A graduate of theSaint Petersburg Conservatory, Prokofiev initially made his name as an iconoclastic composer-pianist, achieving notoriety with a series of ferociously dissonant and virtuosic works for his instrument, including his first two piano concertos. In 1915, Prokofiev made a decisive break from the standard composer-pianist category with his orchestralScythian Suite, compiled from music originally composed for a ballet commissioned bySergei Diaghilev of theBallets Russes. Diaghilev commissioned three further ballets from Prokofiev—Chout,Le pas d'acier andThe Prodigal Son—which, at the time of their original production, all caused a sensation among both critics and colleagues. But Prokofiev's greatest interest was opera, and he composed several works in that genre, includingThe Gambler andThe Fiery Angel. Prokofiev's one operatic success during his lifetime wasThe Love for Three Oranges, composed for theChicago Opera and performed over the following decade in Europe and Russia.
After theRevolution of 1917, Prokofiev left Russia with the approval of SovietPeople's CommissarAnatoly Lunacharsky, and resided in the United States, then Germany, then Paris, making his living as a composer, pianist and conductor. In 1923 he married a Spanish singer,Carolina (Lina) Codina, with whom he had two sons; they divorced in 1947. In the early 1930s, the Great Depression diminished opportunities for Prokofiev's ballets and operas to be staged in America and Western Europe. Prokofiev, who regarded himself as a composer foremost, resented the time taken by touring as a pianist, and increasingly turned to the Soviet Union for commissions of new music; in 1936, he finally returned to his homeland with his family. His greatest Soviet successes includedLieutenant Kijé,Peter and the Wolf,Romeo and Juliet,Cinderella,Alexander Nevsky, theFifth andSixth Symphonies,On Guard for Peace, and thePiano Sonatas Nos. 6–8.
TheNazi invasion of the USSR spurred Prokofiev to compose his most ambitious work, an operatic version of Leo Tolstoy'sWar and Peace; he co-wrote the libretto withMira Mendelson, his longtime companion and later second wife. In 1948, Prokofiev was attacked for producing "anti-democraticformalism". Nevertheless, he enjoyed personal and artistic support from a new generation of Russian performers, notablySviatoslav Richter andMstislav Rostropovich: he wrote hisNinth Piano Sonata for the former and his Symphony-Concerto for the latter.
Life and career
Childhood and first compositions
Sergei Prokofiev, aged 9 with the score of his operaThe Giant
Prokofiev was born in 1891 in a rural estate in Sontsovka,Bakhmut uezd,Yekaterinoslav Governorate,Russian Empire (now known asSontsivka,Pokrovsk Raion,Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine).[12] His father, Sergei Alekseyevich Prokofiev, was anagronomist from a mercantile family in Moscow. Prokofiev's mother, Maria (née Zhitkova), came from aSaint Petersburg[13] family of formerserfs who had been owned by theSheremetev family, under whose patronage serf-children were taught theatre and arts from an early age.[14][15][16][17] She was described byReinhold Glière, Prokofiev's first composition teacher, as "a tall woman with beautiful, clever eyes … who knew how to create an atmosphere of warmth and simplicity about her."[18] After their wedding in the summer of 1877, the Prokofievs moved to a small estate in the Smolensk governorate. Eventually, Sergei Alekseyevich found employment as a soil engineer, employed by one of his former fellow-students, Dmitri Sontsov, to whose estate in the Ukrainian steppes the Prokofievs moved.[19]
By the time of Prokofiev's birth, Maria—having previously lost two daughters—had devoted her life to music; during her son's early childhood, she spent two months a year in Moscow or St Petersburg taking piano lessons.[20] Sergei Prokofiev was inspired by hearing his mother practicing the piano in the evenings, mostly works byChopin andBeethoven, and wrote his first piano composition at the age of five, an "Indian Gallop", which was written down by his mother: it was in the FLydian mode (a major scale with a raised 4th scale degree), as the young Prokofiev felt "reluctance to tackle the black notes".[21] By seven, he had also learned to playchess.[22] Chess remained a passion of his, and he became acquainted with world chess championsJosé Raúl Capablanca, whom he beat in a simultaneous exhibition match in 1914, andMikhail Botvinnik, with whom he played several matches in the 1930s.[23][n 5] At the age of nine, he composed his first opera,The Giant, as well as an overture and various other pieces.[25] Opera remained thereafter as the genre Prokofiev was most fond of working in.[26]
Education and early works
ComposerReinhold Glière, Prokofiev's first composition teacher
In 1902, Prokofiev's mother metSergei Taneyev, director of theMoscow Conservatory, who initially suggested that Prokofiev should start lessons in piano and composition withAlexander Goldenweiser.[27] Unable to arrange that,[28] Taneyev instead arranged for composer and pianist Reinhold Glière to spend the summer of 1902 in Sontsovka teaching Prokofiev.[28] The first series of lessons culminated, at the 11-year-old Prokofiev's insistence, with the budding composer making his first attempt to write a symphony.[29] The following summer, Glière revisited Sontsovka to give further tuition.[4] When, decades later, Prokofiev wrote about his lessons with Glière, he gave due credit to his teacher's sympathetic method but complained that Glière had introduced him to "square"phrase structure and conventionalmodulations, which he subsequently had to unlearn.[30] Nonetheless, equipped with the necessary theoretical tools, Prokofiev started experimenting withdissonantharmonies and unusualtime signatures in a series of short piano pieces he called "ditties" (after the so-called "song form", more accuratelyternary form, on which they were based), laying the basis for his own musical style.[31]
Despite his growing talent, Prokofiev's parents hesitated over starting their son on a musical career at such an early age, and considered the possibility of his attending a good high school in Moscow.[32] By 1904, his mother had decided instead onSaint Petersburg, and she and Prokofiev visited the then capital to explore the possibility of moving there for his education.[33] They were introduced to composerAlexander Glazunov, a professor at theSaint Petersburg Conservatory, who asked to see Prokofiev and his music; Prokofiev had composed two more operas,Desert Islands andThe Feast during the Plague, and was working on his fourth,Undina.[34] Glazunov was so impressed that he urged Prokofiev's mother to have her son apply for admission to the Conservatory.[35] He passed the introductory tests and enrolled that year.[36]
Several years younger than most of his class, Prokofiev was viewed as eccentric and arrogant and annoyed a number of his classmates by keeping statistics on their errors.[37] During that period, he studied under, among others,Alexander Winkler for piano,[38]Anatoly Lyadov for harmony and counterpoint,Nikolai Tcherepnin forconducting, andNikolai Rimsky-Korsakov fororchestration (though when Rimsky-Korsakov died in 1908, Prokofiev noted that he had only studied with him "after a fashion"—he was just one of many students in a heavily attended class—and regretted that he otherwise "never had the opportunity to study with him").[39] He also shared classes with the composersBoris Asafyev andNikolai Myaskovsky, the latter becoming a close and lifelong friend.[40]
As a member of the Saint Petersburg music scene, Prokofiev developed a reputation as a musical rebel, while getting praise for his original compositions, which he performed himself on the piano.[41][42] In 1909, he graduated from his class in composition with unimpressive marks. He continued at the Conservatory, studying piano underAnna Yesipova and continuing his conducting lessons under Tcherepnin.[43]
In 1910, Prokofiev's father died and Sergei's financial support ceased.[44] Fortunately, he had started making a name for himself as a composer and pianist outside the Conservatory, making appearances at the St Petersburg Evenings of Contemporary Music. There he performed several of his more adventurous piano works, such as his highlychromatic and dissonant Etudes, Op. 2 (1909). His performance of it impressed the organisers of the Evenings sufficiently for them to invite Prokofiev to give the Russian premiere ofArnold Schoenberg'sDrei Klavierstücke, Op. 11.[45] Prokofiev's harmonic experimentation continued withSarcasms for piano, Op. 17 (1912), which makes extensive use ofpolytonality.[46] He composed his first twopiano concertos around then, thelatter of which caused a scandal at its premiere (23 August 1913, Pavlovsk). According to one account, the audience left the hall with exclamations of "'To hell with this futuristic music! The cats on the roof make better music!'", but themodernists were in rapture.[47]
In 1911, help arrived from renowned Russianmusicologist andcriticAlexander Ossovsky, who wrote a supportive letter to music publisherBoris P. Jurgenson (son of publishing-firm founder Peter Jurgenson [1836–1904]); thus a contract was offered to the composer.[48] Prokofiev made his first foreign trip in 1913, travelling to Paris and London where he first encounteredSergei Diaghilev'sBallets Russes.[49]
In 1914, Prokofiev finished his career at the Conservatory by entering the 'battle of the pianos', a competition open to the five best piano students for which the prize was a Schroeder grand piano; Prokofiev won by performing his ownPiano Concerto No. 1.[50]
Soon afterwards, he journeyed to London where he made contact with the impresario Sergei Diaghilev. Diaghilev commissioned Prokofiev's first ballet,Ala and Lolli; but when Prokofiev brought the work in progress to him in Italy in 1915 he rejected it as "non-Russian".[51] Urging Prokofiev to write "music that was national in character",[52] Diaghilev then commissioned the balletChout ("The Buffoon"). (The original Russian-language full title was Сказка про шута, семерых шутов перешутившего, meaning "The Tale of the Buffoon who Outwits Seven Other Buffoons".) Under Diaghilev's guidance, Prokofiev chose his subject from a collection of folk tales by the ethnographerAlexander Afanasyev;[53] the story, concerning a buffoon and a series of confidence tricks, had been previously suggested to Diaghilev byIgor Stravinsky as a possible subject for a ballet, and Diaghilev and his choreographerLéonide Massine helped Prokofiev to shape it into a ballet scenario.[54] Prokofiev's inexperience with ballet led him to revise the work extensively in the 1920s, following Diaghilev's detailed critique,[n 6] prior to its first production.[55]
The ballet's premiere in Paris on 17 May 1921 was a huge success and was greeted with great admiration by an audience that includedJean Cocteau,Igor Stravinsky andMaurice Ravel. Stravinsky called the ballet "the single piece of modern music he could listen to with pleasure", while Ravel called it "a work of genius".[56]
Prokofiev ca. 1918
First World War and Revolution
During World War I, Prokofiev returned to the Conservatory and studiedorgan to avoidconscription. In 1916, he debuted hisToccata. Shortly after this he composedThe Gambler based onFyodor Dostoyevsky'snovel of the same name, but rehearsals were plagued by problems, and the scheduled 1917 première had to be cancelled because of theFebruary Revolution. In the summer of that year, Prokofiev composed hisfirst symphony, theClassical. The name was Prokofiev's own; the music is in a style that, according to Prokofiev,Joseph Haydn would have used if he were alive at the time.[57] The music is more or lessClassical in style but incorporates more modern musical elements (seeNeoclassicism).
The symphony was also an exact contemporary of Prokofiev'sViolin Concerto No. 1 in D major, Op. 19, which was scheduled to premiere in November 1917. The first performances of both works had to wait until 21 April 1918 and 18 October 1923, respectively. Prokofiev stayed briefly with his mother inKislovodsk in the Caucasus.[58][59]
After completing the score ofSeven, They Are Seven, a "Chaldean invocation" for chorus and orchestra,[60] Prokofiev was "left with nothing to do and time hung heavily on [his] hands". Believing that Russia "had no use for music at the moment", Prokofiev decided to try his fortunes in America until the turmoil in his homeland had passed. He set out for Moscow and Petersburg in March 1918 to sort out financial matters and to arrange for his passport.[61] In May, he headed for the US, having obtained official permission to do so fromAnatoly Lunacharsky, the People's Commissar for Education, who told him: "You are a revolutionary in music, we are revolutionaries in life. We ought to work together. But if you want to go to America I shall not stand in your way."[62]
Arriving inSan Francisco after having been released from questioning by immigration officials onAngel Island on 11 August 1918,[63] Prokofiev was soon compared to other famous Russian exiles, such asSergei Rachmaninoff. His debut solo concert in New York led to several further engagements. He also received a contract from the music director of theChicago Opera Association,Cleofonte Campanini, for the production of his new operaThe Love for Three Oranges,[64] but due to Campanini's illness and death, the premiere was postponed.[65] The delay was another example of Prokofiev's bad luck in operatic matters. The failure also cost him his American solo career since the opera took too much time and effort. He soon found himself in financial difficulties, and in April 1920, he left forParis, not wanting to return to Russia as a failure.[66]
In Paris, Prokofiev reaffirmed his contacts with Diaghilev'sBallets Russes.[67] He also completed some of his older, unfinished works, such as hisThird Piano Concerto.[68]The Love for Three Oranges finally premièred in Chicago, under the composer's baton, on 30 December 1921.[69] Diaghilev became sufficiently interested in the opera to request Prokofiev play thevocal score to him in June 1922, while they were both in Paris for a revival ofChout, so he could consider it for a possible production.[70] Stravinsky, who was present at the audition, refused to listen to more than the first act.[70] When he then accused Prokofiev of "wasting time composing operas", Prokofiev retorted that Stravinsky "was in no position to lay down a general artistic direction, since he is himself not immune to error".[71] According to Prokofiev, Stravinsky "became incandescent with rage" and "we almost came to blows and were separated only with difficulty".[71] As a result, "our relations became strained and for several years Stravinsky's attitude toward me was critical."[70]
In March 1922, Prokofiev moved with his mother to the town ofEttal in theBavarian Alps, where for over a year he concentrated on an opera project,The Fiery Angel, based onthe novel byValery Bryusov. His later music had acquired a following in Russia, and he received invitations to return there, but decided to stay in Western Europe. In 1923, Prokofiev married the Spanish singerCarolina Codina (1897–1989, stage name Lina Llubera)[72] before moving back to Paris.[73]
In Paris, several of his works, including theSecond Symphony, were performed, but their reception was lukewarm and Prokofiev sensed that he "was evidently no longer a sensation".[74] Still, the Symphony appeared to prompt Diaghilev to commissionLe pas d'acier (The Steel Step), a "modernist" ballet score intended to portray the industrialisation of the Soviet Union. It was enthusiastically received by Parisian audiences and critics.[75]
Around 1924, Prokofiev was introduced toChristian Science.[76] He began to practice its teachings, which he believed to be beneficial to his health and to his fiery temperament[77] and to which he remained faithful for the rest of his life, according to biographerSimon Morrison.[78]
Prokofiev and Stravinsky restored their friendship, though Prokofiev particularly disliked Stravinsky's "stylization ofBach" in such recent works as theOctet and theConcerto for Piano and Wind Instruments.[79][n 7] For his part, Stravinsky described Prokofiev as the greatest Russian composer of his day, after himself.[81]
Prokofiev metBoris Krasin in the violinistJoseph Szigeti's Paris apartment in 1924. In 1927, Prokofiev made his first concert tour in theSoviet Union.[82] Over more than two months, he spent time in Moscow and Leningrad (as St Petersburg had been renamed), where he enjoyed a very successful staging ofThe Love for Three Oranges in theMariinsky Theatre.[83] In 1928, Prokofiev completed hisThird Symphony, which was broadly based on his unperformed operaThe Fiery Angel. The conductorSerge Koussevitzky characterized the Third as "the greatest symphony sinceTchaikovsky'sSixth".[84]
In the meantime, under the influence of the teachings ofChristian Science, Prokofiev had turned against theexpressionist style and the subject matter ofThe Fiery Angel.[n 8] He now preferred what he called a "new simplicity", which he found more sincere than the "contrivances and complexities" of so much modern music of the 1920s.[85][n 9] In 1928–29, Prokofiev composed his last ballet for Diaghilev,The Prodigal Son. When first staged in Paris on 21 May 1929, choreographed byGeorge Balanchine withSerge Lifar in the title role, the audience and critics were particularly struck by the final scene, in which the prodigal son drags himself across the stage on his knees to be welcomed by his father.[87] Diaghilev had recognised that in the music to the scene, Prokofiev had "never been more clear, more simple, more melodious, and more tender".[88] Only months later, Diaghilev died.[89]
That summer, Prokofiev completed the Divertimento, Op. 43 (which he had started in 1925) and revised hisSinfonietta, Op. 5/48, a work started in his days at the Conservatory.[90][n 10] In October of that year, he had a car crash while driving his family back to Paris from their holiday: as the car turned over, Prokofiev pulled some muscles on his left hand.[91] Prokofiev was therefore unable to perform in Moscow during his tour shortly after the accident, but he was able to enjoy watching performances of his music from the audience.[92] Prokofiev also attended theBolshoi Theatre's "audition" of his balletLe pas d'acier, and was interrogated by members of theRussian Association of Proletarian Musicians (RAPM) about the work: he was asked whether the factory portrayed "a capitalist factory, where the worker is a slave, or a Soviet factory, where the worker is the master? If it is a Soviet factory, when and where did Prokofiev examine it, since from 1918 to the present he has been living abroad and came here for the first time in 1927 for two weeks [sic]?" Prokofiev replied, "That concerns politics, not music, and therefore I won't answer." The RAPM condemned the ballet as a "flat and vulgar anti-Soviet anecdote, a counter-revolutionary composition bordering on Fascism". The Bolshoi had no option but to reject the ballet.[93]
With his left hand healed, Prokofiev toured the United States successfully at the start of 1930, propped up by his recent European success.[94] That year, Prokofiev began his first non-Diaghilev balletOn the Dnieper, Op. 51, a work commissioned bySerge Lifar, who had been appointedmaitre de ballet at theParis Opéra.[95] In 1931 and 1932, he completed hisfourth andfifth piano concertos. The following year saw the completion of theSymphonic Song, Op. 57, which Prokofiev's friendMyaskovsky—thinking of its potential audience in the Soviet Union—told him "isn't quite for us… it lacks that which we mean by monumentalism—a familiar simplicity and broad contours, of which you are extremely capable, but temporarily are carefully avoiding."[96]
By the early 1930s, both Europe and America were suffering from theGreat Depression, which inhibited both new opera and ballet productions, though audiences for Prokofiev's appearances as a pianist were, in Europe at least, undiminished.[97] But Prokofiev saw himself as a composer first and foremost, and increasingly resented the time lost to composition through his appearances as a pianist.[98] Having been homesick for some time, Prokofiev began to build substantial bridges with the Soviet Union.[99]
Following the dissolution of the RAPM in 1932, he acted increasingly as a musical ambassador between his homeland and western Europe,[100] and his premieres and commissions were increasingly under the auspices of the Soviet Union. One such wasLieutenant Kijé, which was commissioned as the score to aSoviet film.[101]
Another commission, from the Kirov Theatre (as the Mariinsky had now been renamed) in Leningrad, was the balletRomeo and Juliet, composed to a scenario created byAdrian Piotrovsky and Sergei Radlov following the precepts of "drambalet" (dramatised ballet, officially promoted at the Kirov to replace works based primarily on choreographic display and innovation).[102] Following Radlov's acrimonious resignation from the Kirov in June 1934, a new agreement was signed with the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow on the understanding that Piotrovsky would remain involved.[103] But the ballet's original happy ending (contrary toShakespeare) provoked controversy among Soviet cultural officials,[104] and the ballet's production was postponed indefinitely when the staff of the Bolshoi was overhauled at the behest of the chairman of the Committee on Arts Affairs,Platon Kerzhentsev.[105]
Return to Russia
Video of performance of "Song about Alexander Nevsky", Section 2 ofAlexander Nevsky cantata. Length: 2 min, 56 sec
In 1936, Prokofiev and his family settled permanently in Moscow, after shifting back and forth between Moscow and Paris for the previous four years.[106][107]
That year, Prokofiev composed one of his most famous works,Peter and the Wolf, forNatalya Sats'Central Children's Theatre.[108] Sats also persuaded him to write two songs for children, "Sweet Song", and "Chatterbox";[109] they were eventually joined by "The Little Pigs" and published asThree Children's Songs, Op. 68.[110] Prokofiev also composed the giganticCantata for the 20th Anniversary of the October Revolution, originally intended for performance during the anniversary year but effectively blocked by Kerzhentsev, who demanded at the work's audition before the Committee on Arts Affairs, "Just what do you think you're doing, Sergey Sergeyevich, taking texts that belong to the people and setting them to such incomprehensible music?"[111] The Cantata was not performed until 5 April 1966, just over 13 years after the composer's death.[112]
Forced to adapt to the new circumstances (whatever private misgivings he had about them), Prokofiev wrote a series of "mass songs" (Opp. 66, 79, 89), using the lyrics of officially approved Soviet poets. In 1938, he collaborated withEisenstein on the historical epicAlexander Nevsky, composing some of his most inventive and dramatic music. Although the film had very poor sound recording, Prokofiev adapted much of his score into a large-scalecantata formezzo-soprano, orchestra and chorus, which was extensively performed and recorded. In the wake ofAlexander Nevsky's success, Prokofiev composed his first Soviet opera,Semyon Kotko, which was intended to be produced by the directorVsevolod Meyerhold. The opera's première was postponed because Meyerhold was arrested on 20 June 1939 by theNKVD, and shot on 2 February 1940.[113] At the end of the same year, Prokofiev was commissioned to composeZdravitsa (literally "Cheers!", but sometimes subtitledHail to Stalin in English) (Op. 85) to celebrateJoseph Stalin's 60th birthday.[114]
Later in 1939, Prokofiev composed his Piano Sonatas Nos.6,7, and8, Opp. 82–84, widely known today as the "War Sonatas". Premiered respectively by Prokofiev (No. 6: 8 April 1940),[115]Sviatoslav Richter (No. 7: Moscow, 18 January 1943) andEmil Gilels (No. 8: Moscow, 30 December 1944),[116] they were subsequently championed in particular by Richter. Biographer Daniel Jaffé argued that Prokofiev, "having forced himself to compose a cheerful evocation of thenirvana Stalin wanted everyone to believe he had created" (i.e. inZdravitsa) then subsequently, in the three sonatas, "expressed his true feelings".[117] As evidence, Jaffé has pointed out that the central movement of Sonata No. 7 opens with a theme based on theRobert Schumannlied "Wehmut" ("Sadness", from theLiederkreis, Op. 39): its words translate, "I can sometimes sing as if I were glad, yet secretly tears well and so free my heart. Nightingales … sing their song of longing from their dungeon's depth … everyone delights, yet no one feels the pain, the deep sorrow in the song."[118] Sonata No. 7 received aStalin Prize (Second Class) and No. 8 a Stalin Prize (First Class).[116]
Meanwhile,Romeo and Juliet was staged by theKirov Ballet, choreographed byLeonid Lavrovsky, on 11 January 1940.[119] To the surprise of all of its participants, the dancers having struggled to cope with the music'ssyncopated rhythms and almost having boycotted the production, the ballet was an instant success[120] and became recognised as the crowning achievement of Soviet dramatic ballet.[121]
Prokofiev had been considering making an opera out ofLeo Tolstoy's epic novelWar and Peace, when news of theGerman invasion of the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941 made the subject seem all the more timely. Because of the war, he was evacuated together with a large number of other artists, initially to theGeorgian SSR, where he lived inTbilisi from 11 November 1941 until 29 June 1942. While there he began to compose the original version ofWar and Peace.[122] While in the Georgian SSR he also composed hisSecond String Quartet andPiano Sonata No. 7.[123] His relationship with the 25-year-old writer and librettistMira Mendelson had finally led to his separation from his wife Lina. Despite their acrimonious separation, Prokofiev tried to persuade Lina and their sons to accompany him as evacuees out of Moscow, but Lina opted to stay.[122]
During the war years, restrictions on style and the demand that composers write in a 'socialist realist' style were slackened, and Prokofiev was generally able to compose in his own way. TheViolin Sonata No. 1, Op. 80,The Year 1941, Op. 90, and theBallade for the Boy Who Remained Unknown, Op. 93 all came from this period. In 1943, Prokofiev joined Eisenstein inAlma-Ata, the largest city inKazakhstan, to compose more film music (Ivan the Terrible), and the balletCinderella (Op. 87), one of his most melodious and celebrated compositions. Early that year, he also played excerpts fromWar and Peace to members of the Bolshoi Theatre collective,[124] but the Soviet government had opinions about the opera that resulted in many revisions.[n 11] In 1944, Prokofiev composed hisFifth Symphony (Op. 100) at a composer's colony outside Moscow. He conducted its first performance on 13 January 1945, just a fortnight after the triumphant premieres on 30 December 1944 of hisEighth Piano Sonata and, on the same day, the first part of Eisenstein'sIvan the Terrible. With the premiere of his Fifth Symphony, which was programmed alongsidePeter and the Wolf and theClassical Symphony (conducted byNikolai Anosov), Prokofiev appeared to reach the peak of his celebrity as a leading Soviet composer.[125]
On 20 January 1945, Prokofiev suffered a concussion afterfainting in his apartment due to untreated chronichypertension.[126] The composerDmitry Kabalevsky visited him in hospital and found him semi-conscious, and "with a heavy heart, I left him, I thought it was the end."[127] He never fully recovered from the injury, and, following medical advice, restricted his composing activity.[128]
Postwar
Sergei Prokofiev and his wife (front center) at the inauguration for the First All-Union Congress of Composers at theHouse of the Unions; 1 April 1948
Prokofiev had time to write his postwarSixth Symphony and hisNinth Piano Sonata (forSviatoslav Richter) before the so-called "Zhdanov Doctrine". On the day before the decree was published, 10 February 1948, Prokofiev was at a ceremony in the Kremlin to mark his elevation to the status of People's Artist of theRSFSR.[129]
The decree followed a three-day conference of more than 70 composers, musicians and music lecturers convened on 10 January, presided over by Zhdanov. Prokofiev was berated by a minor composer,Viktor Bely, who accused him of "innovation for innovation's sake" and "artistic snobbishness", but unlikeDmitri Shostakovich,Aram Khachaturian and others, Prokofiev gave no speech.[130] His silence set off rumors that he had been deliberately defiant and uncooperative. There is no official record, but according to a variety of witnesses, Prokofiev did not attend on the first day, and had to be fetched, arriving on day two wearing a brown suit and baggy-kneed trousers tucked into his felt boots.[131]Ilya Ehrenburg, who was not in the hall, claimed in his memoirs that Prokofiev fell asleep, woke up suddenly and loudly asked who Zhdanov was.[130] The cellistMstislav Rostropovich heard that Prokofiev was chatting to the person next to him when a senior figure sitting nearby warned him to be quiet. Prokofiev asked: "Who are you?" The official said that his name did not matter, but that Prokofiev had better pay attention to him, to which Prokofiev retorted: "I never pay attention to comments from people who haven't been introduced to me." This possibly apocryphal story was corroborated by the head of the composers' union,Tikhon Khrennikov, who said that the person Prokofiev snubbed was the Stalinist officialMatvei Shkiryatov.[132]
The decree, published on 11 February, denounced six artists—Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Khachaturian,Shebalin,Popov, andMyaskovsky, in that order—for the crime of "formalism", described as a "renunciation of the basic principles of classical music" in favor of "muddled, nerve-racking" sounds that "turned music into cacophony".[133] Eight of Prokofiev's works were banned from performance:The Year 1941,Ode to the End of the War,Festive Poem,Cantata for the Thirtieth Anniversary of October,Ballad of an Unknown Boy, the 1934 piano cycleThoughts, and Piano Sonatas Nos. 6 and 8.[134] Such was the perceived threat behind the banning of the works that even works that had avoided censure were no longer programmed.[135] By August 1948, Prokofiev was in severe financial straits, his personal debt amounting to 180,000 rubles.[134]
On 22 November 1947, Prokofiev filed a petition in court to begin divorce proceedings against his estranged wife. Five days later the court ruled that the marriage had no legal basis since it had taken place inGermany, and had not been registered with Soviet officials, thus making it null and void. After a second judge upheld the verdict, he and his partner Mira wed on 13 January 1948.[136][137] On 20 February 1948, Prokofiev's first wife Lina was arrested and charged with espionage for trying to send money to her mother in Spain. After nine months of interrogation,[138] she was sentenced by a three-member Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR to 20 years of hard labor.[139] She was released eight years later on 30 June 1956[140] and in 1974 left the Soviet Union.[141]
Prokofiev's latest opera projects, among them his desperate attempt to appease the cultural authorities,The Story of a Real Man, were quickly cancelled by theKirov Theatre.[142] The snub, in combination with his declining health, caused Prokofiev to progressively withdraw from public life and from various activities, even chess, and increasingly devote himself to his own work.[143][144] After he had astroke on 7 July 1949, his doctors ordered him to limit his composing to an hour a day.[145][146]
In spring 1949, Prokofiev wrote hisCello Sonata in C major, Op. 119, for the 22-year-oldMstislav Rostropovich, who gave the first performance in 1950, with Sviatoslav Richter.[147] For Rostropovich, Prokofiev also extensively recomposed his Cello Concerto, transforming it into aSymphony-Concerto, a landmark in the cello and orchestra repertory today.[148] The last public performance he attended, on 11 October 1952, was the première of theSeventh Symphony, his last completed work.[149] The symphony was written for the Children's Radio Division.[150]
Prokofiev's grave inNovodevichy Cemetery. His wife Mira's gravestone is at the bottom.
Death
Prokofiev died ofhypertensive crisis at age 61 on 5 March 1953, the same day asJoseph Stalin. He had lived in acommunal apartment onChamberlain Lane next to theRed Square, and for three days throngsgathered to mourn Stalin, making it impossible to hold Prokofiev's funeral service at the headquarters of theSoviet Composers' Union. Because the hearse was not allowed near Prokofiev's house, his coffin had to be moved by hand through back streets in the opposite direction of the masses of people going to visit Stalin's body. About 30 people attended the funeral, Shostakovich among them. Although they had not seemed to get along when they met, in the later years their interactions had become far more amicable, with Shostakovich writing to Prokofiev, "I wish you at least another hundred years to live and create. Listening to such works as your Seventh Symphony makes it much easier and more joyful to live."[151] Prokofiev is buried in Moscow'sNovodevichy Cemetery.[152]
The leading Soviet musical periodical reported Prokofiev's death as a brief item on page 116[153] (the first 115 pages were devoted to Stalin's death).[153] Prokofiev's death is usually attributed tocerebral hemorrhage. He had been chronically ill for eight years.[154]
Prokofiev's wife Mira Mendelson spent her final years living in the Moscow apartment they had shared.[155] She occupied her time organizing her husband's papers, promoting his music, and writing her memoirs, having been strongly encouraged by Prokofiev to embark on the latter. Work on the memoirs was difficult for her; she left them incomplete at her death.[156] Mendelson died of a heart attack in Moscow in 1968, 15 years after Prokofiev.[157] Inside her purse a message dated February 1950 and signed by Prokofiev and Mendelson instructed: "We wish to be buried next to each other." Their remains are buried together at Novodevichy Cemetery.[158]
Lina Prokofiev outlived her ex-husband by many years, dying in London in early 1989.Royalties from his music provided her with a modest income, and she acted as storyteller for a recording of her husband'sPeter and the Wolf (released on CD byChandos Records[159]) withNeeme Järvi conducting theScottish National Orchestra. Their sons Sviatoslav (1924–2010), an architect, andOleg (1928–1998), an artist, painter, sculptor and poet, dedicated much of their lives to promoting their father's work.[160][161]
Legacy
Reputation
A Soviet stamp marking Prokofiev's centenary in 1991
Arthur Honegger said that Prokofiev would "remain for us the greatest figure of contemporary music",[162] and the American scholarRichard Taruskin wrote of Prokofiev's "gift, virtually unparalleled among 20th-century composers, for writing distinctively original diatonic melodies".[163] Yet for some time Prokofiev's reputation in the West suffered as a result of Cold War antipathies,[164] and his music has never won from Western academics and critics the same esteem asIgor Stravinsky's andArnold Schoenberg's, which had greater influence on younger musicians.[165] Nonetheless, his unique approach to composition (which he reflected on significantly in autobiographical writings) continues to receive steady musicological examination.[166][167][168]
The All-Ukrainian open pianists' competition named after Prokofiev is held annually in Kyiv and comprises three categories: piano, composition, and conducting.[170]
Prokofiev was a soloist with theLondon Symphony Orchestra, conducted byPiero Coppola, in the first recording of hisPiano Concerto No. 3, recorded in London byHis Master's Voice in June 1932. Prokofiev also recorded some of his solo piano music for HMV in Paris in February 1935; these recordings were issued on CD by Pearl andNaxos.[171] In 1938, he conducted theMoscow Philharmonic Orchestra in a recording of the second suite from hisRomeo and Juliet ballet; this performance was later released on LP and CD.[172] A short sound film has been discovered of Prokofiev playing some of the music from his operaWar and Peace and then explaining the music.[173]
Prokofiev, Sergei (1991).Soviet Diary 1927 and Other Writings. London: Faber and Faber.
Prokofiev, Sergei (2000) [1960]. S. Shlifstein (ed.).Sergei Prokofiev: Autobiography, Articles, Reminiscences. Translated by Rose Prokofieva. The Minerva Group.ISBN978-0-89875-149-9.
Prokofiev, Sergei (2006).Diaries 1907–1914: Prodigious Youth. Translated by Phillips, Anthony. London/Ithaca: Faber and Faber/Cornell University Press.ISBN978-0-8014-4540-8.
Prokofiev, Sergei (2008).Diaries 1915–1923: Behind the Mask. Translated by Phillips, Anthony. London / Ithaca: Faber and Faber/Cornell University Press.ISBN978-0-571-22630-6.
Prokofiev, Sergei (2012).Diaries 1924–1933: Prodigal Son. Translated by Phillips, Anthony. London/ Ithaca: Faber and Faber/Cornell University Press.ISBN978-0-571-23405-9.
^While Sergei Prokofiev himself believed 11/23 April to be his birth date, the posthumous discovery of his birth certificate showed that he was actually born four days later, on 15/27 April.[6]
^Prokofiev has the rare distinction for a composer of having won a game against a future world chess champion, albeit in the context of a simultaneous match: his win over Capablanca of 16 May 1914 can be played through atchessgames.com (Java required). For extracts from Prokofiev's notebooks recounting his games against Capablanca, see:The Game (part 2), sprkfv.net.[24]
^"Diaghilev pointed out a number of places which had to be rewritten. He was a subtle and discerning critic and he argued his point with great conviction. ... we had no difficulty in agreeing on the changes."Prokofiev 2000, p. 56
^It has been suggested that Prokofiev's use of text from Stravinsky'sSymphony of Psalms to characterise the invading Teutonic knights in the film score forEisenstein'sAlexander Nevsky (1938) was intended as a dig at Stravinsky's "pseudo-Bachism".[80]
^Quote: "I decided a long time ago that I must compose in a quite different style, and that I would set about it as soon as I had extricated myself from the revisions ofFiery Angel andThe Gambler. If God is the unique source of creation and of reason, and man is his reflection, it is abundantly clear that the works of man will be better the more closely they reflect the works of the Creator".Prokofiev 2012, p. 699
^That is not to say that Prokofiev approved of simplistic music: when in June 1926 he arranged "a simplified version of the March fromOranges as a crowd-pleaser", Prokofiev observed in his diary, "The process of denuding for the sake of simplicity is highly disagreeable".[86]
^Prokofiev wrote in his autobiography that he could never understand why the Sinfonietta was so rarely performed, whereas the "Classical" Symphony was played everywhere.[90]
^"Prokofiev wrote the first version ofWar and Peace during the Second World War. He revised it in the late forties and early fifties, during the period of the 1948 Zhdanov Decree, which attacked obscurantist tendencies in the music of leading Soviet composers.""Prokofiev'sWar and Peace" byAlex Ross,The New Yorker, 4 March 2002, via Ross's blog.Archived 27 October 2017 at theWayback Machine
Citations
^Jones, Daniel (2003) [1917], Peter Roach; James Hartmann; Jane Setter (eds.),English Pronouncing Dictionary, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,ISBN978-3-12-539683-8
^Hippelheuser, R. H. (29 January 1933)."Just a Picnic to Prokofieff".Knoxville Journal.Associated Press. p. 23. Retrieved6 August 2025.But Prokofieff is not so modest as regards his worth as a composer. He was once asked to name the greatest living Russian composers. Without hesitation came the answer: Stravinsky and Prokofieff—in that order.
^Peter Rollberg (2016).Historical Dictionary of Russian and Soviet Cinema. US: Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 584–585.ISBN978-1-4422-6842-5.
^Berman, Boris (2008).Prokofiev's Piano Sonatas: A Guide for the Listener and the Performer. New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press. p. 35.ISBN978-0-300-11490-4.
^McSmith, Andy (2015).Fear and the Muse Kept Watch, The Russian Masters – from Akhmatova and Pasternak to Shostakovich and Eisenstein – Under Stalin. New York: The New Press. p. 272.ISBN978-1-59558-056-6.
^Norris, Geoffrey (23 January 2003)."My father was naïve".The Daily Telegraph. London.Archived from the original on 11 January 2022. Retrieved29 May 2014.
Rakhmanova, Marina Pavlovna, ed. (1991).Сергей Прокофьев: к 110-летию со дня рождения: письма, воспоминания, статьи [Sergei Prokofiev on the 110th anniversary of his birth: letters, reminiscences and articles] (in Russian). Российская академия наук, Ин-т этнологии и антропологии.ISBN978-5-201-14607-8.
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