The secretive man was Sergei Rakhmaninov. Summary of sergei vasilievich rakhmaninov

Few people really knew Rachmaninoff - he approached with difficulty, opened up to a few. At first, he was a little frightening - there was too much dignity in him, too significant, even tragic was his haggard face with eyes half-closed by heavy eyelids. But some time passed, and it became clear that the stern appearance did not at all correspond to his inner, spiritual experiences, that he was attentive to people - not only relatives, but also strangers, ready to help them. And he always did it imperceptibly - no one ever knew about the many good deeds of Rachmaninoff.
Yes, I will be allowed to break the word once given to Sergei Vasilyevich, and tell one episode that I promised him to keep secret.
Once, in Latest News, I printed a short appeal - a request to help a young woman, mother of two children, who was in a difficult situation. The next day, a check came from Rachmaninov for 3,000 francs - this was a lot of money according to the then Parisian concepts, they provided the life of this family for several months. Sergei Vasilyevich did not know the name of the woman he was helping, and he set me the only condition that I should not report this in the newspaper, and that no one, especially a woman in need, should know about his help.
He gave large donations to the disabled, to the starving in Russia, sent many parcels to old friends in Moscow and St. Petersburg, arranged an annual concert in Paris in favor of Russian students - they knew about this, they could not help but know. And at the same time, Rachmaninov, who always made record collections, gathered crowded audiences all over the world, was terribly worried and asked before each charity concert:
- It is necessary to write something in the newspaper ... What if the hall is incomplete?
- What are you, Sergei Vasilievich?!
- No, everything can be, everything can be ... Big competition!
And this man, who painfully hated advertising and all the hype around his name, hiding from photographers and journalists, suddenly, with some kind of childish pity, once asked me:
- Maybe the interview should be printed? How do you think?
Somehow, at the beginning of 1942, in the midst of World War II, the New Russian Word organized a campaign to collect donations in favor of Russian prisoners of war, who were dying of hunger in Germany by the thousands.
It was necessary to propagandize the collection, to attract big names to it, and I turned to Rachmaninov with a request to write a few words about helping Russian prisoners of war. So that Sergei Vasilyevich would not be afraid that his appeal might be too short, I suggested that it be printed in the first place, in a frame.
Rachmaninoff had a great sense of humour, and the letter he sent me in reply bears the stamp of benevolent irony:
“Dear Mr. Sedykh!
I have to refuse your offer: I do not like to appear in the press, even if my speech is "framed as it should be." And what can be the answer to the question: “why is it necessary to give to Russian prisoners? "It's the same when asking why
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gotta eat. By the way, I inform you that I have just sent 200 parcels through the American Red Cross.
Yours sincerely, S. Rachmaninov.” (453 words) (And Sedykh. Far, close)

Title the text and retell it in detail. Answer the question: “What is the main idea of ​​this text?”
Title the text and retell it concisely. Answer the question: “What conclusions about the personality of S. Rachmaninoff can be drawn from this text?”

A strong wind was blowing, the traveler held the brim of his hat and looked at the shore melting in the haze. People walked around the gloomy man and whispered softly, nodding their heads in his direction. On the ship they discussed the coup in Russia, the terrible changes in the country and the possibility of survival in a foreign land. The traveler did not like these conversations. His eyes watered either from the steamer's smoke, or from the flood of memories... A four-year-old boy sits at the piano and grimly hammers on the keyboard. Near always smiling mother, Lyubov Petrovna. She covers his thin palm with her hand: “You will definitely play well. Look at your hands."

Now there were legends about these hands. Beautiful, sleek, without swollen veins and nodes, like many concert pianists, they were as if carved from ivory. With his right hand, he could cover twelve white keys at once, and with his left hand he could play the chord C - E flat - G - C - G. But at home, his art was no longer needed. “This is the end of old Russia, there will be no art here for many years,” he told his wife Natalya Alexandrovna shortly before their departure. “And without him, my life is aimless, you know.” Two weeks later, Sergei Rachmaninoff, with his wife and two daughters, sailed on a steamer to Paris, from where they were to go on tour to Stockholm. Whether he would have the opportunity to emigrate to the United States, Rachmaninoff did not yet know. He planned to return to Russia in ten years, not earlier. These thoughts made me sad. Everyone had already left the deck of the ship, the darkness of the night was cut by the light of swinging lanterns. How everything suddenly happens in life. As soon as you are going to live quietly, without worrying about anything, something is sure to happen. Or it seems that hell is ahead, and life suddenly becomes interesting and easy.

FROM PETERSBURG TO MOSCOW

For a long time, the boy did not attach importance to either his perfect ear or phenomenal musical memory. His mother made him sit down at the piano. He quickly played everything she asked him to, without looking at the notes, and ran away to play with the children. When Father Vasily Arkadievich, a retired hussar officer, "prone to a scattered lifestyle", squandered his fortune and his wife's inheritance, the family was forced to sell the Oneg estate in the Novgorod province and move to St. Petersburg with almost no means of subsistence. But it was necessary to study, and Seryozha easily entered the conservatory. The boy was assigned to live with his aunt, Varvara Arkadyevna Satina. His mother rarely visited him, his father did not come at all. Seryozha found out that his parents divorced. He was rude to his benefactress and her daughters, hooligans and skipped classes at the conservatory. After three years of study, the question arose of his expulsion.
He stood in front of the teaching staff, wrinkling the skirts of his jacket with his hands, and cursed his burning ears. He was going to put an end to music forever and was just waiting for the opportunity to slip out of the office. At home, his mother and cousin, Alexander Ilyich Ziloti, were waiting for him. A student of Liszt and Rubinstein, at the age of 25 Siloti was known in musical circles as a talented pianist. “Seryozha, please play for Sasha,” the mother asked. The son obediently sat down to the instrument. By the shining eyes of his brother, I realized that he did well. “You will go to Moscow, to the teacher of the Moscow Conservatory Zverev. I will vouch for you, ”said Alexander.

In the autumn of 1885, Seryozha left St. Petersburg for Moscow, to the Zverev family. The master did not have a wife and children, and he took talented students for full board. Outstanding people entered this house - the director of the conservatory Taneyev, the director of the Moscow branch of the Russian Musical Society Tchaikovsky, as well as well-known and well-educated gentlemen and ladies, among whom there were actors, lawyers, university professors. Communication with them, visiting theaters, concerts and art galleries turned the young man's idea of ​​life upside down. He became seriously interested in music and even began to compose. At the age of 16, Rachmaninoff played his own piano works at the Conservatory exam. Thin, round-shouldered, with long legs and sharp knees, at first he elicited only patronizing smiles. But as soon as his hands touched the keyboard, the faces of the examiners turned serious. The student received "excellent", and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky on the certification sheet next to the five drew three "pluses" - on the side, top and bottom. In the same year, Sergei had to leave the Zverev boarding house - the master, in a fit of anger, swung at his student, and they quarreled. Sheltered by his aunt and her two grown-up daughters, Natalia and Sophia. Sergei was given a room, and he continued his studies and writing. At the age of 19 he graduated from the conservatory with a gold medal, presenting as an examination paper the one-act opera Aleko based on the plot of Pushkin's poem The Gypsies. He wrote it in 17 days. In the same year, Aleko was staged at the Bolshoi Theatre. Fame fell upon the young composer.

FIRST SYMPHONY

During the performance, he sat in the hall and did not know where to go from shame. The orchestra was conducted by Glazunov, and either he did not understand the composer's intention, or he preferred to interpret the work in his own way, but the performance, in the author's opinion, turned out to be terrible. Rachmaninoff escaped from the theater. In the morning, after reading the newspaper reviews, I locked myself in my room and tightly drew the curtains. Later, he himself said that he was like "a man who had a stroke and for a long time his head and hands were taken away." Never again during the composer's lifetime was the First Symphony performed. In fact, he imposed a ban on her.
For several months, the entire Satin family walked around the tenant on tiptoe. Natalia and Sophia brought coffee, threw out cigarette butts from overflowing ashtrays and cautiously asked if he would like to take a walk. Rachmaninoff was absent-mindedly silent. At that time, only need could pull him out of the room. I had to earn a living. Six months after the crushing failure, he agreed to the offer of Savva Mamontov to take the place of a conductor in his private opera house. He worked there for only a season, arguing that apart from the money side of the issue, nothing attracted him there, and relations with the orchestra and opera performers only depressing. One of the few who immediately became friends with the young conductor was Fyodor Chaliapin. Under the direction of Rachmaninoff, he sang the parts of Melnik in Rusalka, the Head in May Nights and Vladimir in Serov's opera Rogneda. Their friendship quickly became the talk of the town. The noisy and colorful Chaliapin and the gloomy, seemingly arrogant Rachmaninov attracted attention wherever they appeared. They talked very closely. Fedor Ivanovich knew about the composer's creative failure and his experiences. and Sergei Rachmaninov Not immediately, but he persuaded a friend to turn to the famous hypnotist Dahl, who helped him to be treated for depression. It took the psychotherapist two years for Rachmaninoff to start writing again. The second piano concerto, performed in 1901, was dedicated to Dr. Dahl.

A year later, Sergei Vasilyevich married Natalia Satina and moved to a small apartment on Vozdvizhenka. He then lived very modestly. To provide for his family, he took the place of a music inspector at the Elizabethan and Catherine's institutes. I went to the service with great displeasure, because stupid work took up a lot of time and left no opportunity to compose. Despite his dislike for teaching, he was forced to give private lessons. Piano concertos still paid little. A gifted and talented person, he was torn: to compose music, conduct or improve his performing talent? Contradictions and doubts tormented him terribly and let him go only in the family. On weekends, the composer often walked around the house in striped pajamas, clutching a newly written score in his hands, dropping ashes here and there, leaving coffee cups everywhere. He was affectionately scolded and looked after him in every possible way. In the evenings, he gladly received guests and recklessly played vint. "Sergey Vasilievich knows how to smile?" - surprised those who came for the first time. And only those close to him knew that the composer hides vulnerability and incredible shyness behind a mock frown.

HOAX?

After the success of the Second Piano Concerto in 1901 and his final recovery, Sergei Rachmaninoff wrote several great works one after another, gave many concerts, and from 1904 conducted at the Bolshoi Theatre. In the salons of Moscow and St. Petersburg, his name constantly sounds: “Sergey Vasilyevich gave a concert yesterday ...” His strange manner of speaking was called “author's”. Each time he went to the piano, he frowned at the instrument, pushed his chair far away and sat down, spreading his long legs wide. He stretched his hands forward and put them on the keyboard, and only then drove up on a chair to the instrument. And once it seemed to the audience that the piano itself went to the performer. Everyone gasped. Mystic! Rachmaninoff possessed such powerful energy.
In the troupe of the Bolshoi Theater, his appearance for many was an unpleasant surprise. Too zealously he undertook to change everything. He rearranged the conductor's stand so that he could see the orchestra - traditionally, he stood near the prompter booth, and the conductor saw only the singers. At that time, the famous Altani also conducted in the theater. The workers resented the need to rearrange the console from place to place, depending on who conducted the orchestra. Rachmaninov did not shake his fists, did not jump and fuss, as was customary. Every movement he made was precise and precise. Reporters did not skimp on praise. The opera "Eugene Onegin" was called subtle and poetic, "Prince Igor" with the participation of Chaliapin struck with epic scope and richness of the orchestral sound. "Life for a guy", "The Queen of Spades", "Boris Godunov" - each work caused a storm of delight.

On January 11, 1906, the one-act plays The Miserly Knight and Francesca di Rimini were performed for the first time at the Bolshoi. The hall was full, despite the suppressed December 1905 uprising a month ago. After the performance, someone asked Rachmaninov why the part of the Miser and Lanciotto Malatesta was performed not by Chaliapin, but by another artist. He pursed his lips in response and hurriedly retreated. Do not explain to everyone that Chaliapin, who was a talented sight reader, was too lazy to learn the proposed parties, because of which the friends seriously quarreled for many years. And in the autumn of the same year, Rachmaninoff decided to move to Dresden. I lived in Germany for three winters, made a big tour of the USA and Canada, and then I realized that I was tired of living in other countries. Sergei Vasilyevich bought the Ivanovka estate in the Tambov province, a car that he himself drove with pleasure, and settled away from the bustle of the capital.
Hopes, plans, a measured way of life - overnight, life has changed dramatically. The year 1917 blew up. The decision was painful. Sergei Rachmaninoff went abroad with his family to continue doing what he knows and loves. He did not know then that this journey would forever cut him off from his homeland.
FOREVER
...Paris greeted the Rakhmaninovs with port hustle and fuss with documents. It was expected that it would be difficult, but did not fully understand how much. He had to learn the works of Strauss, Schumann, Bach, because the spoiled European public did not perceive the concerts of the famous Russian musician, which consisted only of his own compositions. In 1918 he moved to New York. Rachmaninoff gave concerts very often to earn money, and quickly became famous as a pianist, which made him very rich. Pretty soon, Rachmaninoff bought the Senar estate on the shores of Lake Lucerne in Switzerland. He rebuilt a magnificent embankment, rode friends in a boat and in a car. Every year I bought a Cadillac or a Continental and returned the old car to the dealer. For concerts in Europe and the United States, he now went behind the wheel.
In his garden, Rachmaninoff grew an amazing black rose, and soon her photographs appeared in all Swiss newspapers. But he carefully hid from reporters. As well as from numerous admirers who besieged his house until the end of his life. Famous financiers were regulars at the Rachmaninoffs. With them, he spent a lot of time, consulting where to invest money. It would seem that life in exile did not turn into a terrible dream. But for some reason, after the performances, the musician came to the dressing room, fell into an armchair and asked not to be disturbed. His huge hands lay palms up, his chin rested on his chest, and his eyes were closed. Anyone who found him in such a state wanted to call a doctor. But he just waved his hands in annoyance, showing that everything was in order.

At times he was tormented by pain in his back, and then he fell into a terrible melancholy. Saved by a patient wife and friends from Russia, who brought gifts that the composer loved very much. Any unusual trifle could cheer up the exile: a pen that opened in an amazing way, a paper stapler, and a vacuum cleaner caused a storm of delight! The composer then often demonstrated this toy in his work.
Sergei Vasilyevich spent huge sums on charity, sent money to Russia in support of scientists, artists, and writers. But in 1931, he became one of 110 well-known emigrants who appealed to the US State Department to refrain from purchasing Soviet goods. In protest against the obscurantism and terror that were happening in his long-suffering homeland. In response, Rachmaninov's music, which is "a reflection of the decaying petty-bourgeois spirit, especially harmful in the face of a sharp struggle on the musical front," ceased to sound in the USSR.
Ten years after leaving Russia, Sergei Rachmaninoff did not compose anything. Only gave concerts. And the more they applauded him, the more he hated himself. Once, having finished his performance to the stormy enthusiastic applause of the public, Rachmaninoff locked himself in the dressing room. When the door was unlocked, the composer was in a fever: "Don't talk, don't say anything... I myself know that I am not a musician, but a shoemaker!"
But the performer did not drown out the musician in Rachmaninoff. The notes were his voice, now sobbing, now enthusiastic, now calling somewhere where it is good and calm. He yearned for his lost homeland, engulfed in the flames of war, and yet he hoped that someday his music would sound where he no longer had a place.
The illness was a complete surprise for Rachmaninoff himself and all his relatives. In mid-February 1943, the composer began to feel very bad, weakness appeared, his hands began to ache. He was taken to the hospital, but after a few days he was discharged without finding anything serious. The patient's condition worsened, and the wife decided to invite home the famous American surgeon. He made a disappointing diagnosis: rapidly progressing cancer. On March 20, Sergei Vasilyevich was unable to read the congratulatory telegrams and letters that came from all over the world in honor of his 70th birthday. He died 8 days later at his estate in Beverly Hills.

Text: Natalia Olentsova

He spent most of the day planning the garden on his property. When his back got tired, he slowly went up to the future workshop above the garage. She was still empty. There were shavings on the floor. Sitting on the windowsill, he clasped his knee in his arms and looked out into the garden.

At the very beginning of autumn, Mikhdil Mikhailovich Fokin died suddenly. The Symphonic Dances have lost their choreographer.

“What a terrible loss! - wrote Rachmaninov to Somov. - Chaliapin - Stanislavsky - Fokin - a whole era in the theater. Now it's over. Who will take their place now! There were, as Chaliapin said, only "scientific walruses" ... "

The season began on October 12, 1942 in Detroit.

Of course, I will play for Russia again, - Rachmaninov told the journalist. - Everyone helps America, but only a few help Russia.

The fiftieth anniversary of the beginning of the concert activity of Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninoff was approaching.

His feelings were twofold. At home, he strictly forbade even stuttering about her. I was afraid that the seal would sound. The thought of honors, speeches, and banquets in the midst of the horrors of war was simply hateful to him. Still, he must have been a little hurt when, on the day of the anniversary, only one single Philadelphia journalist remembered him.

After the concert, a handful of closest friends gathered at dinner, and old Steinway sent a magnificent new piano to the California house as a gift to the composer. This was the end of the honor.

But how deeply moved the musician was when he received a thick bundle of Moscow newspapers from the Soviet embassy in Washington!

Moscow, bitter, half-starved, immersed in darkness under the incessant thunderstorm of bombing, found time to remember its prodigal son and even organized an exhibition dedicated to his activities.

On one of the stands hung his oil portrait, sent by 85-year-old Anna Danilovna Ornatskaya.

Sergei Vasilyevich once remarked half-jokingly that he was created by eighty-five percent by a musician and only by fifteen by a man. This is true only insofar as it reflects his constant desire to obscure, hide from immodest eyes this, as it seemed to him, "a gray, useless and uninteresting person."

His art comrades, who had been in contact with him for decades, judged him quite differently. With his characteristic romantic pathos, Joseph Hoffman expressed his thought.

“... There has never been a purer and holier soul in the world than Rachmaninov's! he exclaimed. “And that is the only reason why Rachmaninoff became a great musician, and the fact that he had such excellent fingers was a pure accident.”

And in his own way, he was probably not so far from the truth.

The fundamental ethical foundations of the musician's soul - the deepest sincerity, humanity, intolerance to lies and poses in all manifestations, ardent responsiveness to human grief - found a vivid and sonorous expression in Sergei Rachmaninov's music.

On the other hand, for him, as a person, his whole life obviously had a musical meaning. He was afraid even to think that this music would cease to sound for him.

Those close to him remembered how angry he once was when the doctors ordered him complete rest.

They think, probably, that I will sit in the sun and feed the pigeons!.,” grumbled the composer. No, this life is not for me. Better death...

However, by the end of the six-week vacation, he complained of unusual heaviness. There was a cough, pain in the left side. These symptoms in a seventy-year-old musician, as the inevitable result of half a century of concert suffering, did not particularly alert anyone.

The second half of the season has begun.

The Somovs came to Columbus Ohio for Rachmaninov's concert, although the composer asked them not to do so. “I will play badly,” he wrote.

The appearance of the musician was terrible. To the question about how you feel, instead of the usual “First-class. Number one!" he said thoughtfully: "Something is bad," and added that he was becoming unbearable to play.

Elena Konstantinovna Somova cautiously noted that he needed to stop the concerts and take up composition.

I'm too tired for this ... Where can I find my former strength and fire!

She reminded him of the Symphonic Dances.

Yes, - he picked up a little perked up. - I don't know how it happened...

But in Chicago on February 12, 1943, he was greeted with such a standing ovation that he perked up. Rarely had he been so pleased with his game. He played Beethoven's First Concerto and his Rhapsody.

The next day he felt a sharp pain in his left side. The doctors diagnosed mild pleurisy and advised to go to the sun.

The tour continued. He played, panting and overcoming the pain.

He refused to cancel the Knoxville concert. The program included Bach, Schumann, Liszt, Chopin and Rachmaninoff. He played Chopin's B-minor sonata with amazing elation.

But that was all he could do.

After canceling a number of concerts, he went to New Orleans. Under the hot winter sun, a multi-tribal southern city boiled at the mouth of a great river. At the moorings outside the windows of the hotel, the antediluvian steamboats of the time of Mark Twain screamed and rang their bells.

Well, - said the composer. - We'll rest for a day or two in the sun, and then to Texas.

However, in the morning it was decided to leave for California for winter quarters.

He can't play. He needs a doctor. Only in this he is, in his words, "a narrow-minded nationalist." Recognizes only Russian doctors.

There is one such in California - a Muscovite. I will talk to him about my side, then we will remember the distant years. It will be good for the body and for the soul.

Three days had to wait for the opportunity to leave and three more by a slow train to get to the goal. The lines were packed with troops.

At the train station in Los Angeles I met Fedor Fedorovich Chaliapin with an ambulance. The patient asked to go home, but he was taken to the Good Samaritan Hospital.

X-ray showed only two small foci of inflammation in the lungs. The blood in the sputum that appeared on the road disappeared.

Reclining on his bunk, the composer wrote to Yevgeny Somov in his usual, half-joking tone, telling about the events of recent days. "Much ado about nothing!" - that was the final conclusion.

But this was followed by the nurse's ominous, laconic postscript in English: "Mr. R. didn't finish the letters."

He stayed in the hospital for three days.

Most of all, he was burdened by the fact that he could not play, exercise. Fyodor Chaliapin, Jr., who visited him for a long time, tried to instill in him faith in recovery.

Not at my age, Fedya, objected Rachmaninov. “At my age, you can’t stop exercising.

Suddenly, as if forgetting about the presence of a guest, he looked at his hands lying on top of the blanket.

My poor hands ... - he said very quietly and, after a pause, added in one breath: - Farewell!

The pain in his side severely tormented him at times. But he didn't complain. Only his growing pallor betrayed him.

Irina and her daughter left New York.

After some hesitation, Dr. Golitsyn agreed to let him go home. He still hoped that with the advent of warm days there would be a turning point for the better.

Olga Georgievna Mordovskaya, an experienced nurse sent by Golitsyn, was waiting on the porch of the house in a white coat and a cap with a red cross.

Sergei Vasilyevich, looking around the room, brightened all over: "It's good to be at home!"

During the first week he was keenly interested in everything. He eagerly read newspapers, asked about flowers, leafed through gardeners' price lists. He asked about the birch trees in the adjacent area. They hid from him that even in the middle of winter the birch trees had been cut down. He asked me to tune the radio to Moscow and not change the settings. He wanted to listen only to Russian music.

Despite the increasing pain in his arm, he continued to exercise his hand and fingers on the silent keyboard.

And when he closed his eyes, the same, perhaps invented, piece of native land with a railway bridge and a blue river returned to him with unfailing persistence. A shady path (he knew it well) past weeping birches leads into a thicket of pines. Along the edge of the grass, chicory stars are turning blue, pale yellow flowers, like mallows, are slender, like candles. He couldn't remember their name...

SERGEI VASILYEVICH RAHMANINOV

Rachmaninov, a remarkable composer, pianist and conductor, wrote a bright page in the history of world musical culture. Five piano concertos, three symphonies, operas and cantatas, compositions for pianoforte and romances capture the unique features of his work: the severity of life conflicts, pathos, penetrating lyricism.

Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninov was born on March 20, 1873 in the Novgorod province. From the age of four, he learned to play the piano. Serious studies

Music began at the Moscow Conservatory, where his teachers in composition were S. I. Taneev and A. S. Arensky in piano - A. Siloti. In 1891 Rachmaninoff graduated from the conservatory as a pianist, and the following year as a composer.

The bright artistic individuality of Rachmaninoff was revealed even in the Conservatory years - in the First Piano Concerto and the opera "Aleko". The symphonic fantasy "Cliff", the First Symphony, etc. written soon after, testified to the diversity of his creative interests.

The true heyday came at the beginning of the 20th century with the creation of such wonderful works as the Second

And the Third Piano Concertos, the Second Symphony, piano preludes and etudes-pictures, the operas The Miserly Knight and Francesca da Rimini.

In 1917, Rachmaninoff went on a concert tour abroad and stayed in America. Far from his homeland, he experienced a painful creative crisis. After a ten-year pause, the Fourth Concerto, the Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini for Piano and Orchestra, the Third Symphony and the Symphonic Dances appeared. One of the main topics in these works was the theme of a distant homeland.

During the Great Patriotic War, the composer followed the heroic struggle of the Soviet people with deep interest and sympathy.

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