Mily Alexeyevich Balakirev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor. He was the head of the artistic group of St. Petersburg composers “The Mighty Handful” and one of the founders (1862) and the director (1868-1873 and 1881-1908) of the Gratuitous Music School in St. Petersburg. He was the conductor of orchestral concerts held by the Russian Musical Society (1867-1869) and the director of the Court Singers’ Cappella (1883–94). Among his compositions are two symphonies (1897, 1908), the “Overture on the Themes of Three Russian Songs” (1858; 2nd version 1881), symphonic poems: “Tamara” (1882), “Rus” (1887) and “In Czechia” (1905), “Islamey: an Oriental Fantasy” for piano (1869), which he dedicated to Nikolay Rubinstein, as well as numerous art songs and arrangements of Russian folk songs, etc.
Pyotr Il’ich Tchaikovsky dedicated his overture-fantasy “Romeo and Juliet” (1869) to Balakirev.
