Konstantin Solomonowitsch Saradschew

Konstantin Solomonovich Saradschew (also Saradschjan , Armenian Կոնստանտին Սարաջեւ , Russian Константин Соломонович Сараджев (Сараджян) * 8. October 1877 in Derbent , Dagestan , † 22. July 1954 in Yerevan ) was an Armenian conductor and violinist . He was a representative of modern Russian music and conducted many world premieres of works by contemporary composers. His son Konstantin Konstantinowitsch Saradschew was a well-known bell ringer and music theorist.

Memorial plaque for Sarajev in Yerevan

Life

Sarajev was born in 1877 as the son of a doctor. He attended the Moscow Conservatory , where he studied violin with Jan Hřímalý and theory with Sergei Ivanovich Taneyev and graduated in 1898. Then he taught and gave concerts. In 1900 he had further violin lessons with Otakar Ševčík in Prague. In 1901 he became a conductor at the Moscow Opera Lovers Club, and he also founded his own string quartet . From 1904 to 1908 he studied conducting with Arthur Nikisch in Leipzig . After returning to Russia, he conducted the summer symphony concerts in Sokolniki Park in 1908, 1910 and 1911 and became director of the State Institute of Theatrical Art.

Sarajev was an advocate of modern music. In 1901 he belonged to a circle of Scriabinists , including the pianist and teacher Alexander Borissowitsch Goldenweiser , the pianist Maria Nemenowa-Lunts , the writer and critic Vladimir Derschanowski and others. From 1909 Derschanowski organized together with his wife Yekaterina Kopossowa-Derschanowskaja and Saradschew "Evenings of Modern Music" in Moscow. Sarajev served as a soldier in World War I and did not return to Moscow until after the Russian Civil War. In 1923 he became a member of the Association for Contemporary Music (ASM) and founded the Evenings of Contemporary Music .

From 1922 to 1935 he was a professor of conducting at the Moscow Conservatory; Boris Emmanuilowitsch Chaikin and Lev Nikolajewitsch Oborin emerged from his class .

Later, Sarajev was the conductor of the Voronezh State Symphony Orchestra , as well as music director and chief conductor of the Yerevan Opera and Ballet Theater. From 1939 until his death he was director of the Yerevan Conservatory, where he directed the orchestra, opera and conducting classes. Among his students was Alexander Kopylov . Saradschew was chief conductor of the Armenian Philharmonic from 1941 to 1944. He died in Yerevan in 1954 at the age of 76.

Sarajev was a patron of Nikolai Jakowlewitsch Mjaskowskis music. He conducted the world premieres of several works, the silence and the tenth symphony the composer dedicated to the conductor. In 1934 he wrote the piece Prelude and Fughetta on the name Saradschew for orchestra op.31 H and for piano four hands op.31 J.

World premieres and premieres

• The Sorochintsy by Mussorgsky fair ; First performance on October 13, 1913 at the Free Theater in Moscow.
• Symphony in E flat major op. 1 by Igor Fjodorowitsch Stravinsky ; first professional and fully rehearsed performance on August 22, 1912 in Moscow.
• First piano concerto by Sergei Sergejewitsch Prokofjew ; First performance on July 25th (or August 7th) 1912 with the composer at the piano. Prokofiev later wrote that Sarajev had "captured all the tempos splendidly".
• Third Piano Concerto by Sergei Sergejewitsch Prokofjew ; Russian premiere on March 22, 1925 by the Theater der Revolution orchestra with Samuil Evgenjewitsch Feinberg at the piano.
• Second Symphony by Dmitri Dmitrijewitsch Schostakowitsch ; Moscow premiere and world premiere of the revised version after the premiere in 1927.
• Sinfonietta in A major op. 5/48 (revised version) by Sergei Sergejewitsch Prokofjew ; First performance on November 18, 1930 in Moscow.
• The Tempest in F minor by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky ; First performed in Voronezh in 1931 , 38 years after the composer's death and 65 years after the work was written.
• Ballet Das Glück by Aram Chatschaturjan ; First performance in September 1939.
• Symphonic poem The Silence by Nikolai Jakowlewitsch Mjaskowski ; First performance on June 12, 1911 at the summer concert in Sokolniki Park, first performance of an orchestral work by the composer.
• Fourth Symphony by Nikolai Jakowlewitsch Mjaskowski ; First performance on February 8, 1925 in Moscow.
• Seventh Symphony by Nikolai Jakowlewitsch Mjaskowski ; First performance on February 8, 1925 in Moscow.
• Eighth Symphony by Nikolai Jakowlewitsch Mjaskowski ; First performance on May 23, 1926.
• Ninth Symphony by Nikolai Jakowlewitsch Mjaskowski ; First performance on April 29, 1928.
• Eleventh Symphony by Nikolai Jakowlewitsch Mjaskowski ; First performance on January 16, 1933 in Moscow.

Awards

In 1921 Sarajev was named a Labor Hero , and in 1945 he became a People's Artist of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic .

Web links

• (True) Synesthete Composers and Musicians ( Memento June 11, 2004 in the Internet Archive )
• Biography on myaskovsky.ru (English and Russian)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} biography on myaskovsky.ru
2. ↑ ^{a b} Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 5th ed. 1954
3. ^ Toccata Classics ( Memento from April 17, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
4. ^ Amy Nelson, Music for the Revolution
5. ↑ Bnet
6. ↑ Naxos
7. ^ Voronezh Music Management Inc.
8. ↑ The Bolshoi: Conductors ( Memento June 3, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
9. ↑ ^{a b c d e f} Soja Gulinskaja: Nikolai Jakowlewitsch Mjaskowski . Moscow 1981, German Berlin 1985
10. ↑ Richard Taruskin : Stravinsky and the Russian Traditions
11. ↑ Page no longer available , search in web archives: New York Philharmonic Orchestra program notes
12. ↑ CD Baby
13. ↑ Page no longer available , search in web archives: Music Web International
14. ↑ Laurel E. Fay, Shostakovich: A Life
15. ↑ The Prokofiev Page ( Memento of November 30, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
16. ^ Tchaikovsky Research
17. ↑ To the 100th birthday anniversary Aram Khachaturian ( Memento from May 2, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
18. ↑ Review of CD with compositions by Miaskovsky ( Memento of February 13, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
19. ^ Music Web International