罗斯托罗波维奇(1927年3月27日-2007年4月27日) 全名:姆斯蒂斯拉夫·列奥波尔多维奇·罗斯托罗波维奇(Mstislav Leopoldovich Rostropovich),苏联大提琴家、指挥家。1927年3月27日生于阿塞拜疆的巴库的一个音乐家庭。幼年从父母学习大提琴和钢琴,4岁学弹钢琴,7岁学大提琴。1940年13岁时首次作为大提琴家举办音乐会。1943年入莫斯科音乐学院学大提琴和作曲。20岁时在国内已负盛名,1950年起常到国外演出,赢得世界声誉。1956年起任莫斯科音乐学院教授。1968年首次以指挥家身份在莫斯科大剧院指挥柴可夫斯基的《叶普根尼·奥涅金》。1970年10月31日,他写信给《真理报》声援被流放的获得诺贝尔文学奖的亚历山大·索饵仁尼琴,而被禁止演出。1974年他带妻子和两个女儿逃离苏联,后定居美国。1978年他们被剥夺苏联苏联国籍。1990年1月被恢复俄罗斯国籍。1991年8月他只身飞往莫斯科支持叶利钦,他作为示威者在直面苏联克格勃总部的捷尔任斯基广场举办了声援音乐会。在一张背景为杜马大厦的著名照片上,他同民众走在一起,手里拿的不是大提琴而是一把来复枪。作曲家格利埃尔、米亚斯科夫斯基、S.S.普罗科菲耶夫、D.D.肖斯塔科维奇、A.N.哈恰图良等都为他写了大提琴乐曲。他一生荣誉无数。他是大英帝国荣誉骑士勋章、法国文化与艺术十字勋章、希腊凤凰勋章、联邦德国优异服务大十字勋章获得者。1987年,他从里根总统手中获得总统自由勋章。1992年获得肯尼迪勋章。他在故国获得列宁勋章、1951年斯大林勋章、1956年的苏联人民艺术家称号、1993年俄罗斯自由战士勋章和2006年总统勋章。此外他还有全球超过30所大学的荣誉学位和职称。罗斯特罗波维奇于2007年4月27日下午在莫斯科一所诊所内逝世。4月29日被安葬于新圣女修道院墓地。
Mstislav Leopoldovich Rostropovich, KBE (Russian: Мстислав Леопольдович Ростропович, Mstislav Leopol'dovič Rostropovič; March 27, 1927 – April 27, 2007), was a Soviet and Russian cellist and conductor. He is considered by many to have been the greatest cellist of the second half of the 20th century, and one of the greatest of all time. In addition to his outstanding interpretations and technique, he was well known for both inspiring and commissioning new works, which enlarged the cello repertoire more than any cellist before or since. He gave the premieres of over 100 pieces, forming long-standing friendships and artistic partnerships with composers including Dmitri Shostakovich, Sergei Prokofiev, Henri Dutilleux, Witold Lutoslawski, Olivier Messiaen, Luciano Berio, Krzysztof Penderecki, Alfred Schnittke, Norbert Moret, Andreas Makris and especially Benjamin Britten.
Rostropovich was internationally recognized as a staunch advocate of human rights, and was awarded the 1974 Award of the International League of Human Rights. He was married to the soprano Galina Vishnevskaya and had two daughters, Olga and Elena Rostropovich.
(wiki)
====================================
by Joseph Stevenson
Mstislav Rostropovich was one of the great cellists, and one of the leading conductors, of his time. His performances in both arenas were characterized by a direct and strongly emotional style, and the often turbulent events of his life, including exile from his native Soviet Union, often resonated with his music making. His father, Leopold, was an acclaimed cellist and his mother was a professional pianist. In 1931, the family moved to Moscow, where Leopold taught at the Gnesin Institute. Taught by his father from the age of three, &Slava& gave his first recital at eight. He entered the Central Music School in 1939, remaining until 1941. In 1943 he entered the Moscow Conservatory. He studied cello with Semyon Kozolupov and composition with Vissarion Shebalin and Dmitri Shostakovich. He became a musical secretary to composer Sergei Prokofiev, and helped persuade the composer to rewrite his failed cello concerto in E minor as the Symphony-Concerto for Cello and Orchestra, Op. 125, one of the major masterpieces for the instrument.
Rostropovich won the International Competition for Cellists in Prague in 1950, and began to concertize throughout Russia. His first appearance in the West was in Florence in 1951. He married Galina Vishnevskaya, the star soprano of the Bol'shoi Opera. The couple found themselves at odds with the authorities for the first time, since she was then being amorously pursued by Soviet President Nikolai Bulganin, who canceled their long-planned 1956 tour of the West. But Bulganin was losing power to Party Secretary Khrushchev, and the tour was reinstated, allowing Rostropovich to debut in London at the Festival Hall in March and at Carnegie Hall in New York in April. He was immediately hailed as a great international star.
Returning to the U.S.S.R., Rostropovich found composers clamoring to write for him. The greatest of them, Shostakovich, wrote both his cello concertos for him. When the cellist brought the first concerto to the West for the first time, he premiered it on LP in a magnificent recording with Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra, beginning a great discography of Western recordings. On the same tour, English composer Benjamin Britten attended the London premiere of the concerto, initiating another great musical friendship with Rostropovich that led to Britten writing five masterpieces for the cello (three solo suites, a sonata, and the Cello Symphony), and a song cycle for Galina.
In 1969, Rostropovich protested official mistreatment of the writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn in a letter that circulated in the West, embarrassing Soviet officials. Rostropovich and Vishnevskaya saw their scheduled concerts suddenly cancelled, and the soprano was expelled from the Bol'shoi roster. In 1974 the government granted their request to visit the West for two years, then exiled them by revoking their Soviet citizenship. Rostropovich became invisible at home, but a major star in the West. He bought the famous &Duport& Stradivarius. In September he made a London conducting debut with the New Philharmonic Orchestra and in March debuted with the National Symphony Orchestra of Washington, D.C. He was appointed its music director in 1977.
In 1990 Soviet President Gorbachev reversed the Rostropovich's expulsion, resulting in an emotional return documented in the film &Soldiers of Music.& When Russian President Boris Yeltsin stood up to Soviet military power, Rostropovich rushed to stand beside him in the events that led to the collapse of Soviet power. He then stepped down from leadership of the Washington orchestra, but appeared as cellist and conductor around the world. He made his first recordings of Bach's six cello suites in 1991, the result of a lifetime of study. He was a major force in inspiring new cello works from the great composers of his time.