When renowned cellist Mstislav Rostropovich died less than a year ago at the age of eighty, the world lost not only an extraordinary musician but an accomplished conductor, an outsize personality, and a courageous human being. "It is not an exaggeration to say that the history of the cello in the twentieth century would be unthinkable without the name of Mstislav Rostropovich," writes Elizabeth Wilson. "He has seemed to me like a personification of the cello itself." Ms. Wilson, a former student of "Slava" and the acclaimed biographer of both Shostakovich and Jacqueline du Pré, has written the definitive biography of the master. Rostropovich teems with entertaining anecdotes and therefore brings the reader as close as one can get to the method and psychology of Rostropovich's playing and teaching.
Elizabeth Wilson studied at the Moscow State Conservatory with Mstislav Rostropovich between 1964 and 1971. She has also written Shostakovich: A Life Remembered and Jacqueline du Pre. She lives in Italy.
Table of Contents
Illustrations ix Preface xiii Acknowledgments xvii Notes on the text xix Introduction: A perspective on the Russian school of cello-playing 1 Beginnings 13 Studies at the Moscow Conservatoire 26 The start of a performing career 41 The young teacher 55 Contacts with composers I: from Gliere to Prokofiev 64 Establishing new performance standards (1952-62) 79 An independent teacher 104 Contacts with composers II: Shostakovich and his successors 125 Natalya Shakhovskaya 141 Popularizing the cello 148 Aleksandr Knaifel 171 The early 1960s 178 Natalya Gutman 206 Teaching principles: Class 19 in the 1960s 211 Karine Georgian 235 Principles of interpretation 242 Victoria Yagling 269 The late 1960s 279 Ivan Monighetti 302 The final years in the Soviet Union 313 Epilogue 343 Rostropovich's cello students, 1947-74 351 Letter from Rostropovich to anumber of Russian newspapers 354 List of sources 359 Index 363
