Richter Svyatoslav Teofilovich biography. Investments for Richter Svyatoslav Teofilovich

Original message Art_Kaleidoscope
Thank you! Very interesting!

“I can’t have a family, only art,” he said. He went into art as if into a monastery.

“Svetik had a feeling that nothing would happen to him. It was as if he was in friendship with all the elements of nature. And even the terrible episodes of his life, which crushed faith in the most beloved person - his mother, and the death of his father, could not extinguish the inner light in him. Unfortunately, I know quite exactly how it all happened. In 1937, Slava came from Odessa to Moscow to enter the conservatory under Heinrich Neuhaus. Although Svetik did not study anywhere (his father only taught him at home), Neuhaus said: “This is the student I have been waiting for all my life.” Then Heinrich Gustavovich will write in one of his letters: “Richter - man of genius. Kind, selfless, sensitive and capable of feeling pain and compassion."

And Slava began studying at the conservatory. At first he lived with friends, and then he was registered with Neuhaus, and he moved there

ODESSA – THE CITY WHERE THE WAR CAUGHT RICHTER'S PARENTS

His parents remained in Odessa. The father was 20 years older than the mother. Slava said that he was a wonderful musician, played the organ and even composed something himself. He taught at the conservatory and played in the church.

His mother was Russian - Anna Pavlovna Moskaleva. Very beautiful woman Karenin type - plump, with graceful movements. She was absolutely red.

When they asked her what she used to dye her hair, Anna Pavlovna called Slava over, and he ran out “as red as an orange.”

While his father was perhaps somewhat distant from him, his mother was everything to Slava. She cooked very well and sewed wonderfully. The family basically lived on the money that Anna Pavlovna earned with her skills. She sewed in the morning, cleaned and cooked during the day, and in the evening she took off her robe, put on a dress, combed her hair and received guests.

Among the friends at home was a certain Sergei Dmitrievich Kondratyev.

This was a man who looked very similar to Lenin. A disabled person who could only move around the apartment. Anna Pavlovna brought him lunch.

Kondratiev was a theoretical musician and studied with Richter. Slava said that he could not stand this man, who gave him a lot in terms of music theory. Slava was irritated by his sweetness.

Kondratyev, for example, wrote to Sveta in Moscow: “Dear Slavonka! Now we have winter-winter, the little frost is tapping with its ice stick. How good is the Russian winter, can you compare it with the overseas one?

On June 23, 1941, Slava was supposed to fly to Odessa. Due to the outbreak of war, all flights were cancelled.

But Svetik managed to receive several letters from his mother. Anna Pavlovna wrote that everything is fine with dad, but she goes to Sergei Dmitrievich and is thinking of moving him to them, since moving around Odessa is becoming more and more difficult every day.

Svetik admired his mother: “She walks 20 kilometers to care for the sick.”

Then Odessa was captured by the Germans, and correspondence stopped.

All this time, Svetik talked about his mother, dreaming about how she would come to visit him. When we were preparing potato peelings - there was no other food - he said: “It turns out delicious. But mom will come and teach you how to cook even more deliciously.”

Svetik lived with the hope of meeting his parents. Mom was everything to him. “I’ll just say it, and my mother will already laugh. “I just think about it, and my mother is already smiling,” he said. Anna Pavlovna was his friend, adviser, and the basis of morality.

Before the war, she came to Moscow and charmed us all - both young and old. We all started writing letters to her. One of Slava’s acquaintances wrote to Anna Pavlovna that Richter did not return the book to her. And she added that, probably, “all talents are like that.” Anna Pavlovna immediately sent her son a letter: “How ashamed you will be if they begin to value you only as a talent. A person and talent are two different things. And a scoundrel can be talented.” This is how their relationship was

In the photo: SVYATOSLAV RICHTER WHEN VISITING HIS MOTHER

ANNA PAVLOVNA WENT WITH THE GERMANS

When Odessa was liberated, Svetik’s acquaintance, an engineer by profession, went there to assess the condition of the city. Through him, Svetik gave his mother a letter, and we also wrote to her.

This was in April. Svyatoslav went on tour, and we were waiting for the return of this engineer friend. The deadline has already passed when he was supposed to return, but our man never showed up.

Then I went to see him out of town myself. I found his house and saw that he was doing something in the garden. And I had this feeling that it would be better for me not to approach him. But I pushed these thoughts away.

“Bad news,” the man greeted me. – Svetik’s father was shot. And Anna Pavlovna, having married Kondratyev, left with the Germans.”

It turned out that this Kondratiev was before the revolution big man and his real name is almost Benkendorf. In 1918, with the help of a conductor Bolshoi Theater Golovanov and his wife, singer Nezhdanova, he managed to change his passport and become Kondratiev.

For more than twenty years he pretended to be disabled. And the mother, whom Svetik admired so much, had an affair with him. And in the end she even moved him to her place.

It turned out that Anna Pavlovna went not to see her sick friend, but to her lover. And she betrayed both her husband and son. She gave her husband up to die. Svetik said: “This has not been proven, but they say that Kondratyev himself denounced his father.” A week before the surrender of Odessa, Richter’s parents were asked to evacuate. But since Kondratyev was not taken with them, Anna Pavlovna refused to leave. Thus, signing the husband’s death warrant.

“Mom and dad were asked to evacuate,” Svetik later said. - But Kondratyev was not taken. And mom refused. I think dad understood everything.”

When the Germans entered the city, Kondratiev revealed who he really was. Moreover, he married Anna Pavlovna and took her last name. When many years later Svetik came to his mother in Germany and saw the inscription “S. Richter,” he felt sick. “I couldn’t understand what I had to do with it,” he told me. - And only then I realized that “S.” – this is “Sergey”.

Svetik was often told abroad: “We saw your father.” He answered: “My father was shot.” Like this…

On the way from Tbilisi, where he was touring, Svetik stopped in Kyiv with his friend, the wife of the famous eye doctor Filatov, and she told him everything about the fate of his parents. She was his father's closest friend. Her last name is Speranskaya. “I couldn’t imagine that a person could change so much before my eyes,” she later recalled. “He began to melt, lost weight, collapsed on the sofa and sobbed. I sat with him all night."

When my sister and I met Slava at the station, his face was absolutely sick. He got out of the car, as if he had fallen out, and said: “Vipa, I know everything.” We didn’t touch this topic until 1960.

In the photo: TEOFIL DANILOVICH RICHTER AND ANNA PAVLOVNA RICHTER WITH LITTLE SVYATOSLAV

IT'S ALL ABOUT HYPNOSIS

As a result of long conversations, Svetik and I decided that it was all about hypnosis. After all, Anna Pavlovna experienced a complete personality change. The fact that hypnosis could have affected her is evidenced by one episode. She herself told me how a young girl from Zhitomir, where she lived then, she went to visit her friend in a neighboring town. During way back in the compartment opposite her sat a young man, intelligent, with an interesting face, usually dressed, middle-aged. And he looked at her intently.

“And suddenly I realized,” said Anna Pavlovna, “that he was giving me some instructions. The train slowed down as we approached the station in front of Zhitomir. The man stood up, and I also stood up and followed him. I felt that I simply could not help but go. We went out into the vestibule. And at that time, my friend appeared from the next compartment and turned to me: “Anya, you’re crazy! Zhitomir is the next station!” I turned in her direction, and this man disappeared as if into thin air, and I never saw him again. Meanwhile, the train moved on.” Then, when after everything that happened, my sister and I were in Odessa, we met with Anna Pavlovna’s friend.

“She waited for Svetik throughout the war,” this woman told us. “But when the Germans were leaving, she came to me with a small suitcase, completely pale, looking somewhere into the distance and saying: “I’m leaving.” Her friend tried to reason with her, but Anna Pavlovna stood her ground: “I’m leaving.”

MEETING WITH MOTHER

In October 1962, in the magazine " Music life" a translation of an article by Paul Moore from the American High Fidelity was published. In it, the American talks about how he witnessed Richter’s meeting with his mother.

It so happened that it was Moore, who in 1958 was the first to write about Richter in the Western press, did everything to ensure that this meeting took place. Having learned that a certain Frau Richter lived in the small German town of Schwäbisch Gmünd, who called herself the pianist’s mother, he immediately got into the car and went to see her. Before this, in all conversations, Richter himself answered questions about his parents that “they died.” That’s why the foreign journalist and musicologist wanted to figure out for himself what kind of Frau Richter he was.

Having found a small two-storey house, one of the apartments in which that same lady and her husband occupied, Moore prepared to explain who he was and why he had come. But as soon as he appeared on the threshold, the mistress of the house herself recognized him.

“My confusion was cleared up,” recalled Paul Moore, “when she told me that a relative living in America had sent her the October 1958 issue of High Fidelity, which contained my article on Richter. Frau said: “Ever since we saw her, we have been praying all the time to meet you. We haven’t had any contact with Slava since 1941, so even the opportunity to see someone who saw him himself was a real sensation for us.”

Anna Pavlovna told the American about the circumstances of her departure from Soviet Union: “Slava’s father was arrested along with about six thousand other Odessa residents who bore German surnames. This was the order received from Beria. My husband did nothing wrong, nothing. He was just a musician, and so was I; most of our ancestors and relatives were either musicians or artists, and we never political activity. The only thing he could be accused of was that long ago, in 1927, he gave music lessons at the German consulate in Odessa. But under Stalin and Beria, this was quite enough to arrest him and put him in prison. Then they killed him.

When the Axis troops reached Odessa, the city was occupied, mainly by the Romanians; then they began to retreat, my second husband and I left with them.

It was impossible to take much with me, but I took everything I could related to the memories of Slava. After leaving Odessa, we lived in Romania, Hungary, then Poland, then Germany.”

That meeting between Moore and Anna Pavlovna did not last long.

“Frau Richter mainly tried to extract from me any, the most insignificant news about Slava, or, as she sometimes called him, Svetik, which translated means “little light.” At the same time, Anna Pavlovna passed through a journalist a short note for her son, which began with the words “Mein uber alles Geliebter!” (“My most beloved!”) and ended with “Deine Dich liebende Anna” (“Anna who loves you”). Through a mutual friend, Paul Moore managed to send a note to Richter in Moscow.

And the pianist’s first meeting with his mother took place in the fall of 1960 in New York, where impresario Solomon Hurok organized a Richter concert.

Anna Pavlovna later recalled that she had to prove to Yurok for so long that she was Richter’s mother that she felt like she was being interrogated by the police. At the same time, Richter was asked whether he was going to seek his father’s rehabilitation. To which Richter replied: “How can you rehabilitate an innocent person?”

After that first meeting, Anna Pavlovna, on behalf of the Soviet Minister of Culture Furtseva, was invited to Moscow - for a visit or for good. But the woman refused. And, in turn, she invited her son to visit. This visit became possible two years later.

Paul Moore left detailed memories of the meeting, which he also attended. “The modest two-room apartment, in fact, turned out to be the museum of Svyatoslav Richter. All the walls were covered with photographs of him from childhood to mature years. One of them showed him made up as Franz Liszt, whose role he once played in a Soviet film about Mikhail Glinka. There were also colored watercolors of the Richter houses in Zhitomir and Odessa, as well as the corner in the Odessa house where his bed stood.

One of the photographs of young Slava at the age of sixteen proves that in his youth, before his blond hair began to gradually disappear, he was truly strikingly handsome.

The mistress of the house said that her son had mixed Russian, Polish, German, Swedish and Hungarian blood...

Frau Richter took her son around the apartment and showed him the paintings that she had saved from their old nest in Odessa. Richter looked at the pencil drawing his old house in Zhitomir and another in Odessa.”

Along with Richter in Germany was his wife, Nina Lvovna Dorliak. Their train arrived from Paris. Richter and Dorliac were met at the station by Paul Moore. “The couple arrived on time, carrying with them a large amount of luggage, including cardboard box, in which, as Nina Dorliak explained with a grin, rested an excellent cylinder, without which, as Slava decided, he simply could not appear in London (the next point of Richter’s tour after Germany. - I.O.). With the same friendly mockery, Richter showed a long round package wrapped in brown paper: according to him, it was a floor lamp that Nina intended to carry with her from London to Moscow via Paris, Stuttgart, Vienna and Bucharest.

They stayed in Germany for a total of several days.

The same Paul Moore recalled how during the way back to the station, from where Richter and Dorliak were supposed to go to London, “Frau Richter’s husband” behaved. “He chuckled nervously and chatted non-stop the whole way. Suddenly he unexpectedly asked: “Svetik, does your passport still say that you are German?” Richter, a little warily, as if not knowing what he was driving at, answered: “Yes.”

“Oooh, that's good! – the satisfied old man laughed. – But next time you come to Germany, you should definitely have German name, - for example, Helmut, or something like that.” Richter smiled condescendingly, but, quietly exchanging glances with his wife, he said decisively: “The name Svyatoslav suits me quite well.”

At the station, while they were waiting for the train, everyone decided to have tea and cakes. We sat down at the table and made an order. But Richter last moment I changed my mind about drinking tea and went to wander around the city. He appeared on the platform at the same time as the train.

Then “Frau Richter tried to impress upon her son how important it was for her to receive news from him. But I doubted the effectiveness of her requests: Nina once told me with a laugh that in all these years that they knew each other, Slava sent her many telegrams, but never wrote a single letter, not even a postcard.”

Paul Moore does not know what the last conversation between mother and son was about, since he deliberately left them alone. He approached Frau Richter only when the train started moving. “Frau Richter, smiling sadly, whispered, as if to herself: “Well, my dream is over.”

“FOR ME, MOTHER DIED A LONG TIME AGO”

“When Svetik returned and I asked him how the meeting went,” says Vera Ivanovna, “he replied: “Mom is not there, there is a mask instead.”

I tried to ask him about the details, because so many years had passed. “Kondratiev did not leave us for a minute,” said Slava. - And instead of mom there is a mask. We were not alone for a single moment. But I didn't want to. We kissed and that was it."

Nina Dorliak tried to distract Anna Pavlovna's husband by coming up with all sorts of tricks, for example, asking to show the house. But he did not give in. After that, Svetik traveled to Germany several more times. The newspapers wrote: “Richter is going to his mother,” everything looked very nice. But they only talked about art.

When Anna Pavlovna became seriously ill, Richter spent all the money he earned on tour on her treatment. His refusal to hand over his royalties to the state caused a big scandal at the time. He learned about his mother’s death from Kondratiev a few minutes before the start of his concert in Vienna. This was his only unsuccessful performance. “The end of a legend,” the newspapers wrote the next day. He also went to funerals.

He sent me a postcard: “Vipa, you know our news. But you also know that for me, my mother died a long time ago. Maybe I'm insensitive. I’ll come and talk..."

Life story
The Unconquered Demon of Music

He did not receive any musical education, did not study anywhere, and I was told that such a young man wants to enter the conservatory. He played Beethoven, Chopin, and I whispered to those around me: “I think he’s a genius.”
Heinrich Neuhaus
Svyatoslav Teofilovich Richter always avoided interviews. And, it seems, he changed this custom only once. A few months before his death, he gave an interview to French television. The television film was shown under different names in different European countries: somewhere - “Richter. Unconquered”, somewhere - “Richter’s Secret”. Both of them, each in their own way, fully reflect the essence of the film, with which the amazing legendary musician, as it were, summed up his life, with incredible frankness telling the world about its details, to which he never let anyone come close.
On the eve of the maestro’s 90th birthday, we bring to your attention a small part of his monologue, only occasionally allowing ourselves to interrupt the great master.
Such a nasty memory
“I have a good, but terribly nasty memory. I remember all the people I met when I went on tour, my acquaintances, their acquaintances, I traveled a lot... I don’t remember the numbers, I don’t remember the address, although I clearly remember my address in Odessa: Nezhinskaya, building 2, apartment 15... When I was 16 years old, in 1931, my dad introduced me to the Semenov sisters - these were his fans: Olga Vasilievna, Vera Vasilievna, Maria Vasilievna, there were eight sisters. They were called “eccentrics”; they lived and dressed as if there had been no revolution, everything was like in the old days. This was my first publication. At the age of 16, in their house, I played Schumann’s first concerto... I was a success with them... I wanted to become a pianist... I hate my memories, but I remember everything...
I was born in Zhitomir. My father was pure German. He studied in Vienna, sat on a bench with Franz Shaker, and studied as a pianist and composer. Dad lived in Vienna for 22 years. My mother is Russian, Moskaleva, her father was a landowner, and my mother became my father’s student when he came to Zhitomir in the summer. Dad was a very talented pianist. After graduating from the conservatory in Vienna, he came to Zhitomir, got married, and was offered a place in Odessa at the conservatory. At that moment I fell ill with typhus, and I could not be taken to Odessa, but my mother went to my father. I stayed in Zhitomir with Aunt Mary and saw my mother only four years later. My mother was a very brilliant lady, very secular, even too much so, since those years I have not liked secularism...
At the age of 8-9 I started playing. I had never played scales, never, and immediately began to learn Chopin’s First Nocturne... Dad was horrified, and my mother said: let him practice as he wants, and I played whatever I wanted: “Tannhäuser”, “Lohengrin”.
I had a terrible craving for the theater, and at the age of 15 I began to accompany in group concerts, went to clubs, began to earn money, once I even earned a bag of potatoes. I worked at the Sailors' Palace for three years, and then they took me to the opera. I was brought up on the opera. At first he was a ballet tutor. Then I was in Odessa good theater. They staged "Turandot", and I wanted to conduct "Raymonda". The main conductor was Stolerman - very good musician, although not a very nice person. He shot his wife out of jealousy, she burned all his works, he wrote music...
Dad gave lessons, he even taught the children of the German consul and took me with him... At the age of 19, I came up with the idea of ​​​​playing a Chopin concerto. In the hall of the engineers' club (the hall was small) there were a lot of people, acquaintances, of course. I finished playing Chopin's Fourth Ballade, and played the Fourth Etude as an encore.
It was a very difficult time. In 1933, the domes of all churches were removed and the cathedral was destroyed. First, the bell was thrown down, and in the place of the cathedral they put some kind of school, a meager one, it was like that everywhere... Odessa was hostile to me. I remember there was fear in both 1935 and 1936 - from doorbells, fear of the bell. And then it was time to go military service, and I left for Moscow.
My teachers: dad, Neuhaus and Wagner. Neuhaus was wonderful person. He was like my father as a type, only much lighter.”
Farewell to a legend
“They accepted me on the promise that I would pass all the exams. But I didn’t give up anything... Neuhaus was like a father to me. I lived with Neuhaus. It freed my sound and gave me a feeling of pauses... There is a lot of theater in pianism. The most important feeling is surprise, it is the only thing that makes an impression. Neuhaus himself played unevenly. I remember his concert from the works of Schumann. The sonatas were played terribly, he played like a shoemaker in every bar false notes, and “Kreisleriana” was a miracle, no one had ever played it like that. From Neuhaus I have the manner of sitting high...”
Upon graduating from the conservatory, Svyatoslav Richter was supposed to receive a diploma with honors. However, this was hampered by poor performance in Marxism-Leninism.
In an exam in this subject, teachers were asked to ask Richter the easiest question. He was asked: “Who is Karl Marx?” Richter answered uncertainly: “It seems like a utopian socialist...”
“...No one ever writes that my father was shot before the Germans arrived in Odessa, but I didn’t know anything, I lived in Moscow then. This dark page in my biography. There was a man named Kondratyev, he was the son of a very high official German origin under the tsar and after the revolution he changed his German surname. He worked at the conservatory in Odessa, was sick a lot, lay with bone tuberculosis, my mother looked after him, but it was all untrue, it was a simulation that lasted twenty years. He stood up when the Germans arrived.
When the war began, the parents were asked to evacuate, but my mother refused. Kondratyev moved in with us, I think that dad understood everything. They left under the Germans in 1941, Kondratiev and my mother managed to leave, and then he took the surname Richter and was considered my father. I was angry when they told me: “We saw your father”... I came to my mother shortly before her death in Germany. She was in the hospital. The worst thing was my concert in Vienna. I just arrived, and on the day of the concert Kondratiev comes to my room, he was a very unpleasant person, he flew in specifically and said: “My wife is dying.” I couldn't play and failed, of course. The newspapers wrote: “Farewell to a legend.” I really played terribly..."
My career began with the war
“The first time I played in the large hall of the conservatory was on December 30, 1941, a Tchaikovsky concert. And in March - even before the war - Prokofiev’s Fifth Concerto was played in the Tchaikovsky Hall, the author conducted - this was significant, I had previously played his Sixth Sonata. Prokofiev heard me for the first time. He was a sharp, dangerous man, he could “hit you against the wall” like that... He wrote to order - he was an unprincipled man, but a brilliant composer. He has a work called “Zdravitsa” about Stalin, they don’t play it anymore, it contains words praising Stalin. The writing is absolutely brilliant. Prokofiev seemed to say: “I can do this too.”
I remember my first solo concert in the small hall of the conservatory in the summer of 1942. I played Prokofiev and six preludes by Rachmaninov. Prokofiev always scolded Rachmaninov, but why? Was under his influence. Prokofiev's style came from Rachmaninov. Such clarity comes from him...
My whole career began with the war. Traveled a lot: Murmansk, Arkhangelsk, Transcaucasia - in 1942. I played in Leningrad for the first time on January 5, 1944. I arrived there on December 31st and was completely alone. So I met one New Year. I looked out the window, there were still traces of devastation and destruction everywhere. The day after the concert they looked at my passport and said: “You need to leave immediately.” “German, German,” and the Germans say “Russian, Russian.” I remember the audience at the concert in Leningrad sat in fur coats, the windows were broken, and I wasn’t cold, if I play, I’m not cold. It was very good concert... I learned Prokofiev's seventh sonata in four days. Prokofiev loved the pianist Maximilian Schmidthoff, dedicated the Second Sonata to him, and the Second Concerto to his memory. He dedicated the Eighth Sonata to Gilels, he played it very well, and he said to me: “And for you I am writing the Ninth Sonata”...
I played a lot at funerals back then. I remember some clarinetist died and there was a memorial service. Igumnov and Neuhaus played, the orchestra was conducted by Anosov, Gena Rozhdestvensky’s father, and then a singer came out, I really liked her and looked like a princess. She sang wonderfully, and only then I realized that it was Nina Dorliak.”
Richter approached Dorliak and said: “I would like to give a concert with you.” She did not understand him, thinking that he wanted to play a concert with her in half, one part - he, the other - she, it never occurred to her that he wanted to accompany her, because he was already very famous...
I play for myself
“I didn’t have an apartment, and in 1946 I moved in with Nina Lvovna. The apartment was communal, there were many neighbors, but, as Nina says, “he was unpretentious, he slept under the Neuhaus’s piano.”
Much later, in the 60s, Richter built a house near Tarusa. While the house was being built, Richter lived in the beacon's hut. Without waiting for the end of construction, he first brought his piano there. And... that's it. So he lived - a piano and nothing else.
“In 1948, Nina Lvovna and I played a concert: the first movement was by Rimsky-Korsakov, the second by Prokofiev. Nothing passed, although it was a terrible time, the resolution of the Central Committee and so on...
I played abroad for the first time in Prague, and then I didn’t go anywhere or anything, I traveled a lot - I played in Siberia, everything is interesting to me.
I didn’t leave until 1953, and in 1953 Stalin became an “aufiderzein”; I was in Tbilisi at that time. They tell me: “You need to fly to Moscow and play at Stalin’s funeral.” But it was impossible to fly out, so I flew on a small military plane, which was carrying wreaths from Georgia. I played the piano and saw up close the dead Stalin, Malenkov and all the leaders. I played and went outside. Moscow was in mourning, but I was not. But I was always far from politics, it didn’t interest me... I didn’t want to fly to the USA, I know that Yurok was always told that Richter was sick, he couldn’t.”
Famous musicians they went to the Central Committee and asked that Richter be allowed to leave, which is inconvenient: the Americans always ask why Richter doesn’t come?
“The issue was finally decided by Khrushchev at the request of Furtseva. Two people traveled with me, guarded me...” By the way, since we are talking about the Minister of Culture of the USSR Furtseva. There is such an anecdotal episode associated with her in Richter’s life. Talking with Svyatoslav Richter, Furtseva began to complain to him in her hearts about Mstislav Rostropovich’s bad behavior: “What does he allow himself to do! Why does this nightmare Solzhenitsyn live in his dacha?! What a disgrace! “I completely agree with you! - Richter suddenly supported her with fervor. - Of course, it’s a disgrace! It’s so crowded there, let Solzhenitsyn live better with me!” It was not a demarche, Richter was simply fantastically far from politics...
Svyatoslav Teofilovich left for the West. First in May 1960 to Finland, then in October of the same year to the United States. He was already forty-six years old. Then he went to Europe: he visited England, France, Germany, Italy, and Scandinavia. However, Richter did not follow the pre-arranged schedule of foreign concerts for long. So, after four tours in the United States, he rejected all new offers to perform in this country, which inspired him with a feeling of disgust, with the exception, as he himself said, of “museums, orchestras and cocktail parties.” “America is the standard, I didn’t like it...”
At the age of seventy extra years Richter left Moscow in a car and returned only six months later. During this time, he traveled the distance to Vladivostok and back, not counting a short foray to Japan, and in conditions that are simply scary to think about, he gave a good hundred concerts in cities and the most remote villages of Siberia...
“...I don’t play for the public, I play for myself, and the better I play for myself, the better the audience perceives the concerts. The most difficult and important thing in music is pianissimo. I usually played three hours a day, studied, well, when I urgently needed to learn something, I played for 10-12 hours, but this is not often. It's not true that I studied a lot. I had 80 concert programs, I played them by heart, and one day I thought: you need to look at the notes carefully, then you will play as written, and I began to play according to the notes.
Nowadays everything has changed in concert life, plans are made in advance, and I hate all this planning. Now you are in shape, and tomorrow everything will fall apart... I’m ready to play in school without a fee, I play in small halls without money, I don’t care...
Now I an old man. I would like to play Scarlatti, Schoenberg, but I no longer have the strength. Prokofiev loved Haydn most of all. Me too: it’s somehow fresh, I love Haydn more than Mozart. I have little strength, although I recently learned the Second Concerto of Saint-Saëns, I was very afraid of it. Not bad for an old person. I am a cold person, despite all my temperament. I know myself well - there are things that interfere not in music, but in life. I don't like myself. All".

Material from the site http://event.interami.com/index.php?year=2005&issue=11&id=1564

The pianist's unusually wide repertoire covered works from Baroque music to 20th-century composers; he often performed entire cycles of works, such as Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier. A prominent place in his work was occupied by the works of Haydn, Schubert, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt and Prokofiev. Richter's performance is distinguished by technical perfection, a deeply individual approach to the work, and a sense of time and style.

Biography

Richter was born on March 7 (20), 1915 in Zhitomir of the Russian Empire, (now Ukraine), in the family of a talented German pianist, organist and composer Theophil Danilovich Richter (1872-1941), teacher at the Odessa Conservatory and organist of the city Church, mother - Anna Pavlovna Moskaleva (1892-1963), von Reinke by mother, from Russian nobles. During the Civil War, the family was separated and Richter lived in the family of his aunt, Tamara Pavlovna, from whom he inherited a love of painting, which became his first creative hobby.

In 1922, the family moved to Odessa, where Richter began studying piano and composition, being largely self-taught. During this time, he also wrote several theater plays, became interested in opera, and harbored plans to become a conductor. From 1930 to 1932, Richter worked as a pianist-accompanist at the Odessa Sailor's House, then at the Odessa Philharmonic. Richter's first solo concert, composed of Chopin's works, took place in 1934, and soon he received a position as an accompanist at the Odessa Opera House.

His hopes of becoming a conductor were not justified; in 1937, Richter entered the Moscow Conservatory in the piano class of Heinrich Neuhaus, but in the fall he was expelled from it (after refusing to study general education subjects) and went back to Odessa. Soon, however, at the insistence of Neuhaus, Richter returned to Moscow and was reinstated at the conservatory. The pianist's Moscow debut took place on November 26, 1940, when in the Small Hall of the Conservatory he performed Sergei Prokofiev's Sixth Sonata - for the first time since the author. A month later, Richter performed with the orchestra for the first time.

During the war, Richter was active in concerts, performed in Moscow, toured other cities of the USSR, and played in besieged Leningrad. The pianist performed for the first time a number of new works, including Sergei Prokofiev's Seventh Piano Sonata.

In 1943, Richter first met singer Nina Dorliak, who later became his wife. Richter and Dorliac often performed together in concerts.

Richter’s great friend and mentor was Anna Ivanovna Troyanovskaya (1885-1977), in her house in Skaternny Lane he practiced the famous Medtner piano.

After the war, Richter gained wide fame by winning the Third All-Union Competition of Music Performers (the first prize was divided between him and Viktor Merzhanov), and became one of the leading Soviet pianists. The pianist's concerts in the USSR and the countries of the Eastern Bloc were very popular, but for many years he was not allowed to perform in the West. This was due to the fact that Richter maintained friendly relations with “disgraced” cultural figures, among whom were Boris Pasternak and Sergei Prokofiev. During the years of the unspoken ban on performing the composer’s music, the pianist often played his works, and in 1952, for the first and only time in his life, he acted as a conductor, conducting the premiere of the Symphony-Concerto for Cello and Orchestra (solo: Mstislav Rostropovich) Prokofiev’s Ninth Sonata is dedicated to Richter and performed for the first time by him.

Richter's concerts in New York and other American cities in 1960 became a real sensation, followed by numerous recordings, many of which are still considered standard. In the same year, the musician was awarded a Grammy Award (he became the first Soviet performer to receive this award) for his performance of Brahms' Second Piano Concerto. In 1952, Richter played the role of Franz Liszt in G. Aleksandrov’s film “The Composer Glinka.” In 1960-1980, Richter continued his active concert activity, giving more than 70 concerts a year. He toured a lot different countries, preferring to play in intimate rooms rather than in large ones concert halls. The pianist recorded little in the studio, but the a large number of"live" recordings from concerts.

Richter - the founder of the series music festivals, including the famous “December Evenings” at the Pushkin Museum (since 1981), during which he performed with leading musicians of our time, including violinist Oleg Kagan, violist Yuri Bashmet, cellists Mstislav Rostropovich and Natalya Gutman. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Richter never taught.

IN last years During his life, Richter often canceled concerts due to illness, but continued to perform. During the performance, at his request, there was complete darkness on the stage, and only the notes on the piano stand were illuminated by a lamp. According to the pianist, this gave the audience the opportunity to concentrate on the music without being distracted by minor moments.

The pianist's last concert took place in 1995 in Lübeck.

Awards and titles

• Stalin Prize (1950);
• People's Artist of the RSFSR (1955);
• Grammy Award (1960);
• Lenin Prize (1961);
• People's Artist of the USSR (1961);
• Robert Schumann Prize (1968);
• Honorary Doctor of the University of Strasbourg (1977);
• Leonie Sonning Award (1986).
• Hero of Socialist Labor (1975);
• Order of Lenin (1965, 1975, 1985)
• Order of the October Revolution (1980)
• State Prize of the RSFSR named after M. I. Glinka (1987) - for concert programs of 1986, performed in the cities of Siberia and Far East
• Order of Merit for the Fatherland, III degree (1995).
• State Prize Russian Federation (1996)
• Triumph Award (1993)

Memory

• On March 22, 2011, a memorial plaque to Svyatoslav Richter was installed in Zhitomir.
• In honor of Svyatoslav Richter in Zhitomir they are going to rename the street where he lived.
• For the 100th anniversary of the musician, the leadership of the city of Zhitomir and the region promise to open a monument and a museum.
• In January 1999, the opening took place in Moscow on Bolshaya Bronnaya Street in building 2/6 Memorial apartment Svyatoslav Richter - department State Museum fine arts named after Pushkin, a museum with which Svyatoslav Teofilovich had a long friendship.
• International Piano Competition named after Svyatoslav Richter
• “Offering to Svyatoslav Richter” is an annual project that traditionally takes place in Great hall Conservatories. In this way, the Richter Foundation honors the memory of the great pianist and fulfills his promise to attract attention to the most interesting performers.

Bibliography

• Rasmussen Karl Aage Svjatoslav Richter - Pianist. - Gyldendal, Copenhagen, 2007. - ISBN 9788702034301
• Rasmussen Karl Aage Szvjatoszlav Richter - A zongorista. - Rozsavolgyi es Tarsa, Budapest, 2010. - ISBN 9789638776488
• Rasmussen Karl Aage Sviatoslav Richter - Pianist. - Northeastern University Press, Boston, 2010. - ISBN 978-1-55553-710-4
• Milshtein Y. Svyatoslav Richter, “ Soviet music", 1948, No. 10;
• Delson V. Svyatoslav Richter, M., 1961;
• Neuhaus G. About art piano playing, 3rd ed., M., 1967;
• Rabinovich D. Portraits of pianists, 2nd ed., M., 1970;
• Gakkel L. For music and for people, in the collection: Stories about music and musicians, L.-M., 1973;
• Neuhaus G. Reflections, memories, diaries. Selected articles. Letters to parents, M., 1983;
• Tsypin G. M. S. Richter. Creative portrait, M., 1987;
• Bashkirov D. The boundlessness of the sensation of music, “SM”, 1985, No. 6;
• Neuhaus S. Moral height, greatness of spirit, “SM”, 1985, No. 6;
• Kogan G. The pride of Soviet art. In the book: Selected articles, 3, M., 1985;
• Bruno Monsaingeon, Sviatoslav Richter: Notebooks and Conversations. Princeton University Press, 2001;
• Terekhov D.F. Richter and his time. Notes of the artist. Unfinished biography (facts, comments, short stories and essays). - M.: Consent, 2002.
• Bruno Monsaingeon, Richter. Dialogues. Diaries Publishing House: Classic XXI, 2007.
• Yu. Borisov. Towards Richter. M.: KoLibri, Azbuka-Atticus, 2011. 336 pp., 3000 copies, ISBN 978-5-389-01751-1

Richter Svyatoslav Teofilovich

(Born in 1915 – died in 1997)

Outstanding pianist, legend of music of the 20th century. An amazing virtuoso performer. One of the organizers of the famous Moscow festival “December Evenings”.

According to the critic Boris Lifanovsky, “the phenomenon called “Svyatoslav Richter” is so immense and majestic that in order to talk about it in detail and seriously, it probably requires considerable courage. Richter passed away recently, we all had the honor of being his contemporaries, one might say, we got used to it. It is all the more surprising to see how his name and his work are rapidly disappearing from modern times into the history of music, becoming one of its greatest pages.”

Svyatoslav was born in Zhitomir, into a family with strong musical traditions. His paternal grandfather, Daniil Richter, was a tuner. He was a real ethnic German, but originally from Poland, and emigrated to Russia in search of work. A piano master, he opened his own workshop in Zhitomir. His son Theophilus was the youngest of five children and the only one who connected his life with music. After serving in the army, he was sent to study in Vienna, which at that time was the musical capital of the world. Then you could easily meet Mahler or Grieg on the street, and Brahms regularly attended the opera. Theophilus Richter was trained as a composer and pianist and showed great promise.

After graduating from the conservatory, he did not return to his homeland for a long time: he played at the court of Queen Draghi, and gave private lessons to Austrian aristocrats. Returning to Zhitomir 22 years later, Theophilus married noblewoman Anna Moskaleva. Her father Pavel Petrovich, who at one time even presided over the zemstvo, was categorically against such unequal marriage, but still gave his consent.

On March 20, 1915, the Richters had a son, who was named Svyatoslav. A year later they moved to Odessa, where their father was offered a place at the conservatory. In 1918, a terrible typhus epidemic broke out. At that time Svyatoslav was visiting his grandfather in Zhitomir. There he fell ill, and with him his mother’s sister Elena. The aunt soon died, and news came from Odessa that the father was also sick. The mother considered it necessary to be close to her husband, and the boy remained for three years in the care of numerous relatives (Anna’s family had seven children).

The greatest influence on little Svyatoslav was his aunt Mary, who was 16 years old at that time. It was to her that he owed his passions for painting, theater and cinema, which he carried throughout his life. If the mother of the future pianist was a real society lady, then the aunt was an eccentric, cheerful woman who was constantly inventing something. She drew all the time and tried to introduce her nephew to painting, who was not at all against it. At that time, little Richter had absolutely no interest in music and was going to become an artist.

Upon returning to Odessa in 1921, the boy found himself in a completely different world. Music reigned here. My father not only taught, but also played the organ in the local church, where everyone went to listen to him on Sundays. Homes were constantly being arranged musical evenings. All this led to the fact that at the age of about eight years the boy himself sat down at the instrument. He never played scales, but immediately took on Chopin's nocturne. Subsequently young talent more than once surprised his father, who was involved in his initial musical education. For example, Svyatoslav himself learned to read orchestral scores. True, music did not yet seem like a choice for the rest of his life. Just on his mother’s instructions, he performed something like compulsory program, but on own choice. The desire to become a pianist appeared after the first public speaking in the house of the Semenov sisters in 1931

From the age of 15, Svyatoslav, who was in love with the theater, began accompanying in various concerts and even worked for three years at the Sailors' Palace. Then it was time for the opera. At first he was hired as a ballet tutor. However, he soon debuted as a solo artist. It happened on February 19, 1934 in the hall of the engineers club. The audience enthusiastically appreciated the performance complex works Chopin and Svyatoslav were even called for an encore.

After working for some time as accompanist of the Odessa Opera and Ballet Theater and trying to avoid military service, Richter went to study in Moscow. In 1937, without exams, he was enrolled in the Moscow Conservatory, in the class of G. G. Neuhaus. This is how the great teacher later recalled this event: “He did not receive any musical education, did not study anywhere, and they told me that such a young man wants to enter the conservatory. He played Beethoven, Chopin, and I whispered to those around me: “I think he’s a genius.” Later, almost everyone who hears Richter’s performance will come to the same opinion. While he was still a student, S. Prokofiev heard him and was so captivated by the skill of his performance that in 1940 he entrusted this generally young and little-known pianist with the premiere of his Sixth Piano Sonata. Subsequently, the musician will become the first performer of the rest of Prokofiev’s sonatas, so much will he be delighted with his playing. And the Ninth Sonata was even dedicated to Richter by the composer.

On the eve of the war, a tragedy occurred in the Richter family, which Svyatoslav Teofilovich did not mention for a long time. However, in his declining years, he spoke about this in one of documentaries About Me. Later this story was repeated by him several times in various books and diary entries. Apparently, this was a very painful topic that tormented the musician for a long time. The story was worthy of a romance novel, and perhaps would not have been perceived so sadly if it had not happened in life.

Even during the years of the revolution, the son of a prominent tsarist official fled to Odessa. He himself was German, but in order to avoid persecution he changed his last name to Kondratyev. He showed promise as a musician, but, again for fear of exposure, he chose to leave the conservatory and feign bone tuberculosis. The role required being bedridden. He earned his living by giving private composition lessons. Richter was one of his students. The boy did not like the lessons, but he attended them regularly. As a result, his mother became very close to the imaginary patient. Anna Pavlovna was not a compassionate and soft-hearted woman, but here she succumbed (according to Richter) to suggestion. Sergei Kondratyev was brought to their house, and she selflessly looked after him. Richter, as we remember, was in Moscow at that time and had no idea what was happening in the family of his parents. Meanwhile, with the beginning of the war, everyone was asked to evacuate, but the mother refused. Her father, understanding everything perfectly, stayed with her and was shot in 1941 on a denunciation as a German, shortly before the arrival of the invaders. With the arrival of the enemy, the “patient” unexpectedly recovered and after 20 years he got up and walked. Anna Petrovna fled with him to Germany, where they got married, and Kondratyev chose to take his wife’s surname. When he was mistaken for the father of the great pianist, he did not mind at all and even took advantage of it...

Throughout the war, Svyatoslav Richter traveled with concerts, traveling both the north of Russia and Transcaucasia. He considered this period the beginning of his career. In the summer of 1942, his first solo concert took place in the Small Hall of the Conservatory. When he played in Leningrad in 1944, the windows in the hall were broken, and the audience sat in fur coats because it was very cold. Richter played as always, claiming that he was warmed by inspiration.

In 1945, Svyatoslav Richter became the winner of the All-Union Competition of Performing Musicians. In 1947, he finally completed his studies at the conservatory, interrupted by the war, and in 1949 he already became a laureate of the Stalin Prize. At the same time, in addition to solo performances, he began giving joint concerts with Nina Lvovna Dorliak. They met during the war in 1943 at one of the then numerous memorial services, where both performed. This is how the musician himself recalled it: “And then the singer came out, I really liked her and looked like a princess. She sang wonderfully, and only then I realized that it was Nina Dorliak.”

Nina Lvovna came from a fairly famous theatrical and musical family. Like Richter, she graduated from the Moscow Conservatory with a gold medal and, like her mother, later became one of its most prominent professors. They lived together for more than 50 years, and until the end of their days they called each other only “you.” It all started in 1946, when Richter, not having his own home (upon arrival in Moscow, he lived with Neuhaus), moved to Nina Dorliak’s apartment on Arbat. These were two rooms in a communal apartment where she lived with her mother and nephew. And their last home was an apartment on the 16th floor on Nezhdanova Street, where now the Museum-Apartment of Svyatoslav Richter is part of the Museum of Fine Arts. A. S. Pushkin. They often organized musical evenings, carnivals, film screenings and even readings of opera librettos there for friends.

Until Stalin's death in 1953, Richter did not travel abroad. He was amazing person and he never hid the fact that he played at the funeral of the Father of Nations, where he was hastily taken from Tbilisi on a military plane. Svyatoslav was so alien to politics that during the exam he could not answer who Karl Marx was, and he recalled literally the following about this event: “I played the piano and saw up close the dead Stalin, and Malenkov, all the leaders. I played and went outside.”

Afterwards, Richter will tour the whole world with concerts, starting from Prague and all the way to the Far East. For example, in 1986 he performed 150 times. In total, he had 80 concert programs, and he played all of them from memory. The success was insane, but being a serious musician, Richter did not get hung up on touring. For him, self-improvement and constant work were the most important.

In 1964, Richter founded an annual festival in France, in Touraine, and took part in it constantly. And in 1989, with his participation, it was organized, which has been held annually since then at the Moscow Museum of Fine Arts. A. S. Pushkin festival “December Evenings” (by the way, the pianist is the author of this name).

Unattainably great on the world stage, the maestro was very modest and never refused to perform at the smallest venues. Richter said: “I’m ready to play at school without a fee, I play in small halls without money, I don’t care.”

So in 1978, he readily responded to the request of I. T. Bobrovskaya, director of Moscow Children's School No. 3. The warmest relations developed between the musician and the school teachers, and since then the concerts have become regular. now this educational institution bears the name of Svyatoslav Richter.

The musician believed that “the public is always right” and “is not to blame for anything,” but at the same time he noted that he plays for himself and the better he plays for himself, the better the audience perceives the concerts. His mother admitted that while carrying her son, she tried to watch and listen only to the most beautiful things, so that the child would perceive it all. Well, she did it. Svyatoslav Richter brought his amazing art. People, listening to his playing, became happier, better, cleaner and kinder. He never went against his conscience. At the first competition. He gave Van Cliburn 25 points for P.I. Tchaikovsky and zero for the rest of the participants. Since then he has not been invited to the jury.

From book Famous travelers author

Jacques Yves Cousteau (1910 - 1997) “And why is it that you are so drawn to the sea?” – practical people ask us. George Mallory was once asked why he so wanted to climb Everest. He replied: “Because it exists!” Let these words be our answer. J. I. Cousteau. "In the world

From book Trojan War In the Middle Age. Analysis of responses to our research [with illustrations] author Nosovsky Gleb Vladimirovich

1997 63) Sergei Leskov. “According to calculations, it turned out that Jesus Christ served as Pope.” - Izvestia newspaper, January 29, 1997. OUR EXPLANATIONS: The article is negative. No substantive objections were given. Our response sent to the editorial office of the Izvestia newspaper, the newspaper did not

author Lyukimson Petr Efimovich

1997. Boomerang It's no secret that usually over time bright colors, in which certain events were painted for society, fade like letters on newsprint, and now the most vile, most barbaric crimes do not seem so terrible and barbaric. And those

From the book Intelligence in Jewish: secret materials victories and defeats author Lyukimson Petr Efimovich

1997. Fatal failure In those days of 2006, when Hamas came to power in Gaza, Israel again remembered who Khaled Meshal was and what place he occupied in the hierarchy of this organization. Israel also remembered how on September 25, 1997, employees Mossad assassination attempt

From the book History of the Russian Mafia 1995-2003. Big roof author Karyshev Valery

From the book History of the British Isles by Black Jeremy

8. TWENTIETH CENTURY, 1914-1997

From the book Intelligence and Counterintelligence author Lekarev Stanislav Valerievich

1997 January 15 - in accordance with the directive of the Director of the CIA, the Director of the US Air Force Intelligence and Surveillance Service is appointed head of all structural units of the intelligence community carrying out US aerial reconnaissance. January 20 - The US Congress approved the FBI plan

From the book “The Lord bless my decision...” author Multatuli Petr Valentinovich

Chapter 5 Vilna-Molodechno operation (September 3-October 2, 1915) and stabilization of the front at the end of 1915 - beginning of 1916. The result of the first decisions of Emperor Nicholas II to improve the situation in the army and at the front in general was the Vilna-Molodechno operation (September 3 - 2

From the book Commanders of the Polar Seas author Cherkashin Nikolay Andreevich

Pskov. November 1997 And in Pskov they remember, love and honor Captain Tatarinov. They can even show you the house of a brave captain: an old mansion on the Olginskaya embankment, with its windows looking at the Velikaya River, at the walls, domes and towers of the local Kremlin. However, the reliability

From book Space time"Mira" author Lesnikov Vasily Sergeevich

1997 In orbit. January From January 12 to January 22, the American spaceship Atlantis (STS-81), during which the fifth docking with the Mir orbital complex was performed. The joint flight lasted from January 15 to 20. Astronaut Jerry remains in orbit

From book Famous actors author Sklyarenko Valentina Markovna

Yuri Nikulin (born December 18, 1921 - died August 21, 1997) Popular Russian actor circus and cinema. Comedy and dramatic roles in more than 40 films. Host of the television program “White Parrot Club”. Recipient of honorary titles and awards: People's Artist of the USSR (1973),

From the book Great History of Ukraine author From the book Cities of Belarus in some interesting historical information. Vitebsk region author Tatarinov Yuri Arkadievich

VIDZY (August, 1997) HEDEMAN'S INFORMATION There is very little information about Vidzy. Only Hedeman, Polish writer, Worked hard for the good of this town. And this is what he says...At the beginning of the 15th century. the son of Grand Duke Keistut Sigismunt transferred the Vidzovsky possessions to three families at once: Dovgerdam,

From the book Hidden Tibet. History of independence and occupation author Kuzmin Sergey Lvovich

1997 See: Laird, 2006, p. 170.

Svyatoslav Richter was not only outstanding pianist last century, but also a cultural figure, accepted Active participation V public life, founded the December Evenings festival.

Great, brilliant, outstanding - this is how everyone who has ever heard his virtuoso performance speaks of pianist Svyatoslav Richter classical works. His repertoire includes works by Bach, Schubert, Chopin, Liszt, Prokofiev, Haydn.

He had his own individual approach to music, he had a sense of time and style, and his performance technique was brought to absolute perfection.

Childhood

Svyatoslav Richter was born in Zhitomir in Ukraine, although at that time it was Russian empire, March 20, 1915. The boy's father was a talented German pianist, organist, and composer Teofil Danilovich Richter (1872-1941), who taught music at the Odessa Conservatory and played the organ in a local church. Svyatoslav’s mother’s name was Anna Pavlovna Moskaleva (1892-1963), a hereditary Russian noblewoman, after von Reinke’s mother. All Civil War little Svyatoslav lived with his aunt Tamara, from whom his nephew inherited a love of painting, which later became one of his serious hobbies after music.

Photo: Svyatoslav Richter in his youth

In 1922, the boy and his family moved to Odessa and learned to play the piano. His father helps him at this time - famous pianist, which is his musical education received in Vienna. Little Svyatoslav was very attracted Opera theatre, he even starts writing theater plays and dreams of studying to be a conductor. Svyatoslav gave two years from 1930 to 1932 to the Odessa Sailor's House, where he was accepted as a pianist-accompanist, after which he moved to the local philharmonic. In 1934, Richter performed his first solo concert, performing mainly the music of Chopin. Soon after this, he was accepted into the Odessa Opera House as an accompanist.

Conservatory

Richter's dream of conducting never came true. In 1937, the young man became a piano student at the Moscow Conservatory, ending up with the famous Heinrich Neuhaus, but that same autumn he was expelled. The reason is that Svyatoslav flatly refused to study general education subjects.

The young man returns home - to Odessa. But Neuhaus managed to insist on his own and Richter agreed to return to Moscow, to the conservatory. The pianist's debut in Moscow was a performance in November 1940, held in the Small Hall of his native conservatory. The young pianist’s repertoire included Prokofiev’s Sixth Sonata, which had previously been performed only by its author. Just a month later, Svyatoslav gives his first concert accompanied by an orchestra. He graduated from the Richter Conservatory in 1947, receiving a gold medal.

War

During the war years, the pianist performed concerts not only in Moscow, but also in other cities of the Soviet Union. He also visited besieged Leningrad. He tried to please his war-weary compatriots beautiful music, perfect execution. His repertoire increasingly includes new works; he played S. Prokofiev’s Seventh Piano Sonata indescribably.

Parents

In the biography of Svyatoslav Richter there was one tragedy that he carefully hid from those around him - the betrayal of his own mother. Before the war, the family lived in Odessa, the father served in the opera theater, the mother was engaged in sewing. Just before the occupation of Odessa, their family was offered to evacuate, but the mother refused. The boy's father is arrested by security officers, citing martial law, and shot, only because he was German by nationality, and therefore a traitor waiting for the arrival of the Nazis. At this time, unexpectedly for everyone, the mother marries Sergei Kondratyev, a descendant of an official Tsarist Russia, who fiercely hated Soviet power and even allows him to take the surname Richter.

Photo: Svyatoslav Richter with his mother and father

Without waiting for Odessa to be occupied Soviet troops, Anna and her newly-made husband flee abroad and settle in Germany. Svyatoslav at this time lives and studies in Moscow and knows nothing, waiting throughout the war to meet his beloved mother, who was both an adviser and a friend for him. Having learned about what had happened, the young man closed himself off - it was a real catastrophe, the collapse of everything that had previously been sacred. He experienced this pain all his life, he even decided that he would never have a family - only creativity.

He hadn't seen his mother for twenty years. Their meeting took place when Furtseva and Orlova obtained permission for Svyatoslav to travel abroad. But alas, the closeness that was before did not work out. But nevertheless, when Richter learned about his mother’s serious illness, he spent the entire fee he earned on tour on her. Kondratiev informed Svyatoslav about her death just before the performance in Vienna - and great pianist I couldn’t cope with my excitement and failed the concert. This was his only failure in his entire life.

Creation

Richter’s name began to appear after the war; the Third All-Union Competition brought him particular fame, but in which he became the winner, sharing the first prize with V. Merzhanov. He was recognized as the best Soviet pianist. Then there were tours at home and in socialist countries, but he was not released to the West. The reason for this was the pianist’s friendship with the disgraced Boris Pasternak and Sergei Prokofiev. Prokofiev's music was secretly banned, but this did not stop Richter from performing his works. In 1952, Richter's dream came true - he conducted the premiere of the Symphony-Orchestra for the first time. M. Rostropovich played the solo part. Prokofiev even dedicated his Ninth Sonata to Richter, and the pianist performed it brilliantly. Richter was the first performer in the Soviet Union to be awarded prestigious award"Grammy" His concert life was very intense - up to 70 concerts per year.

The work of Svyatoslav Richter is preserved by numerous recordings, both studio and concert, which were recorded in the period from 1946 to 1994.

Social activity

Svyatoslav Richter is the founder of the “December Evenings”, which were held at the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts. These were thematic festivals of music and painting, at which popular classical music was played and paintings corresponding to the theme were demonstrated. These evenings brought together the most best musicians, artists, directors and actors. The festival was first held in 1981.

Richter also took the initiative to organize the “Musical Celebrations” festival in Touraine in 1964 and the music festival in Tarusa in 1993.

In the early 90s, Richter was working to create a school for young artists and musicians, where they could not only study, but also relax. Ideal place for such a school, the pianist considered the city of Tarusa, where his dacha was located. But to fulfill my dream I needed money. This is how the idea of ​​holding annual festivals in which artists and musicians would participate arose. To be able to hold them, the pianist organizes the Svyatoslav Richter Foundation, of which he becomes president. The pianist also donated his dacha to the foundation.

Painting

One more great love Richter was painting. He had a whole collection of paintings and drawings that were given to him famous artists– K. Magalashvili, A Troyanovskaya, V Shukhaeva, D. Krasnopevtseva.

He even had a painting by the great Picasso - “Dove”, on which the artist left a dedicatory inscription. Richter’s mentor in the art of painting was A. Troyanovskaya, he took lessons from her. She believed that Richter had a special sense of light, he somehow perceived space in his own way, had a vivid imagination and a phenomenal memory.

Personal life

Svyatoslav met his future wife in 1943. There were many rumors and gossip about the pianist’s personal life, even to the point that he was a homosexual, despite having a wife. The musician never talked about the details of family relationships - it was too personal. His wife's name was Nina Dorliak (1908-1998).

Photo: Svyatoslav Richter with his wife Nina Dorliak

She was a daughter popular singer To Dorliak. At the time they met, Nina was a singer (soprano), and after that she became a teacher at the Moscow Conservatory. Nina Lvovna outlived her husband by almost a year. They lived long life– 50 years old, but never gave birth to children. Richter believed that all these quiet family joys he didn’t need it, he was happy only in art. They had a very unusual marriage - this is an appeal to you, living in different rooms... According to the will of N. Dorliak, their apartment became the property of the Pushkin Museum.

Museum

Since 1999, the apartment that previously belonged to Richter has become a museum. Everything here remains as it was during the life of the great pianist. All things are in their places, the piano with sheet music is in the same room in which Svyatoslav Teofilovich rehearsed. Now this room is used for watching films and listening to classical music. The cabinets are still filled with sheet music, cassettes, and records that were donated to the great maestro by friends and numerous fans.

The original manuscript of Prokofiev’s Ninth Sonata, dedicated to Richter, is also safely kept here. The musician’s office amazes with the abundance of books; he was fond of Russian classics. And painting occupies a special place in the museum - another serious hobby of the pianist. Here are his own works and paintings by his artist friends, famous and not so famous. The museum is open to everyone who wants to listen to good music or take part in one of the musical evenings.

Recognition of the greatest of musicians

Richter's work was rewarded with numerous titles and awards. He National artist USSR and RSFSR, received Lenin and Stalin Prize. He was awarded the title of honorary doctor by two universities - Strasbourg and Oxford.

He awarded with orders « October revolution" and "For services to the Fatherland." He is the winner of numerous domestic and foreign awards, is a Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters received in France, a Hero of Socialist Labor and a member of the Moscow Academy of Creativity.

In memory of the pianist

In 2011, a memorial plaque was installed in Zhitomir, the homeland of the great musician. The name of Svyatoslav Richter was given international competition pianists. In the city of Yagotin in Ukraine and in Bydgoszcz in Poland there are monuments to the unsurpassed maestro. One of the streets in Moscow also bears the name of Svyatoslav Richter.

Richter made his last public appearance in Germany in 1995. The musician died in Moscow on August 1, 1997. Burial place: Novodevichy Cemetery.

The relevance and reliability of information is important to us. If you find an error or inaccuracy, please let us know. Highlight the error and press the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Enter .