Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Introduction
- List of sources
- Chapter One Glinka's operas
- Chapter Two The 1840s and 1850s
- Chapter Three The Conservatoire controversy – a clash of ideals
- Chapter Four New ideas about opera
- Chapter Five New operas
- Chapter Six The 1860s, opera apart
- Chapter Seven Opera in the 1870s
- Chapter Eight The 1870s, opera apart
- Index
Chapter Three - The Conservatoire controversy – a clash of ideals
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Introduction
- List of sources
- Chapter One Glinka's operas
- Chapter Two The 1840s and 1850s
- Chapter Three The Conservatoire controversy – a clash of ideals
- Chapter Four New ideas about opera
- Chapter Five New operas
- Chapter Six The 1860s, opera apart
- Chapter Seven Opera in the 1870s
- Chapter Eight The 1870s, opera apart
- Index
Summary
The beginning of the reign of Alexander II (1855–81) was propitious for initiatives. After the stagnation of the previous period there was hope for reform and development in many spheres of Russian life. The musical world offered scope for the creation of new institutions for training musicians and raising performance standards. The prime mover in the most significant innovation, the establishment of conservatoires, was Anton Rubinstein. Education being a matter on which everyone has an opinion, and a body calling itself the Russian Musical Society presenting an obvious target when both national identity and music's past and future were topics of polarized debate, the controversy associated with Rubinstein's ideas drew in all the main commentators (Stasov, Serov, Cui and Laroche) and provided a focal point for the airing of their views about music in general and music in Russia in particular. It was at about this time that the dilettante littérateur lost the initiative in writing on music to the well-grounded specialist. From now on, musicography as an agreeable pastime lost its dominance.
(a) A. G. Rubinstein: The state of music in Russia. The Age, 1861, no. 1. A. G. Rubinshteyn: Literaturnoye naslediye (‘Literary heritage’), vol. 1 (Moscow 1983), pp. 46–53.
Anton Grigor'yevich Rubinstein (1829–94) w a s a pianist of the highest distinction. Born in the Russian Empire, he completed his musical education in Berlin and returned to his homeland in 1848. The Russian Musical Society was founded in 1859 to promote concerts and run classes in music. The next step was to formalize this instruction through the opening of a conservatoire in St Petersburg, which took place on 8 September 1862.[…]
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- Russians on Russian Music, 1830–1880An Anthology, pp. 64 - 93Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1994