M. I. Glinka. Portrait by A. G. Goravsky, 1869.
Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka was a Russian composer, the founder of the Russian national school of composition and the Russian national classical opera, being in essence the first Russian musical genius. Born into a noble family, he was educated in his father’s estate, where he familiarized himself with the Russian folk song, as well as instrumental music of the Western European classic composers (regularly attending concerts of the orchestra of serfs and participating in them himself). In 1818-22 he studied at the Noble Boarding School affiliated with the Main Pedagogical Institute (his teacher was poet Wilhelm Karlovich Küchelbecker, who subsequently became a Decembrist), taking private lessons with John Field and Charles Meyer. Among Glinka’s compositions from the 1820s the art songs are especially distinguished(“Ne iskushay” – “Do Not Tempt Me,” “Bednï pevets” – “Poor Singer,” etc.).
In 1830-1834 Glinka travelled in Italy, Austria and Germany (in Berlin he studied composition with Siegfried Dehn), in 1837-1839 he served as Kappelmeister of the St. Petersburg Court Singers’ Cappella, in 1844-1847 he went traveling again, this time to France and Spain. The mature period of his music was opened by his opera “A Life for the Tsar” (“Ivan Sussanin,” 1836), written on a dramatic plot, which was very popular at that time, of a heroic feat of a peasant from Kostroma during the Time of Troubles in early 17th century Russia. Glinka worked for almost 6 years on his second opera with the fairytale epic plot – “Ruslan and Ludmila” (1842) based on the long poem of Aleksandr Pushkin, with whom the composer was closely acquainted.
Being a master of the Russian art song (especially noteworthy are the songs “Ya pomnyu chudnoye mgnoven’ye” – “I Remember the Wondrous Moment,” – “Somnenie” – “Doubt,” – and the song cycle “Proshchanie s Peterburgom” – “Farewell to St. Petersburg;” – altogether he wrote about 80 songs), Glinka also composed “Valse-Fantasie” (originally written for piano, orchestrated by the composer in 1856), music for the tragedy “Prince Kholmsky” by Nestor Vasil’yevich Kukol’nik (1840), a number of other orchestral works, including two “Spanish Overtures” (“Jota Aragonesa,” 1845; “Night in Madrid,” 1848; second version, 1851) and the “Kamarinskaya” Fantasy (“Russian Scherzo,” 1848). In the 1850 a group of followers gathered around Glinka, intent on popularizing his music, among which were Aleksandr Nikolayevich Serov, Vladimir Vasil’yevich Stasov, Aleksandr Sergeyevich Dargomyzhsky and Mily Alekseyevich Balakirev. A great friend of Glinka was Prince Vladimir Feodorovich Odoyevsky. When he was living in Berlin in 1856, Glinka made a thorough study of the early contrapuntal masters and, at the same time, melodies of the early Russian znamenny chant, which he saw as providing the foundation for Russian polyphonic music in the upcoming future (similar ideas were subsequently taken on by Tchaikovsky, Taneyev and Rachmaninoff). The musical legacy of Glinka presents a testimony of a powerful rise of the Russian national culture. In the history of Russian music Glinka, similarly to Pushkin in Russian literature, stood out as a founder of a new historical period; his compositions have established the significance of the Russian musical culture in Russia and in the world. Glinka’s “Patriotic Song” became the foundation of the first National Anthem of the Russian Federation (1993–2000).
