Born Today November 12: Aleksandr Borodin

1833-1887

Russian romantic composer Alexksandr (westernized to Alexander) Porfiryevich Borodin was born on this day in St. Petersburg a central city in the Russian Empire. Borodin was the illegitimate son of a Georgian nobleman and a married young Russian woman.  His biological father had him registered as being the son of one of his Russian serfs, Porfiry Borodin, hence his last name.  Condemning him to the life of a serf for at least the first 7 years of his life, his nobleman father emancipated him from serfdom then and provided him with shelter and money for his up keep.  Though he lived under the same roof with his biological mother, she would never publicly acknowledge him, and he would grow up calling her "aunt."  After training as and working as a chemist, Borodin would go on to be tutored by Russian pianist and composer Mily Balakirev.  He then began to compose his own works, which ranged from chamber works (string quartets) to symphonies; he also penned one opera.  The reason for his inclusion here is that a chamber work, the string quartet In The Steppes of Central Asia was used as a proscribed soundtrack for the 1909 film Moscow Clad In Snow.  This little 7 minute documentary, produced by France's Pathé Freres, shows several areas in the city under wintery and blizzard conditions.  This was the only film to deliberately make use of his music during the silent era.  Since the advent of talking pictures, however his music has shown up in many, many films; oddly, the most recent is this year's horror anthology Holidays.  Borordin died of a heart attack on the 27th of February 1887 in his birth city of St. Petersburg.  He had always severed from health trouble, having contracted cholera as a child, which led to a series of small heart attacks as an adult.  He was only 53 years of age.  He is buried in a an elaborate tomb in St. Petersburg's Tikhvin Cemetery, along with several other luminaries, many of them composers, including his old tutor Balakirev.  For more on his life, follow links below. His music can be found on both Spotify and Pandora. 

Wikipedia

IMDb

Claasical Net

Leave Virtual Flowers @ Find A Grave

Born Today March 21: Modest Mussorgsky (Not So Silent Edition)

1839-1881

Russian composer Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky was born on this date in Karevo, Russian Empire.  The place of his birth is located about 400 KM/250 miles south of St. Petersburg.  His family claimed that they were descended from the first Ruthenian ruler Rurik; basically, a kind of royal Viking ancestry, who seems to have been some sort of Slavic viking established chieftain.  There were, at the time of his birth, a very wealthy, land-owning family with broad influence and acknowledged serious noble ancestry.  There are several theories about his surname (all of which are explored in the Wikipedia link below), with questions about how seriously the family took to the various spellings of the name.  They were certainly a very proud lot.  Modest's mother was a trained pianist, and she began to teach the instrument to him at the age of six.  Reportedly, by the age of nine he was an extremely accomplished player.  At the age of 10 years, he and his brother were taken to St. Petersburg to study at the very exclusive German language St. Peter's School.  There, he continued his piano studies; at the age of 12 published as self-penned compositional polka, which his father paid for.   Despite his obvious talent for composition at an early age, the family, because of their position in society, intended both of their sons to follow a military career.  He was sent off to a military school at the age of 13; reportedly a brutal environment that lead to difficulties, including, possibly, the beginnings of his serious struggle with drink; yet he was still able to indulge his passion for music there.  He did graduate and in 1856, when he was 17,  he formally entered the army and made the acquaintance of A. Borodin, who was 22 at the time.  They were both serving at a military hospital; Borodin had already become aware of the talent Mussorgsky possessed.  Ever the student of German, but equally proud of his ancient Slavic ancestry, he was a keen admirer of composers from both backgrounds.  He did, though suffer from the tendency to be overtly influenced, even "ruled" by teachers who were conductors/composers of his time.  He seemed also to suffer from the romanticizing of generational ideas.  Through his life, he was never truly a person who supported himself with his musical work, and never became a "true" career composer.  He, through almost all of his adult life, was a civil servant; a civil servant of high rank, but not a self supporting artist.  He apparently was a very heavy lifelong alcoholic and developed some type of seizure disorder.  He was also apparently given to serious bouts of depression as well.  Complications from his heavy drinking, and what may have been other physical problems that went undiagnosed, lead to his seriously premature death on the 28th of March 1881 at the age of 42, exactly one week after his birthday.  He died in a St. Petersburg hospital; the same at which his portrait had been painted only a week or so prior to his death.  He was buried in the Tikhvin Cemetery in St. Petersburg.  In regards to this cemetery, it is reported that when the Soviet government wished on construct a square in front of the famous cemetery, the area contained graves that they never actually moved.  It is rumored that they only moved the headstones and not the bodies.  Supposedly Mussorgsky's burial was amongst them.  If this is true, his actual grave site lies beneath a modern bus stop.  In regards to film, the first real credit of his music being used came in 1929 in the not so silent and partially lost Dark Red Roses.  In the year 2000, his "Pictures At An Exhibition" was used as part of the restored release of the 1913 epic The Last Days Of Pompeii.  Curiously, the same piece was used in the lost and found cult horror classic White Zombie (1932) starring Bela Lugosi.  The most recent use released of his music came in the music heavy comedy drama Mozart In The Jungle; with Murder, I Wrote, an Indian production, yet to be released.  

Modest Mussorgsky's eleaborate grave marker--most likley defret of a body in St. Petersburg.

For More:

Wikipedia

IMDb

A Brief Biography

Leave Virtual Flower @ Finda A Grave