Sergei Prokofiev
Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was born on the 23rd of April 1891 at a rural estate in Sontsovka, a village in the Bakhmut uezd of the Yekaterinoslav Governorate. His mother Maria spent two months each year in Moscow or St Petersburg taking piano lessons while her son watched from the Ukrainian steppes. He wrote his first piano composition at age five called an Indian Gallop which he dictated to his mother because he felt reluctance to tackle the black notes. The piece existed in the F Lydian mode featuring a major scale with a raised fourth scale degree. By age nine he had composed his first opera titled The Giant along with various other pieces including an overture. Opera remained thereafter as the genre Prokofiev was most fond of working in throughout his life.
Prokofiev enrolled at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory in 1904 after Alexander Glazunov urged his mother to apply for admission. Several years younger than most classmates he annoyed peers by keeping statistics on their errors and was viewed as eccentric and arrogant. He studied under Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov for orchestration though he regretted never having the opportunity to study with him directly since Rimsky died in 1908. In 1913 he caused a scandal at the premiere of his second piano concerto held on the 23rd of August 1913 in Pavlovsk. One account describes the audience leaving the hall with exclamations that cats on the roof make better music while modernists stood in rapture. His harmonic experimentation continued with Sarcasms for piano Opus 17 which makes extensive use of polytonality.
Sergei Diaghilev commissioned Prokofiev's first ballet Ala and Lolli but rejected it in Italy during 1915 as non-Russian. Diaghilev then commissioned the ballet Chout or The Buffoon based on folk tales collected by ethnographer Alexander Afanasyev. The ballet premiered in Paris on the 17th of May 1921 to an audience including Jean Cocteau Igor Stravinsky and Maurice Ravel. Stravinsky called the work the single piece of modern music he could listen to with pleasure while Ravel termed it a work of genius. Diaghilev subsequently commissioned three further ballets from Prokofiev including Le pas d'acier and The Prodigal Son which all caused a sensation among critics and colleagues upon their original production.
Prokofiev left Russia in May 1918 after obtaining official permission from Anatoly Lunacharsky who told him You are a revolutionary in music we are revolutionaries in life. He arrived in San Francisco on the 11th of August 1918 following questioning by immigration officials at Angel Island. His debut solo concert in New York led to several engagements but financial difficulties soon arose when his opera The Love for Three Oranges was delayed due to illness and death of Cleofonte Campanini. By April 1920 he had left for Paris not wanting to return to Russia as a failure. In the early 1930s the Great Depression diminished opportunities for his ballets and operas to be staged in America and Western Europe.
In 1936 Prokofiev and his family settled permanently in Moscow after shifting back and forth between Moscow and Paris for four years. That year he composed Peter and the Wolf for Natalya Sats Central Children's Theatre. Later in 1939 he composed Piano Sonatas Nos 6 7 and 8 widely known today as the War Sonatas. Sonata No 7 received a Stalin Prize Second Class while No 8 won a Stalin Prize First Class. Biographer Daniel Jaffé argued that having forced himself to compose a cheerful evocation of the nirvana Stalin wanted everyone to believe he had created he subsequently expressed his true feelings in these three sonatas.
On the 11th of February 1948 a decree denounced six artists including Prokofiev for the crime of formalism described as muddled nerve-racking sounds turning music into cacophony. Eight of Prokofiev's works were banned from performance including The Year 1941 Ode to the End of the War Festive Poem and Cantata for the Thirtieth Anniversary of October. By August 1948 Prokofiev was in severe financial straits with personal debt amounting to 180,000 rubles. He gave no speech during the conference though rumors circulated that he fell asleep or asked who Zhdanov was when woken up by Ilya Ehrenburg.
Prokofiev died of hypertensive crisis at age 61 on the 5th of March 1953 the same day as Joseph Stalin. He lived in a communal apartment on Chamberlain Lane next to Red Square where throngs gathered to mourn Stalin making it impossible to hold his funeral service at the headquarters of the Soviet Composers Union. About 30 people attended the funeral including Shostakovich among them. His coffin had to be moved by hand through back streets in the opposite direction of masses visiting Stalin's body. Prokofiev is buried in Moscow's Novodevichy Cemetery alongside his wife Mira Mendelson whose remains are interred there after her death in 1968.
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Common questions
When and where was Sergei Prokofiev born?
Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was born on the 23rd of April 1891 at a rural estate in Sontsovka, a village in the Bakhmut uezd of the Yekaterinoslav Governorate. His mother Maria spent two months each year in Moscow or St Petersburg taking piano lessons while her son watched from the Ukrainian steppes.
What were the key events during Sergei Prokofiev's time at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory?
Prokofiev enrolled at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory in 1904 after Alexander Glazunov urged his mother to apply for admission. He studied under Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov for orchestration though he regretted never having the opportunity to study with him directly since Rimsky died in 1908.
Why did Sergei Prokofiev leave Russia in May 1918?
Sergei Prokofiev left Russia in May 1918 after obtaining official permission from Anatoly Lunacharsky who told him You are a revolutionary in music we are revolutionaries in life. He arrived in San Francisco on the 11th of August 1918 following questioning by immigration officials at Angel Island.
Which ballets did Sergei Diaghilev commission from Sergei Prokofiev?
Sergei Diaghilev commissioned Prokofiev's first ballet Ala and Lolli but rejected it in Italy during 1915 as non-Russian. Diaghilev then commissioned the ballet Chout or The Buffoon based on folk tales collected by ethnographer Alexander Afanasyev which premiered in Paris on the 17th of May 1921.
What happened to Sergei Prokofiev during the 1948 decree denouncing formalism?
On the 11th of February 1948 a decree denounced six artists including Prokofiev for the crime of formalism described as muddled nerve-racking sounds turning music into cacophony. Eight of Prokofiev's works were banned from performance including The Year 1941 Ode to the End of the War Festive Poem and Cantata for the Thirtieth Anniversary of October.
When and how did Sergei Prokofiev die?
Prokofiev died of hypertensive crisis at age 61 on the 5th of March 1953 the same day as Joseph Stalin. He is buried in Moscow's Novodevichy Cemetery alongside his wife Mira Mendelson whose remains are interred there after her death in 1968.