# Nineteenth-Century Russian Nationalism and Anton Rubinstein



## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

Having reached the end of my posts on the "Russian Nineteenth-Century Orchestral Composers" thread (Orchestral Music Forum), this is to say that my completing the thread should not be taken as indifference to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. I'm completely opposed to that invasion. 

And I think that listening to or reading about Russian music of the past helps me understand the present. The last composer discussed in the thread, Anton Rubinstein, faced stiff opposition in the mid- to late-nineteenth century from the Russian nationalists for his internationalist stance. Yet his parents were German and we need to consider more how his background influenced his allegiance to composers like Beethoven and Mendelssohn. Also the impact of Russian antisemitism on Rubinstein's career has been underestimated. We can't just assume that nationalism reflected in the use of folk music and Russian Orthodox church style was good, and the influence of Western music bad. It is a complex topic.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

sounds like this belongs more in the religion & politics section


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

Anton Rubinstein is an immortal composer for one reason: Melody in F. His music though fills a significant stretch of shelf space in my library. Listening to any of the symphonies and it's easy to hear why they fell from grace. The piano concertos are a different matter - they're a lot of fun. Bombastic to be sure, but who cares! It's his solo piano music and the chamber music where he shows genuine originality and talent. The opera The Demon is far better than you might expect. Antisemitism might have worked against him after he died, but in his heyday he was quite well-known and popular in Russian musical circles from what I gather.


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## advokat (Aug 16, 2020)

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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

hammeredklavier said:


> sounds like this belongs more in the religion & politics section


You're right -- that's what I intended but I forgot to click on the Sub-Forum.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

Roger Knox said:


> You're right -- that's what I intended but I forgot to click on the Sub-Forum.


Doesn't seem that controversial to me. It's mostly about amateurs protecting their influence and power against the inexorable tide of Western professional education in music. The idea that such education is inevitably antithetical to a truly Russian art music strikes me as at best a dubious pretext for a turf war. Conservatory trained musicians managed to write convincing folk influenced, nationalistic music well into the 20thc. Weinberg's Third Symphony, Myaskovsky's Eighth, and Prokofiev's Second Quartet are excellent cases in point. And Rimsky-Korsakoff's music maintained a clear national character after he went over to the "dark side."


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

A lot of the places where classical music became established in the 19th century (e.g. Nordic countries and Eastern Europe) or in effect reestablished (e.g. UK) built upon a Germanic base. A lot of composers trained there before setting up local music academies. Another issue is that as composers where able to gain a formal qualification at home, study of folk music became increasingly rigorous (with the generation that matured at the turn of the century - e.g. Grainger, Vaughan Williams and Holst, Bartok and Kodaly).

In hindsight, it could be that the conflict between cosmopolitanism and nationalism is similar to other aesthetic debates during that period of artistic ferment (e.g. questions about the legacy of Beethoven, or Hanslick's views on objective versus subjective approaches). They help us understand the trends and personalities which shaped the music.


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

mbhaub said:


> Anton Rubinstein is an immortal composer for one reason: Melody in F. His music though fills a significant stretch of shelf space in my library. Listening to any of the symphonies and it's easy to hear why they fell from grace. The piano concertos are a different matter - they're a lot of fun. Bombastic to be sure, but who cares! It's his solo piano music and the chamber music where he shows genuine originality and talent. The opera The Demon is far better than you might expect. Antisemitism might have worked against him after he died, but in his heyday he was quite well-known and popular in Russian musical circles from what I gather.


mbhaub, You've helped me greatly with Russian orchestral music. Concerning Anton Rubinstein I've simply run out of energy -- there was a pause because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and now summer is here. Yet I think that anyone on TC who has come this far with Russian music can benefit from dipping into Rubinstein's symphonies and symphonic poems, and might even be pleasantly surprised! Rubinstein was a flawed genius in my view, one who did not give his own compositions the concentrated critiques that were needed, but still there is much to enjoy and admire.

I remember when I was working on the thread about German and Austrian composers you mentioned Roentgen and Rubinstein. I included the first but not the second. In Russia Rubinstein was the most popular classical composer of his time, but he had bitter enemies. It _would _be interesting to try out thinking of him as a German composer, based on his parentage, musical education, and extensive time spent in Germany (which according to one account was because of a particularly nasty period of Russian antisemitism). Perhaps he'd appear in a more positive light. But there would still be the problem that he just tried to do too much.

I'm going to take some time off and return at the beginning of September. Best wishes to everyone for a fine summer.


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