 April with the Great Performers series at
Lincoln Center, are devoted entirely to Shostakovich.
There have been many other composers who have been inspired by Rostropovich's playing, ranging from Stravinsky, Hindemith and Sibelius to Penderecki, Schnittke and MacMillan. Like audiences around the world, they have been struck by his facility and artistry — in particular, his remarkable interpretive range, intonation and control of dynamics as well as colors and nuances. For the last 35 years Rostropovich has also distinguished himself as a conductor with a wide symphonic and operatic repertoire.
But Rostropovich's musical life is only part of his story. The cellist is an outspoken defender of human rights, having risked his life to protest the excesses of the Soviet regime. On 31 October 1970 he sent an open letter to the state-controlled newspaper Pravda that bitingly attacked the government's repressive actions against leading Soviet artists, and in particular, defended the dissident writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn — a courageous act that eventually led to years of exile.
Rostropovich recently spoke with andante contributor Jon Tolansky in London about his extraordinary life. In the first part of this two-part interview, the cellist and conductor recounted his childhood, his seminal collaborations with Shostakovich and Prokoviev, and his landmark 1952 recording of the Dvorak Cello Concerto.
Jon Tolansky: As a child in your home in Baku you heard music from a very early age because your father was a cellist who had studied with Casals. Was music a passion from the start?
Mstislav Rostropovich: Yes, and as my father was a cellist and my mother was a pianist, I heard them rehearsing in our apartment there from as long ago as I can remember. By the time we left Baku, when I was just four years old, I was already crazy about music and I had already started to play the piano. Then we went to Moscow, where my parents made sure I had a good musical education, and when I was eight years old my father told me: "Slava, you must play the cello." He gave me a small cello and I started to play this phenomenal instrument.
I must tell you I was not very good about practicing. I was a normal boy and so sometimes when I saw my parents come out of their room I immediately started to practice the cello, but when they went out I would just look out of the window, sometimes for up to two hours. Then when I saw them coming back I would immediately start practicing again. I was a good actor, and when my parents came into my room I really convinced them I was very tired from all my practicing. My mother would say "Slava, enough, enough, you must rest." Then she gave me some candy.
But then my life changed completely when I was 14 years old. During the war my family had emigrated to the Ural, and there my father passed away. Now I really started to work very hard. I took over my father's teaching at the music school — and as I was only 14 my pupils were older than me! From this moment my personality changed completely. I knew I had to work to make money for the family, as I had a mother and sister who had been dependent on my father. So, in 1943 — when I was 16 years old — I went to the Moscow Conservatorium and while I was there I made frames for an exhibition of paintings at the Architects House. This is how I earned money. Then in December 1945 in Moscow there was the first national competition for young musicians since the outbreak of war, which had ended that year. Also taking part was the pianist Sviatoslav Richter, and we both received the Gold Medal. After this my life became much more pleasant — not necessarily more interesting, but more pleasant, I think.
JT: Was it around this time that you first met Shostakovich ?
MR: Yes, it was in 1943, when Shostakovich was very popular. His popularity in Russia fluctuated so much during his life. There were some periods when he was hailed as a genius and then there were other times when he was accused of having no talent for composition and had been mistaken to make music his profession! But in 1943 he was very popular because of the recent 7th Symphony, the Leningrad Symphony. So his composition class in the Moscow Conservatorium was full of students. Well, I asked my cello professor, "Maybe could you perhaps ask Shostakovich if he could give me half an hour so that I could show him the score of my piano concerto?" My professor was good and told Shostakovich that he had a talented student who also composed and would like to show him one of his compositions. So I went to Shostakovich's class in room 45 on the fourth floor of the Conservatorium. I was so nervous because this genius was going to make time especially to look at my bad composition. He asked if I could play some of it on the piano for him, and never in my life have I played anything so quickly. But now Shostakovich did not tell really me the truth — he said "Slava, you are so talented that I would be honored if you were to accept an invitation from me to join my class!" Of course this changed my life. On a Thursday I would have a cello lesson from 9 to 10 in the morning and then I would go to Shostakovich and stay all day with him, learning composition and playing four-hand piano duets with him. That was a real musical university for my life.
JT: Did you meet Prokofiev around this time too?
MR: Yes, but I got to know him closely later. I was introduced to him by a musician when I was at the Conservatorium but Prokofiev forgot me the next second. But then after I had won the 1945 Competition I decided I wanted to play some music of Prokofiev and in due course I found a piano reduction of his Cello Concerto, which was not available in a full orchestral score. I so liked the piece that I included it in a recital, playing it with piano accompaniment. That was on the 18th of January 1948. Prokofiev came to the recital and afterwards came backstage and said to me: "You know I very much like the musical material of this composition but I don't really like the reduction. If you agree, I would like to consult with you and make another reduction for cello and piano." At this moment I was like an angel coming into the sky. I thought I was no longer a human being! It was such an honor — it was like my real dream coming true.
At that time Prokofiev had so many admirers around him and was so successful
that I realized he could only do this with me when he could find time. But then,
just three weeks later, on the 10th of February, suddenly there was this
horrible, idiotic ruse from the Communist Party, attacking Shostakovich and
Prokofiev and others who were accused of "Formalism" in music. Of course, more
than 80 percent of the admirers of Shostakovich and Prokofiev immediately turned
against them because this was a decree from the Party. Maybe Shostakovich still
had a few friends around him after that, but Prokofiev, I really believe, was
left all alone with his wife. After that I called Prokofiev and said to him, "If
you ever want to contact me for anything I will be ready immediately." He said,
"Thank you very much, and of course I would like to continue our contact."
Then, in 1949, his close friend Nicolai Miaskovsky — a very great composer in my opinion and a man who had enormous respect both for Prokofiev and Shostakovich — composed his first work since the decree, which had included him and affected him badly. It was his second Cello Sonata, and Miaskovsky invited Prokofiev to the first performance, which I gave on the 5th of March 1949. Afterwards, Prokofiev came backstage and said he would like to compose a Cello Sonata, and so he began writing one immediately. When he gave me the manuscript I was so happy I immediately memorized both the cello and the piano parts. Prokofiev sent a car for me — a very bad car! — and invited me to his dacha to have the first run-through of his Sonata. It was such a long time since Prokofiev had played the piano that he had lost some of his fantastic technique and was now playing badly — please excuse me for saying this because he had been a phenomenal soloist.
We started rehearsing and I stopped sometimes to tell him he was playing wrong notes. Five or six time he was very nice about it, but then the next time he stopped and said, "Slava, did I compose this piece or did you? I play exactly what I like to play, and that's even if there are wrong notes!" Well, after that Prokofiev, who was so alone, invited me to live with him in his dacha through the summer. That was in 1949 and I lived with him there through 1953, when he died.
That was an incredible time for me, but it was also so terrible because I saw how poor he became. He had no money at all and one day he said, "Slava, I have no more money for breakfast." I was shocked, so I went to the Union of Composers and spoke with Mr. Khrennikov, the President. I told him, "Prokofiev has no money for food. Maybe the Union can give him a little bit of money? If not I will go to the Conservatorium and see if I can ask some students for some rubles." Khrennikov gave to me a sum of $50, in rubles of course, and I gave this to Prokofiev.
After that, a composer who had a powerful position at the Soviet radio network, the great conductor Samuel Samosud, and I had a secret meeting to discuss how we could try and help Prokofiev. The composer had a stroke of genius: "If Prokofiev were to compose something connected with Stalin I may be able to arrange a commission." So we all conceived an idea that Prokofiev could compose an overture called "The Meeting of the Volga and the Don." Stalin had an idea to build a canal between the two big rivers, the Volga and the Don, and we thought that this could make an opportunity for Prokofiev to earn something at last by writing a celebratory work. So I took the idea to Prokofiev, and I was so happy to tell him. Prokofiev said, "such a stupid idea!" You know, I was very near to crying. "Why are you so distressed?" Prokofiev asked me. I said, "There are thousands of bulldozers there and they are all plowing up the ground!" "Oh — well, maybe that's not such a bad idea after all," he said, and he composed this overture! So he had his first money for food.
But he died an unhappy man. He made a special reduction of his opera War and Peace, which had been taken out of the repertory, so that it could be performed on one evening in the theater instead of the usual two. He said to me, "I don't want to die without hearing my opera just once more." But he never did hear it again.
JT: The first time you were heard outside the Eastern bloc was on a recording — the Dvorak Cello Concerto, made in Prague in 1952, with Vaclav Talich conducting. It made a huge impact and it is still available, on CD. What do you remember from your time in Prague?
MR: You know, the most fantastic moments in my life have been connected with Czechoslovakia, and specifically Prague. I first appeared in Prague in 1947 at the Democratic Festival of Young People, where I won an international competition. Then in 1950 I was successful in another competition in Prague, the International Cello Competition, in which I received first prize, and after that in 1952, the Supraphon record company decided to make a series of Dvorak recordings for a jubilee in honor of the composer. They told me about the great Czech conductor Vaclav Talich. He had been accused by the Soviet KGB of performing for the German people while Czechoslovakia was under German occupation during the war. He had lost his position as music director of the Czech Philharmonic and was forbidden to give any concerts. After being arrested in his home he had been taken to Bratislava, where he was now kept in obscurity. But, Supraphon was going to try to get permission for him to make just one recording, and this, they hoped, would be the Dvorak Cello Concerto, with me.
When they told me this, I remembered how a few years earlier the great Russian conductor Evgeni Mravinsky had once asked me who I thought was the greatest conductor alive. "Maybe Furtwängler?" I said. "No," said Mravinsky — "Vaclav Talich." Well, Supraphon did manage to get President Gottwald to give permission for Talich to make the recording. And so, he came — he was now an old man.
Before the recording, he sent a message asking if I could have a piano rehearsal with him. During the rehearsal, I played right through the first movement and then he asked me something about one passage where there is a ritenuto, a gradual slowing down, and then a resumption of the first tempo. He said: "Slava, what do you think if, after the ritenuto, instead of immediately making a primo tempo and going faster at once, you gradually come back to the faster tempo, bit by bit?" I said, "Maestro, of course if you would like this, I will do it." Then he said: "I am so happy you agree, because I want to tell you that when I was a student, Dvorák was still alive, and this idea came from the composer."
I immediately asked him to teach me how I should play the concerto — I begged him to tell me absolutely everything he knew about it. And so he did, in great detail. He gave me the most wonderful lessons. Later I had phenomenal lessons from other musicians, and even now if I am with a great musician I say, "Thank you for teaching me." Talich was one of the first and the very greatest. You know, I am just coming up to 75 years old, and I very much like it if somebody can teach me now.
In part two of this interview, Rostropovich talks about his embarrassing first meeting with Benjamin Britten, his long relationship with the London Symphony Orchestra and the historic events that led to his exile from Russia.
