Creative Union : The Professional Organization of Soviet Composers, 1939 1953

Kiril Tomoff

ISBN 10: 1501731211 / ISBN 13: 9781501731211

Published by Cornell University Press Nov 2018, 2018

About this Item

Neuware - Kiril Tomoff is Professor of History at the University of California, Riverside. He is the author of Virtuosi Abroad: Soviet Music and Imperial Competition during the Early Cold War, 1945¿1958 and Creative Union: The Professional Organization of Soviet Composers, 1939¿1953, both from Cornell.

Seller Inventory # 9781501731211

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Creative Union : The Professional Organization of Soviet Composers, 1939 1953
• Publisher: Cornell University Press Nov 2018
• Publication Date: 2018
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1501731211
• ISBN 13: 9781501731211
• Binding: Taschenbuch
• Condition: Neu
• Dimensions: 233W x 155H x 23D millimeters 233 millimeters width by 155 millimeters height by 23 millimeters depth
• Weight: 538 grams

About this title

Synopsis

Why did the Stalin era, a period characterized by bureaucratic control and the reign of Socialist Realism in the arts, witness such an extraordinary upsurge of musical creativity and the prominence of musicians in the cultural elite? This is one of the questions that Kiril Tomoff seeks to answer in Creative Union, the first book about any of the professional unions that dominated Soviet cultural life at the time. Drawing on hitherto untapped archives, he shows how the Union of Soviet Composers established control over the music profession and negotiated the relationship between composers and the Communist Party leadership. Central to Tomoff's argument is the institutional authority and prestige that the musical profession accrued and deployed within Soviet society, enabling musicians to withstand the postwar disciplinary campaigns that were so crippling in other artistic and literary spheres.

Most accounts of Soviet musical life focus on famous individuals or the campaign against Shostakovich's Lady Macbeth and Zhdanov's postwar attack on musical formalism. Tomoff's approach, while not downplaying these notorious events, shows that the Union was able to develop and direct a musical profession that enjoyed enormous social prestige. The Union's leadership was able to use its expertise to determine the criteria of musical value with a degree of independence. Tomoff's book reveals the complex and mutable interaction of creative intelligentsia and political elite in a period hitherto characterized as one of totalitarian control.

About the Author

Kiril Tomoff is Professor of History at the University of California, Riverside. He is the author of Virtuosi Abroad: Soviet Music and Imperial Competition during the Early Cold War, 1945–1958 and Creative Union: The Professional Organization of Soviet Composers, 1939–1953, both from Cornell.