Year Shostakovich: Life And Works Contemporary Soviet Music Contemporary Soviet Culture Contemporary Soviet Life
1926 19-20. April: recommended for Shcherbachov: Symphony No.2 (Blok) Zamyatin's We published in Height of NEP. Stalin inches
higher degree course. May 12: Mosolov: Nocturnes; Quartet No.1; Prague. Zabolotsky founds quietly towards total power.
premiere of Symphony No.1 in Blok Poems Dadaist Oberiu group in July: Zinoviev expelled from
Leningrad. Great success. May Deshevov: The Rails Leningrad. October 2: Politburo. Kirov becomes
26: plays pf reduction of 1st Krein: Lenin Ode Mayakovsky demands legal Leningrad boss. Death
of Symphony for Myaskovsky in Shaporin: Zamyatin Songs reprisals against Bulgakov's Dzerzhinsky, head of GPU.
Moscow. Summer: during creative play The Days of the Turbins. (Replaced by Menzhinsky.)
crisis, destroys juvenilia, Pudovkin: Mother (film) Babel: October: new legal code attacks
incl. Fantasy for 2 pfs; In the Red Cavalry (stories) Katayev: 'bourgeois family'. October 23:
Forest for pf; The Gipsies The Embezzlers (novel) Fadeyev: Trotsky and Kamenev expelled from
(opera); Rusalochka (ballet); The Rout (novel) Mayakovsky: To Politburo.
Revolutionary Symphony. Autumn: Esenin (poem) Tsvetayeva:
Piano Sonata No. 1, Op.12. Rat-Catcher (poem)
1927 20-21. January 9: plays First Myaskovsky: Symphonies Nos. 9 and Bulgakov's The Days of the Stalin creates 'war scare' to
Piano Sonata in Moscow. January 10 Popov: Chamber Concerto Turbins and Olesha's novella cover his campaign against his
28-30: competes in First Zhivotov: Suite for Orchestra Envy the literary sensations of enemies. Great tension in the
International Chopin Mosolov: Piano Concerto No. 1 the year. Berg's Wozzeck staged country. Summer: United
Competition (Warsaw). Lev Glier: The Red Poppy (ballet) in Leningrad. Eisenstein: Opposition (Trotsky, Zinoviev,
Oborin wins. February: to Knipper: Symphony No. 1 October (film) Pudovkin: The Kamenev) criticise Stalin in the
Berlin. Meets Bruno Walter. Kabalevsky: 3 Poems of Blok End of St Petersburg (film) Central Committee. Autumn:
Tours Poland. Returns to Shub: The Fall of the Romanovs protesting low prices, peasants
Leningrad and meets Prokofiev. (film) Dovzhenko: Zvenigora hoard their grain. September:
April: meets Sollertinsky. (film) Leonov: The Thief climax of political feud.
Aphorisms for pf, Op.13. June: (novel) Pasternak: The Year Demonstrations in Moscow.
Symphony No. 2 in B, Op.14 ('To 1905 (poem) Babel: Odessa November 12: Trotsky and Zinoviev
October'). Becomes musical Stories; Sunset (play) expelled from the Party.
director of TRAM. Begins The December: Zinoviev and Kamenev
Nose. August: meets Nina banished to Kaluga. Stalin reigns
Varzar. November 5: premiere of supreme. End of legal opposition;
Second in Leningrad. November unification of Party and state.
22: Walter conducts First
Symphony in Berlin.
1928 21-22. Spring: stays in Moscow Mosolov: Steel (ballet, including Summer: Central Committee January: Trotsky internally
with Meyerhold as head of his The Iron Foundry); Symphony No. 1 resolution against creative exiled to Alma-Ata. Stalin visits
music department. Writes Act II Zhivotov: Fragments for nonet 'backsliding'. Eisenstein and Siberia and orders 'extraordinary
of The Nose. Returns to Shaporin: The Flea (suite) Pudovkin call for 'ideological measures' for seizing grain.
Leningrad. May: finishes The Kabalevsky: Piano Concerto No. 1 dictatorship' in the cinema. May-July: Shakhty case (first
Nose, Op.15. July: completes Polovinkin: Last Sonata The cultural revolution begins. show trial since 1922) of 53
post-graduate course. Autumn: Roslavets: October (cantata) Gorky returns to Russia. 'wreckers' from the Donbass.
Tahiti Trot, Op.16; 2 Scarlatti December: Central Committee Press whips up hate campaign
Pieces, Op.17; first three decrees Communist hegemony in against the accused. July:
Japanese Romances (see 1932). art. RAPP ascendant in Comintern condemns Social
November 2: Stokowski gives US literature. Pudovkin: Storm Democrats as 'social fascists'.
premiere of First Symphony in Over Asia (film) Katayev: October 1: official beginning of
New York. November 25: suite Squaring the Circle (play) Ilf 1st Five Year Plan. November:
from The Nose performed in and Petrov: The Twelve Chairs food shortages again. Bread-cards
Moscow. (novel) Erdman: The Suicide in Leningrad.
(play)
1929 22-23. February: New Babylon, Myaskovsky: 3 Pieces, Op.32 January: Voronsky arrested. 'Super-industrialization' heralds
Op.18 and The Bedbug, Op.19. Shebalin: Symphony No. 2 Knipper: May: Bulgakov's plays banned. Russia's new Iron Age.
The latter causes a furious Symphony No. 1 Polovinkin: Propagation of religion becomes Collectivism is the watchword in
scandal. March. Cinema Symphony No. 1 crime against state. Christians every sphere of Soviet life.
orchestras refuse to play New hounded. Summer: leading 'Shockworkers' appear. January:
Babylon. Score shelved till historians arrested. Autumn: Trotsky exiled from USSR. April:
Marius Constant performs it in orchestrated campaign of Stalin announces Shakhtyites
Paris in 1975. March: 2 pieces vilification against Zamyatin ('bourgeois wreckers') at work in
for Dressel's Columbus, Op.23. and Pilnyak. They are forbidden all branches of industry - they
May: announces engagement to publication and their works are must be 'rooted out'. Party
Nina. June: attends First banned. December: proletarian purged. November: Stalin defeats
All-Russian Musical Conference groups awarded supreme power right wing. Bukharin expelled
in Leningrad. June 16: concert over Soviet culture. Mayakovsky from Politburo. December 21:
performance of The Nose joins RAPP. Commisariat for extraordinary national
provokes savage controversy. Enlightenment abolished. 'celebrations' of Stalin's 50th
July: Symphony No. 3 in E flat, Eisenstein: The General Line birthday. Foundation of the 'cult
Op.20 ('First Of May'). August: (film) Dovzhenko: Arsenal of personality'. December 27: End
The Shot, Op.24 (lost). (film) Romanov: Comrade of NEP. Stalin announces 'total
September: begins The Golden Kislyakov (novel) Pilnyak: collectivization' and
Age. Mahogany (novel, banned) 'liquidation of the kulaks as a
class'.
1930 23-24. January: controversial Knipper: The North Wind (opera) Height of Cultural Revolution. January-February: 6 million
premieres of The Nose and Third Deshevov: Ice and Steel (opera) Stalin writes in Pravda, peasants expropriated. They
Symphony in Leningrad. Myaskovsky: Quartets Nos. 1-3 demanding end to non-Bolshevik slaughter their livestock in
February: finishes The Golden Kabalevsky: Poem of Struggle literature. Proletarians take protest and a drastic meat
Age, Op.22. March: declines Zhelobinsky: Symphony No. 1 over universities and shortage ensues. March 2:
commission from Bolshoi Theatre conservatories. Serapion Stalin's Dizzy with Success
to write opera Battleship Brothers, Pereval, Oberiu, and temporarily halts
Potemkin. April: Soil, Op.25 ACM repressed. All pre-1917 collectivisation. May: end to
(lost). July: holiday on Black culture outlawed. March: trips abroad for Soviet citizens.
Sea coast. Begins The Bolt. Mayakovsky's The Bathhouse a Russia's borders sealed.
September: begins Alone. failure. He is howled down September: closed trial of
October: begins work on during a recital at the House 'Famine Organizers' (agronomists
libretto for Lady Macbeth. The of Komsomol. April 14: accused of wrecking meat
Golden Age premiered in Mayakovsky shoots himself. industry). All shot.
Leningrad. November: Gorky's If The Enemy November-December: show-trial of
Does Not Surrender, He Must Be the 'Industrial Party' (group
Destroyed. Kharkov Congress on accused of wrecking factories and
Proletarian Art calls for an plotting to overthrow Stalin).
end to 'individualism'. All shot.
1931 24-25. January: finishes The Shebalin: Lenin Symphony Under proletarian rule, Soviet Treason, wrecking, espionage
Bolt, Op.27 and film score Shcherbachov: Symphony No. 3 art is battered into 'discovered' everywhere.
Alone, Op.26. April: Rule, Knipper: Symphony No. 2 compliance. Babel adopts 'genre Persecution of technical
Britannia!, Op.28. The Bolt Korchmarev: Symphony No. 2 of silence'. Pilnyak and Olesha intelligentsia superseded by
premiered in Leningrad (October) Polovinkin Symphony No. conform. Nonconformist hounding of 'gold-hoarders'.
(failure). Summer: film score 2 Mandelstam thrown out of Torture now institutionalized.
Golden Mountains, Op.30 and Leningrad. Zamyatin writes to January: major Party purge
revue Allegedly Murdered, Stalin asking permission to begins. March: show-trial of
Op.31. S. pulls out of theatre emigrate; Gorky intercedes - 'All-Union Bureau of Mensheviks'
contracts (including TRAM) and permission granted. Zamyatin (non-existent subversive party
goes on holiday to the Black goes to Paris. Bulgakov's supposedly engaged in sabotaging
Sea. October: Alone released. similar request denied. the planning sector). August:
Becomes international hit, Afinogenov: Fear (play) bread-queues in every city. G. B.
largely due to S.'s score. Shaginian: Hydrocentral (novel) Shaw, on flying visit, remarks
November: finishes Act I of Leonov: Sot (novel) Ilf and 'there is no hunger in Russia'.
Lady Macbeth. 4th Japanese Petrov: The Golden Calf (novel) September: beginning of ill-fated
Romance. December 20: Olesha: A List of Assets (play) White Sea Canal project. October:
interviewed by New York Times Stalin usurps control of Party
in Leningrad. ideology and history.
1932 25-26. February: begins Myaskovsky: Symphonies Nos. 11 Gorky advises Stalin to Last year of the 1st Five-Year
symphony From Karl Marx To Our and 12 (Collective Farm) Mosolov: dissolve the proletarian Plan. Exhaustion and disillusion
Own Days. March: finishes Act Piano Concerto No. 2 Dzerzhinsky: artistic organizations. Stalin set in (mood of rebellion similar
II of Lady Macbeth. April: Piano Concerto No. 1 Zhivotov: orders private performance of to that of early 1921). February:
finishes 6 Japanese Romances, West (choruses) Kabalevsky: Bulgakov's Days of the Turbins. Stalin introduces
Op.21. Joins new Composers' Symphony No. 1 Knipper: Symphony Gorky leads 'brigade' of wage-differentials, condemning
Union. Abandons Karl Marx. May No. 3 (To the Far Eastern Red writers on propaganda trip to equal pay as 'egalitarianism'.
13: marries Nina Varzar. May Army) Mosolov: Symphony No. 2 White Sea Canal. April 23: Summer: only Party protest is
19: premiere of Hamlet, Op.32, Polivinkin: Symphony No. 3 Central Committee resolution on from the 'Ryutin Platform'.
at Vakhtangov Theatre, Moscow, (Romantic) Popov: Symphony No. 1 restructuring of creative Failing to move Politburo to have
causes scandal. June: film Roslavets: Symphony No. 2 (Uzbek) groups. Preferential treatment protesters shot, Stalin
score Counterplan, Op.33. Score Zhelobinsky: Symphony No. 2 offered to 'co-operative' intensifies purge. August:
a popular success. August: Act artists. Proletarian death-penalty introduced for
III of Lady Macbeth. December: organisations banned. May: damaging state property.
finishes Lady Macbeth of launch of five-year plan for September: Pavlik Morozov
Mtsensk District, Op.29. Begins the elimination of religion. declared a hero for denouncing
24 Preludes. Dovzhenko: A Simple Case (film) his father. December:
Sholokhov: Virgin Soil Upturned introduction of internal
(Pt.1) (novel) Katayev: Time, passports allows only townsfolk
Forward! (novel) Leonov: to travel (peasants bound to
Skutarevsky (novel) farms); prejudice against Soviet
Jews is likewise
institutionalised by this measure
(the notorious 'Point 5').
1933 26-27. March: finishes 24 Myaskovsky: Symphonies Nos. 13 Nobel Prize for Literature Severe winter. Stalin continues
Preludes for pf, Op.34. Begins and 14 Prokofiev: Symphonic Song; awarded to emigré novelist Ivan to export grain to raise
foreign
Tale of a Priest and His Lieutenant Kije Knipper: Symphony Bunin. Pasternak, appalled at currency. Famine in the Ukraine
Servant Balda (see 1934) and No. 4 (Poem of the Fighting events in the USSR, stops kills seven million. Eight
Piano Concerto No.1. April: The Komsomol) Shaporin: Symphony No. writing. August: Mandelstam's million more die during
Age of Gold criticised in 1 Kabalevsky: Symphony No. 2 Journey to Armenia denounced by collectivization. January: end of
Moscow press for frivolity. Khrennikov: Piano Concerto No. 1 Pravda. November: Mandelstam purge (one million victims since
July: finishes Piano Concerto Polovinkin: Symphony No. 4 privately circulates his Poem 1931). Beginning of Second
No.1 in C minor, Op.35. Autumn: Ivanovs: Symphony No. 1 (lost) About Stalin, which describes Five-Year Plan. March: show-trial
preparations for staging of him as 'murderer and of Metro-Vickers 'spies'. April:
Lady Macbeth. November: elected peasant-slayer'. Afinogenov: White Sea Canal finished (at cost
deputy to Leningrad's The Lie (play) Pudovkin: of a hundred thousand lives).
Oktyabrsky District soviet. Deserter (film)
1934 27-28. Winter: incidental music Myaskovsky: Symphonies Nos. 15 May 14: Mandelstam arrested. January: 17th Party Congress
for The Human Comedy, Op.37. and 16 (Aviation) Dzerzhinsky: Pasternak and Akhmatova ('Congress of Victors'). Stalin
January: Lady Macbeth premiered Piano Concerto No. 2 Shebalin: protest. He receives three declares all targets fulfilled
in Leningrad and Moscow. Symphony No. 3; Quartet No. 2 years internal exile. August: and Socialism achieved. His cult
Biggest success since First Kabalevsky: Symphony No. 3 (Lenin First Congress of Writers' now gargantuan. Radek eulogizes
Symphony. February: Suite for Requiem) A. Khachaturian: Union. Mandelstam, Akhmatova, him as 'great chief of toilers...
Danceband No.1. Summer: film Symphony No. 1 Koval: Pushkiniana Bulgakov, Platonov, and wisest of the wise'. Zinoviev,
score Love and Hate, Op.38. Tubin: Symphony No. 1 Zabolotsky are excluded. Gorky Kamenev, and Bukharin are made to
August-September: S. argues announces Socialist Realism as confess that Stalin always right.
with Nina; temporarily they the new Soviet aesthetic. Sensing unease in the Party,
separate. Cello Sonata in D Critic Viktor Shklovsky Stalin prepares to move against
minor, Op.40. November: denounces Dostoyevsky as a it. July: GPU renamed NKVD under
finishes Tale of a Priest and posthumous traitor to the Yagoda. December 1: Stalin
His Servant Balda, Op.36. Revolution. Vertov: Three engineers murder of rival Kirov
December: film score s Maxim's Songs Of Lenin (film) Pogodin: in Leningrad. Forty thousand
Youth, Op.41 No.1 and Aristocrats (play) Sholokhov: Leningraders deported to Siberia
Girlfriends, Op.41 No.2. And Quiet Flows The Don (novel) for conspiracy to assassinate.
December 25: premiere of Cello Ostrovsky: How The Steel Was The Great Terror begins.
Sonata in Leningrad. Tempered (novel)
1935 28-29. January: The Limpid Prokofiev: Violin Concerto No. 2 Stalin decrees that 'life has February: beginning of new purge
Stream, Op.39. February 4-6: Shcherbachov: Symphony No. 4 become more joyful'. Optimism of the Party. Mass-arrests,
angry debate on Soviet (Izhorsk) Shebalin: Symphony No. in art now compulsory. shootings and deportations.
symphonism in Composers' Union. 4 (Heroes of Perekop) Zhivotov: Akhmatova's husband and son Gorky, arguing that Terror is
April 3: S. defends Lady Kirov Elegy Khrennikov: Symphony arrested. CP sponsors campaign counter-productive, falls out of
Macbeth against charges of No. 1 Koval: Tale of the Partisan against 'Meyerholdism'. July: favour with Stalin. Attempting to
Formalism in Izvestia. April Kabalevsky: Piano Concerto No. 2 first gymnastic display in Red leave the country, he finds his
26: 5 Fragments, Op.42. June: Dzerzhinsky: Quiet Flows the Don Square, following Nazi model. visa withdrawn. May 1: huge
The Limpid Stream premiered in (opera) Knipper: Symphony No. 5 December: Stalin declares intensification of the
Leningrad. Success. September: Ippolitov-Ivanov: Symphony No. 2 Mayakovsky 'the best, the most Stalin-cult. Massive floral
concert tour of Turkey. Begins Korchmarev: Symphony No. 3 talented'. The poet's cult pictures of him carried in Red
Fourth Symphony. November: The Ivanovs: The Blue Lakes (suite) begins. Dovzhenko: Aerograd Square. New slogans portray him
Limpid Stream premiered in (film) S./G.Vasiliev: Chapayev as 'good and kind', 'Beloved
Moscow. December: new (film) Ermler: Peasants (film) Leader', 'the great humanist',
production of Lady Macbeth Medvedkin: Grabbers (film) etc. August 30: shockworker A.
opens in Moscow. Serebryakova: Marx's Youth Stakhanov overfulfills his norm
(novel) Mandelstam: First by fifteen times (a publicity
Voronezh Notebook (unpublished) stunt). Birth of the
'Stakhanovite' movement.