Document Type
Other
Publication Date
2025
Abstract
Amid shifting empires, political turmoil, cultural reform, famine, and immense poverty, few individuals have asserted themselves as boldly as Alexander Konstantinovich Glazunov. Glazunov lived through the end of the Tsarist Russia era and the uprising of the Soviet Union. The transition between those two powers consisted of hostile political pressure, brutal winters, revolts, and famine. What ultimately kept Glazunov from succumbing to the darkness of his times were his students and his compositions. As a teacher he was protective of his students’ academic success and their physical wellbeing. Not only did Glazunov live during the transition of one great political power to another, but this coincided with the close of one great period of Russian music and its transition to another. He lived amongst and was formed by the towering compositional greats of the Mighty Handful, Anton Rubinstein, Pyotr Tchaikovsky, and he helped to raise the next generation of Russian greats including Dimitri Shostakovich, Igor Stravinsky, Sergei Prokokiev, and in a roundabout way, Sergei Rachmaninoff. Central to Glazunov’s life was the question which loomed over every Russian since Tsar Peter the Great. Shall Russia look-to the West or within for the resolution between Westernizers and Nationalists? In Glazunov’s case, this question was asked not only politically, but in art and music. Glazunov bridged the worlds of the Nationalistic Mighty Handful and those, like Tchaikovsky and Rubinstein, who looked to the West for musical inspiration and training. These are the divided worlds Alexander Glazunov lived through and reconciled.
Publisher
South Dakota State University
Rights
Copyright © 2025 Levi Gebhard
Recommended Citation
Gebhard, Levi, "Alexander Glazunov: Patriarch of Students" (2025). Schultz-Werth Award Papers. 55.
https://openprairie.sdstate.edu/schultz-werth/55
