Year Shostakovich: Life And Works Contemporary Soviet Music Contemporary Soviet Culture Contemporary Soviet Life
1906 September 25: Born in St
Petersburg.
1915 8-9. First piano lessons.
1916 9-10. Joins Gliasser's class.
The Soldier (Ode To Liberty)
for pf (not written down).
1917 10-11. Bored by Gliasser's Prokofiev: Symphony No. 1 February: Bogdanov founds February: workers' protests lead
pedantic approach, studies with (Classical) Proletkult with main base in to creation of Provisional
Rozanova at her house on the Moscow. November: Lunacharsky Government under Kerensky in
Fontanka. Gives first recital made Commissar for Petrograd. March: Tsar abdicates.
at Stoyunina's grammar school. Enlightenment. Mandelstam October 21-25: Bolshevik coup.
publishes poem supporting December 7: formation of the
Kerensky and calling Lenin Cheka, Lenin's secret police.
'October's upstart'. Press Winter: unrestrained anarchy in
censorship introduced. the cities - many killed.
1918 11-12. Playing for family Myaskovsky: Symphonies Nos. 4 May: Mayakovsky demands January: Lenin orders summary
friends. Fedin (hearing him at and 5 abolition of libraries, shooting of 'bourgeois
Grekov's): 'The bony boy is theatres, and galleries. July recalcitrants'. January 5: 50,000
transformed at the piano into a 16: Lenin suppresses Gorky's students, civil servants, and
bold musician with a man's journal New Life for middle-class professionals march
strength and arresting rhythmic criticising the Bolsheviks. All towards Petrograd's Tauride
drive'. Early works: The non-Party papers and Palace, protesting Lenin's
Gipsies (opera) and Rusalochka periodicals banned. December announced plans to dissolve the
(ballet), both destroyed in 11: birth of Solzhenitsyn. democratically elected
1926. January: according to Blok: The Twelve (poem) Constituent Assembly. Red troops
Boris Lossky, S's Funeral March machine-gun them. March:
For the Victims of the Brest-Litovsk peace treaty.
Revolution for pf (not written April: Civil War breaks out.
down) is 'probably' composed in June: first concentration camps.
memory of those killed by Red July: general collapse of
troops during the protest march industry. Tsar and family
of 5th January (see col. 4). executed in Ekaterinburg. Allied
military intervention commences.
August 31: attempt on Lenin's
life provokes Red Terror; Cheka
sets out 'to exterminate the
bourgeoisie'.
1919 12-13. Accepted full-time at Golyshev: 'Anti-Symphony' March: 'war against War Communism brings food and
Conservatoire (pf under Lyatoshinsky: Symphony No. 1 superstition'. Churches sacked fuel shortages. Cities
Nikolayev). Summer: privately and closed. November: programme depopulate. Spring: Tambov
coached by Petrov in of 'social prophylaxis' brings Rebellion begins. March:
composition. Autumn: accepted mass-arrests of intelligentsia foundation of Communist
into Steinberg's composition in Petrograd. Ehrenburg: International (Comintern).
class. Winter: Scherzo for Julio Jurenito (novel) Summer: peasant revolts all over
orchestra in F sharp minor, Russia. Genocidal suppression of
Op.1 (ded.: Steinberg). Don Cossack uprising. Autumn: Red
Army victorious on all fronts.
Liquidation of the Cadets.
1920 13-14. Spring: 8 Preludes, Roslavets: Quartet No. 3 Meyerhold Theatre opens in January: Entente blockade lifted.
Op.2. (1st ded.: Kustodiev, Myaskovsky: Piano Sonata No. 3 Moscow. November 7: Yevreinov's April 23: Lenin's 50th birthday
2nd-5th ded.: sister Maria, Storming of the Winter Palace marks beginning of his cult.
6th-8th ded.: Natasha Kuba, (spectacle). December: Lenin April-October: war with Poland.
first girlfriend). Glazunov bans Proletkult. Zamyatin: We November: Civil War ends. Peasant
awards S. grant from Borodin (novel, unpublished) War continues. Ten million have
Fund for student composers. May Mayakovsky: 150 Million (poem) died since 1918.
8: portrait painted by Boris Akhmatova: Anno Domini MCMXI
Kustodiev. (poems) Esenin: Mass for the
Dead (poem)
1921 14-15. Suffers malnutrition. Shcherbachov: Inventions (suite) Zamyatin and Malevich complain January: bread ration reduced.
Glazunov requests extra rations Myaskovsky: Verses by Blok of restrictions. Gorky goes Riots and strikes. Mass-arrests
for S. from Lunacharsky. 2 abroad. Voronsky deputed to follow. February: martial law in
Krylov Fables for mezzo and humour Fellow Travellers. Petrograd. March: Kronstadt
orchestra, Op.4. Orchestrates Serapion Brothers form. August Uprising and Tambov Rebellion put
Rimsky-Korsakov's I Waited For 7: Blok dies, disillusioned down by Tukhachevsky. Peasant War
Thee In A Grotto. Winter: with the Revolution. August: ends. Left Opposition liquidated.
begins Op.3. Akhmatova's husband, poet Lenin decrees New Economic Policy
Nikolai Gumilev, shot for (NEP) at Tenth Party Congress.
alleged involvement in Summer-Winter: famine kills five
Kronstadt Uprising. Pilnyak: million.
St Petersburg (novel)
1922 15-16. Spring: finishes Theme Roslavets: Symphony No. 1 General suppression of the Harvest good. NEP brings recovery
and variations in B flat, Op.3 Avraamov: 'Symphony of (Factory) church. 8,000 priests, monks, in the countryside. Kulaks,
(ded.: N. Sokolov, polyphony Horns' and nuns die. Chagall leaves repressed in 1918, reappear as
teacher); 3 Fantastic Dances Russia. February: Orgburo consequence of surplus
for pf, Op.5. March: death of resolution against 'bourgeois incentive-schemes. Markets and
S.'s father. Suite in F sharp ideology' in literature. May: entrepreneurial economy return to
for 2 pfs, Op.6, composed in further purge of intellectuals. cities. Life regains its colour.
his memory. S.'s mother gets Tsvetayeva leaves Russia, February 6: Cheka renamed the
job as a cashier; sister Maria denouncing Bolshevik barbarism. GPU. March: attending his final
obtains pianist's diploma and August: new censorship body Congress, Lenin observes that the
finds employment at College of Glavlit bans Zamyatin's We. Party has enough political and
Choreography, thereby enabling Autumn: deportation of economic power - 'what is lacking
S. to go on studying. 'reactionary intelligentsia'. is culture'. April 2: Stalin
Pasternak: My Sister Life elected General Secretary of the
(poems) V. Ivanov: Armoured Central Committee. May 26: Lenin
Train 14-69 (story) Pilnyak: suffers first stroke. June:
The Naked Year (novel) show-trial of the SRs. December
Mandelstam: Tristia (poems) 16: Lenin's second stroke.
Vakhtangov's The Dybbuk December 30: foundation of the
(theatre production) USSR.
1923 16-17. Spring: completes pf Myaskovsky: Symphonies Nos. 6 and Formation of proletarian The 'scissors crisis': cost of
course and sketches symphony. 7 Kastalsky: Agricultural literary group October living in cities rises as that of
Unable to continue owing to Symphony Shebalin: Quartet No. 1 (forerunner of RAPP). Centrist the country falls. Wild
malnutrition and tuberculosis. Korchmarev: Symphony No. 1 Pereval group founded. ACM set fluctuation in prices. Chaos in
Summer: recovers in Crimean up in Leningrad and RAPM formed industry produces surge in
sanatorium. Meets Tanya in Moscow to oppose it. unemployment. March 3: Lenin's
Glivenko, his girlfriend till Furmanov: Chapayev (novel) A. third stroke ends his
her marriage in 1929. Autumn: Tolstoy: Aelita (novel) participation in government.
obliged to find a job, S. Pasternak: Themes and July: adoption of Constitution of
becomes accompanist in Bright Variations (poems) the USSR. August: wave of strikes
Reel cinema, Petrograd. Piano and unrest among workers.
Trio No.1 in C minor, Op.8
(ded.: Tanya). Winter: begins
Opp.7 and 9.
1924 17-18. Spring: finishes 3 Myaskovsky: Piano Sonata No. 4 Students strike for right of January 21: death of Lenin.
Pieces for vc and pf, Op.9 Shaporin: Piano Sonata No. 1 assembly and removal of Stalin insists on embalming his
(lost). S.'s mother ill with Mosolov: Piano Sonatas Nos. 1 and indoctrination from university body and building the Red Square
malaria. He plays in various 2 curricula. Many arrested in mausoleum. Petrograd renamed
cinemas to support his family. Leningrad. Eisenstein: Strike Leningrad. Leadership passes to a
Unable to compose. October: (film) Fedin: Cities and Years triumvirate of Zinoviev, Kamenev,
finishes Scherzo for pf and (novel) Leonov: The Badgers and Stalin. March: currency
orchestra in E flat, Op.7. (novel) Serafimovich: The Iron reform stabilizes economy. 'Lenin
Begins symphony again. Flood (novel) Erdman: The enrolment' swells Party by
November: S.'s mother attacked Warrant (play) Bulgakov: The two-thirds - step from elite
by robber outside family White Guard (unpublished novel) corps to mass organization
apartment. December: stops work Mayakovsky: Vladimir Ilyich capable of running the country.
on symphony to write Prelude Lenin (poem) Summer: recovery. Confidence
for string octet, Op.11a, in grows. December: Stalin's first
memory of his friend the young reference to 'socialism in one
poet Volodya Kurchavov. country'.
1925 18-19. February: stops cinema Myaskovsky: Symphony No. 8 February: CP meeting on 'the Permissiveness rules: free sex,
work. Opp.5, 10, and 11a Mosolov: Piano Sonatas Nos. 4 and problem of the intelligentsia'. divorce and abortion, overruling
accepted for publication. March 5; Twilight (symphonic poem) Bukharin calls for of parental authority,
20: gives concert at Moscow Shaporin: Paulina Goebel (opera) 'standardized intellectuals, as educational experimentalism, etc.
Conservatoire (Opp.1, 6, and Shebalin: Symphony No. 1 Gnesin: though from a factory'. July: April: Bukharin exhorts peasants
8). July 1: finishes Symphony 1905-1917 ('symphonic monument') proletarian 'zealots' demand to 'enrich' themselves. May:
No. 1 in F minor, Op.10. Krein: Symphony No. 1 suppression of Fellow 'Menshevik students' arrested.
Graduates from Leningrad Travellers. November 28: September: Zinoviev attacks
Conservatoire. July: Scherzo 'people's poet' Esenin hangs 'moral degeneracy' of NEP.
for string octet, Op.11b. himself. Eisenstein: October: Stalin's crony
Battleship Potemkin Kuleshov: Voroshilov replaces Frunze as
Death-Ray (film) Gladkov: Minister of War. Winter: Zinoviev
Cement (novel) Bulgakov: Heart (Leningrad; for workers' world
Of A Dog (story, published revolution) versus Stalin
1987) Sholokhov: Tales from the (Moscow; for peasants and
Don Zamyatin: The Flea (play) socialism in one country).