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Mieczyslaw Weinberg
Mieczysław Weinberg (also Moisey Vainberg, Moisey Samuilovich Vaynberg;
Russian Моисей Самуилович Вайнберг; Polish Mieczysław Wajnberg)
(December 8, 1919 in Warsaw, Poland – February 26, 1996 in Moscow,
Russia) was an important Soviet composer of Polish-Jewish origin. He
lived in the Soviet Union and Russia since 1939 and lost most of his
family in the Holocaust.
He left a large body of work that included twenty-two symphonies and
seventeen string quartets; according to one reviewer he ranked as, "the
third great Soviet composer, along with Prokofiev and Shostakovich".
Names
Much confusion has been caused by different renditions of the composer's
names. In the Polish language (i.e. prior to his move to the USSR), his
name was spelled as 'Mieczysław Wajnberg' whereas in the Russian
language (i.e. after the move) he was and still is known as 'Моисей
Самуилович Вайнберг' (Moisey Samuilovich Vaynberg). Among close friends
he would also go by his Polish diminutive 'Metek'. Re-transliteration of
his surname from the Cyrillic alphabet (Вайнберг) back into the Latin
alphabet produced a variety of spellings, including 'Weinberg', 'Vainberg',
and 'Vaynberg'. The form 'Weinberg', as the most frequent
English-language rendition of this common Jewish surname, is now being
increasingly used, notably in the latest edition of Grove and by
Weinberg's biographer, Per Skans.
Life
Weinberg was born in 1919 to a Jewish family in Warsaw. His father,
Shmil (or Shmuel) Wajnberg (1882-1943), moved to Warsaw from Chişinău a
decade before Weinberg's birth and worked as a violinist and conductor
for a Yiddish theatre in Warsaw, where the future composer joined him as
pianist at the age of 10 and later as a musical director of several
performances[1]. The family had already been the victim of anti-semitic
violence in Bessarabia— his great-grandfather and grandfather were
believed killed during the Kishinev pogrom. This is unconfirmed, as
their names do not appear on the list of victims.
Weinberg entered the Warsaw Conservatory, studying piano, at the age of
twelve, and graduated in 1939. Two works (his first string quartet and a
berceuse for piano) were composed before he fled to the Soviet Union at
the outbreak of war. His parents and sister remained behind and perished
in the Trawniki concentration camp. He settled in Minsk, where he
studied composition for the first time at the Conservatory there. At the
outbreak of the World War II on the Soviet territory, Weinberg was
evacuated in Tashkent (Central Asia), where he wrote works for the
opera, as well as met and married Solomon Mikhoels' daughter Natalia
Vovsi. There he met Dmitry Shostakovich who was impressed by his talent
and became his close friend. Meeting Shostakovich had a profound effect
on the younger man, who said later that, "It was as if I had been born
anew". In 1943 he moved to Moscow at Shostakovich's urging,
Mikhoels was murdered in 1948 as part of Stalin's post-war anti-semitic
campaign. Some of Weinberg's works were among those banned during the
Zhdanovshchina of 1948, and for a time he could make a living only by
composing for the theatre and circus. In February 1953, he himself was
arrested on charges of "Jewish bourgeois nationalism" in relation to his
participation in the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee: Shostakovich wrote
to Lavrenti Beria to intercede on Weinberg's behalf, as well as agreeing
to look after Weinberg's daughter if his wife was also arrested. In the
event, he was saved by Stalin's death the following month, and he was
officially rehabilitated shortly afterwards.
Thereafter Weinberg continued to live in Moscow, composing and
performing as a pianist. He and Shostakovich lived nearby, sharing ideas
on a daily basis. Besides the admiration which Shostakovich frequently
expressed for Weinberg's works, they were taken up by some of Russia's
foremost performers, including Emil Gilels, Leonid Kogan, Mstislav
Rostropovich and Kurt Sanderling.
Towards the end of his life, Weinberg suffered from Crohn's disease,
although he continued to compose. He reportedly converted to Orthodox
Christianity shortly before his death.
Works
Weinberg's output includes twenty-two symphonies, other works for
orchestra (including chamber symphonies and sinfoniettas), seventeen
string quartets, eight violin sonatas (three solo and five with piano),
twenty-four preludes for cello and six cello sonatas (two with piano and
four solo), six piano sonatas, numerous other instrumental works, as
well as more than 40 film and animation scores (including The Cranes are
Flying, Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, 1958). He wrote seven
operas, and considered one of them, Passazhirka (written in 1967-68,
world premiere 12.25.2006, Moscow International House of Music[2]), to
be his most important work. His piano quintet, piano trio and cello
works have received performances in concert series and festivals across
Europe and the USA in recent years, and the British record label Olympia
released over fifteen compact disc recordings of his music, consisting
of both original recordings and remasterings of earlier Melodiya LPs.
Weinberg's works frequently have a strong programmatic element:
throughout his life he continually referred back to his formative years
in Warsaw and to the war which ended that earlier life. Typically,
however, this darkness serves as a background to the finding of peace
through catharsis. This desire for harmony is also evident in his
musical style; Lyudmilla Nikitina emphasises the "neo-classical,
rationalist clarity and proportion" of his works.
Although he never formally studied with Shostakovich, the older composer
had an obvious influence on Weinberg's music. Explicit connections
include the pianissimo passage with celesta which ends the Fifth
Symphony, reminiscent of Shostakovich's Fourth and written around the
time of that work's premiere. Another Weinberg work, his sixth piano
sonata, quotes one of the Shostakovich Preludes and Fugues. More general
similarities in musical language include the use of extended melodies,
repetitive themes and extreme registers. This has been one of the main
criticisms voiced of Weinberg: Alexander Ivashkin has argued that
composers such as Weinberg damaged not only their reputations, but also
that of Shostakovich himself: "these works only served to kill off
Shostakovich's music, to cover it over with a scab of numerous and bad
copies".
Nevertheless, Shostakovich was not the only influence on Weinberg's
style. Nikitina identifies Prokofiev, Myaskovsky, Bartók and Mahler as
other influences, while the trumpet concerto quotes Mendelssohn's
well-known Wedding March. Naturally Jewish music features heavily, but
one can also find other ethnic elements, including Moldavian, Polish,
and Armenian. Weinberg has been identified by some critics as the source
of Shostakovich's own increased interest in klezmer themes in the period
after he met the Jewish composer.List of compositions by
Mieczyslaw Weinberg
Opus 1: Lullaby for piano (1935)
Opus 2: String Quartet No. 1 (1937)
Opus 3: String Quartet No. 2 (1940)
Opus 4: "Acacias", six romances after J. Tuwim for singer and piano
(1940)
Opus 5: Piano Sonata No. 1 (1940)
Opus 6: Symphonic Poem for orchestra (1941)
Opus 7: Three Romances after J. Rivina and A. Prokofiev (1941)
Opus 8: Piano Sonata No. 2 (1942)
Opus 9: Aria for string quartet (1942)
Opus 10: Symphony No. 1 (1942)
Opus 11: Capriccio for violin and piano (1943)
Opus 12: Sonata No. 1 for violin and piano (1943)
Opus 13: Children's Songs after I.L. Peretz for singer and piano (1943)
Opus 14: String Quartet No. 3 (1944)
Opus 15: Sonata No. 2 for violin and piano (1944)
Opus 16: Children's Notebook No. 1 (1944)
Opus 17: Jewish Songs after Shmuel Halkin (1944)
Opus 18: Piano Quintet (1944)
Opus 19: Children's Notebook No. 2 (1944)
Opus 20: String Quartet No. 4 (1945)
Opus 21: Sonata No. 1 for cello and piano in C major (1945)
Opus 22: Three Romances after A. Mickiewicz for singer and piano (1945)
Opus 23: Children's Notebook No. 3 (1945)
Opus 24: Piano Trio (1945)
Opus 25: Six Romances after F. Tyutchev for singer and piano (1945)
Opus 26: Suite for small orchestra (1939-1945)
Opus 27: String Quartet No. 5 (1945)
Opus 28: Sonata for clarinet and piano (1945)
Opus 29: Twelve Miniatures for flute and piano (1946)
Opus 30: Symphony No. 2 for stringorchestra (1946)
Opus 31: Piano Sonata No. 3 (1946)
Opus 32: Elegy after F. Schiller for baritone and piano (1946)
Opus 33: Six Sonettes after W. Shakespeare for bass and piano (1946)
Opus 34: Twenty-One Easy Pieces for piano (1946)
Opus 35: String Quartet No. 6 (1946)
Opus 36: "Festive Scenes" for orchestra (1946-1947)
Opus 37: Sonata No. 3 for violin and piano (1947)
Opus 38: Four Romances after Maksym Rylsky and G. Nikolayeva for singer
and piano (1947)
Opus 39: Sonata No. 4 for violin and piano (1947)
Opus 40: Two Ballet Suites for orchestra (1947)
Opus 41: Sinfonietta No. 1 (1948)
Opus 42: Concertino for violin and stringorchestra (1948)
Opus 43: Concerto for cello and orchestra in C minor (1948)
Opus 44: Greetings Overture for orchestra (1949)
Opus 45: Symphony No. 3 (1949)
Opus 46: Sonatina for violin and piano in D major (1949)
Opus 47 No. 1: Rhapsody on Moldavian Themes for orchestra (1949)
Opus 47 No. 2: "Polish Tunes" for orchestra (1949)
Opus 47 No. 3: "Moldavian Rhapsody" for violin and orchestra (1949)
Opus 47 No. 4: Serenada for orchestra (1949)
Opus 48: String Trio (1950)
Opus 49: Sonatina for piano (1951)
Opus 50: "At the Source of the Past", songcycle after Alexander Blok for
mezzo-soprano and piano (1951)
Opus 51: "In the Homeland", cantata after poems of Soviet children for
boys-alto, boys chorus, mixed chorus and orchestra (1952)
Opus 52: Fantasy for cello and orchestra (1951-1953)
Opus 53: Sonata No. 5 for violin and piano (1953)
Opus 54: Partita for piano (1954)
Opus 55: "The Golden Key", ballet in six scenes after Alexey Tolstoy
opus 55 (1954-1955)
Opus 55A: Suite No. 1 from the ballet "The Golden Key" (1964)
Opus 55B: Suite No. 2 from the ballet "The Golden Key" (1964)
Opus 55C: Suite No. 3 from the ballet "The Golden Key" (1964)
Opus 55D: Suite No. 4 from the ballet "The Golden Key" (1964)
Opus 56: Piano Sonata No. 4 in B minor (1955)
Opus 57: "Bible of the Gypsies", seven romances after J. Tuwim for
mezzo-soprano and piano (1956)
Opus 58: Piano Sonata No. 5 (1956)
Opus 59: String Quartet No. 7 (1957)
Opus 60: "Morning-Red", symphonic poem for orchestra (1957)
Opus 61: Symphony No. 4 in A minor (1957) (Revised in 1961)
Opus 62: "Memories" after J. Tuwim for middle-voice and piano
(1957-1958)
Opus 63: Sonata for cello and piano No. 2 in C major (1958-1959)
Opus 64: "The White Chrysantheme", ballet in three acts after A. Rumnev
and J. Romanovich (1958)
Opus 65: "In the Armenian Mountains" after O. Tumanian for singer and
piano (1958)
Opus 66: String Quartet No. 8 (1959)
Opus 67: Concerto for violin and orchestra in G minor (1959)
Opus 68: Symphonic Songs for orchestra (1959) (Revised from 1951
version)
Opus 69: Sonata for two violins (1959)
Opus 70: Sinfonietta No. 2 (1960)
Opus 71: Seven Romances after various poets for singer and piano (1960)
Opus 72: Sonata No. 1 for cello solo (1960)
Opus 73: Piano Sonata No. 6 (1960)
Opus 74: Sinfonietta No. 2 for string orchestra and timpani (1960)
Opus 75: Concerto for flute and stringorchestra (1961)
Opus 76: Symphony No. 5 in F minor (1962)
Opus 77: "Old Letters" after J. Tuwim for soprano and piano (1962)
Opus 78: Three romances after V. Sosnora, Y. Vinokurov and A. Yashin for
singer and piano (1962)
Opus 79: Symphony No. 6 after Leib Kvitko, Shmuel Halkin and M. Lukonin
for boys' chorus and orchestra (1962-1963)
Opus 80: String Quartet No. 9 (1963)
Opus 81: Symphony No. 7 in C major for strings and harpsichord (1964)
Opus 82: Sonata No. 1 for violin solo (1964)
Opus 83: Symphony No. 8 "Flowers of Poland" after J. Tuwim for tenor,
mixed chorus and orchestra (1964)
Opus 84: "Oh, Grey Fog", romance after J. Tuwim for bass and piano
(1964)
Opus 85: String Quartet No. 10 (1964)
Opus 86: Sonata No. 2 for cello solo (1965)
Opus 87: "The Diary of Love", cantata after S. Vygodski for tenor, boys'
chorus and chamberorchestra (1965)
Opus 88: "The Profile", songcycle after S. Vydodski for bass and piano
(1965)
Opus 89: String Quartet No. 11 (1965-1966)
Opus 90: "Words in Blood", songcycle after J. Tuwim for tenor and piano
(1965)
Opus 91: "Piotr Plaksin", cantata after J. Tuwim for tenor, alto and
nineteen instruments (1965)
Opus 92: "Hiroshima", cantata after Fukagawa for mixed chorus and
orchestra (1966)
Opus 93: Symphony No. 9 "Everlasting Times" after J. Tuwim and V.
Bronievsky for narrator, chorus and orchestra (1940-1967)
Opus 94: Concerto for trumpet and orchestra in B flat major (1966-1967)
Opus 95: Sonata No. 2 for violin solo (1967)
Opus 96: Requiem after D. Kedrin, M. Dudin, F. Garcia Lorca, Fukagawa
and others for children's chorus, mixed chorus and orchestra (1965-1967)
Opus 97: "The Traveller", opera in two acts (1967-1968)
Opus 98: Symphony No. 10 in A minor (1968)
Opus 99: "Triptychon" after L. Staff for bass and orchestra (1968)
Opus 100: Twenty-four Preludes for cello solo (1968)
Opus 101: Symphony No. 11 "Festive Symphony" after various revolutionary
poets for chorus and orchestra (1969)
Opus 102: "Nobody did have known ......", poem after Demyan Bedny for
soprano, chorus and orchestra (1970)
Opus 103: String Quartet No. 12 (1969-1970)
Opus 104: Concerto for clarinet and stringorchestra (1970)
Opus 105: "The Madonna and the Soldier", opera in three acts after A.
Medvedev (1970)
Opus 106: Sonata No. 3 for cello solo (1971)
Opus 107: Sonata No. 1 for viola solo (1971)
Opus 108: Sonata No. 1 for double-bass solo (1971)
Opus 109: "The Love of d'Artagnan", opera after A. Dumas (1971)
Opus 110: "When I sing this child asleep", congcycle after G. Mistral
for soprano and piano (1973)
Opus 111: "Congratulations!", opera in one act after Sholom Aleichem's
play "Mazltov!" (1975)
Opus 112: "Lady Magnesia", opera in one act after G.B. Shaw (1975)
Opus 113: Six Ballet Scenes for orchestra (1973-1975)
Opus 114: Symphony no. 12 (1975-1976)
Opus 115: Symphony no. 13 (1976)
Opus 116: "From the Lyrics of Zhukovsky", songcycle after V. Zhukovsky
for bass and piano (1976)
Opus 117: Symphony No. 14 (1977)
Opus 118: String Quartet No. 13 (1977)
Opus 119: Symphony No. 15 "I Believe in This Earth" after M. Dudin for
soprano, baritone, women's chorus and orchestra (1977)
Opus 120: Three Palmtrees" after M. Lermontov for soprano and string
quartet (1977)
Opus 122: String Quartet No. 14 (1978)
Opus 123: Sonata No. 2 for viola solo (1978)
Opus 124: String Quartet No. 15 (1979)
Opus 125: "From the Lyrics of Baratinsky", songcycle after Y. Baratynsky
for bass and piano (1979)
Opus 126: Sonata No. 3 for violin solo (1979)
Opus 127: Trio for flute, harp and viola (1979)
Opus 128: "The Portrait", opera in eight scenes after N. Gogol (1980)
Opus 129: String Quartet No. 16 (1981) (??)
Opus 130: String Quartet No. 16 (1981)
Opus 131: Symphony no. 16 (1981)
Opus 132: "The Relic", recitative for bass and piano
Opus 133: Sonata for bassoon solo
Opus 134: "From Afanasy Fet's Poetry", songs for bass and piano
Opus 135: Sonata No. 3 for viola solo
Opus 136: Sonata No. 4 for viola solo
Opus 137: Symphony No. 17 "Memory" (1984)
Opus 138: Symphony No. 18 "War, there is no word more cruel" (1986)
Opus 139: Six Children's Songs for voice and piano (1986)
Opus 140: Sonata No. 4 for cello solo (1986)
Opus 141: String Quartet No. 1 (1986) (Recomposition of opus 2)
Opus 142: Symphony No. 19 "The Bright May" (1986)
Opus 143: "The Banners of Peace", symphonic poem (1986)
Opus 144: "The Idiot", opera after F. Dostoyevsky (1985)
Opus 145: Chamber Symphony No. 1 (1987)
Opus 146: String Quartet No. 17 (1987)
Opus 147: Chamber Symphony No. 2 (1987)
Opus 148: Flute Concerto No. 2 (1987)
Opus 151: Chamber Symphony No. 3 (1991)
Opus 153: Chamber Symphony No. 4
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