Balakirev, Mily (EN)

Balakirev Mily Alexeyevich, *2 January 1837 (21 December 1836) Nizhny Novgorod (present-day Gorky), †29 (16) May 1910 Saint Petersburg, Russian composer, pianist, conductor and music activist. In 1844, he began learning to play the piano under his mother’s guidance; in 1846, he took lessons from the renowned Moscow teacher A. Diubyuk, a pupil of Field.

He continued his studies with K. Eisrich in Nizhny Novgorod, where he met A. Ulybyshev in 1851. Thanks to the latter’s extensive library, he gained a thorough knowledge of music literature (including the works of Chopin and Glinka) and performed as a pianist at chamber concerts. In 1852, he conducted several public concerts, and his first compositions also date from this year. In 1853/54, he studied mathematics at the University of Kazan. At the same time, he continued to improve his piano playing through contact with Antoni Kątski, who was performing in Kazan at the time; he attributed the development of his piano technique mainly to Kątski, expressing this many years later in a letter (12 March 1907) to N. Findeizen.

In December 1855 Balakirev arrived in St Petersburg, where he became acquainted with Glinka, Dargomyzhsky, and Serov, and in 1856 he met Stasov and Moniuszko. He then formed connections with the composers who would later be associated with the group known as The Mighty Handful: he met Cui in 1856, Mussorgsky in 1857, Rimsky-Korsakov in 1861, and Borodin in 1862.

Until the end of the 1860s, Balakirev served as the leader of this group, shaping its creative ideology, promoting his friends’ works on the concert stage, and influencing their approach to musical folklore. His method of arranging folk songs, marked by deep sensitivity to tonal structure and performance practice, became a model for the Mighty Handful. This approach is evident both in his original compositions and in his Collection of Russian Folk Songs, recorded during his expedition along the Volga in 1860. Balakirev’s journeys to the Caucasus in 1862, 1863, and 1868 yielded numerous recordings of folk melodies, which represented a genuine discovery of Eastern music for the composers of the group. In 1862, together with G. Lomakin, he founded the Free Music School in St Petersburg, which he directed until 1872, devoting himself primarily to concert conducting. These concerts provided an important platform for young Russian composers while also introducing broader audiences to contemporary Western European music, particularly works by Berlioz, Liszt, and Schumann. The first of these concerts, held on 25 February 1863, marked Balakirev’s conducting debut in St Petersburg; the programme included, among other works, his Russian Overture No. 2. In 1866 and 1867, he travelled to Prague, where he prepared the premiere of Ruslan i Lyudmila (4 February 1867) and conducted a performance of Glinka’s Ivan Susanin. Between 1867 and 1869, Balakirev also conducted concerts for the Russian Musical Society, seeking to reform the institution’s conservative orientation. Dismissed from his post at the Russian Musical Society in April 1869, Balakirev found himself engaging in an unequal struggle with the institution, continuing his work at the Free Music School. However, in April 1872 the School was forced to suspend its concert activities owing to a lack of financial support. Disheartened by this failure and burdened by family difficulties following his father’s death, as well as by fears of losing his creative inspiration, Balakirev fell into depression, withdrawing from musical life and severing his close ties with the composers of the Mighty Handful. In 1872, Balakirev took employment as a railway clerk, and between 1873 and 1875 he gave piano lessons at the Mariinsky Institute in St Petersburg. From 1876 onward, he gradually returned to musical activity, assisting Rimsky-Korsakov in running the Free Music School and collaborating with him in 1877–78 on the publication of the scores of Glinka’s operas. From 1881 to 1908, he once again directed the school, and in 1882 he also resumed his activity as a conductor. After parting ways with the composers of the Mighty Handful (and eventually with Rimsky-Korsakov in 1891) and with the so-called Belyayev Circle, from 1886 onward Balakirev limited his contacts to a circle of pupils drawn mainly from the Court Kapella, which he directed between 1883 and 1894. Balakirev’s most faithful pupil and close friend was S. Lyapunov, who collaborated with him on the publication of Glinka’s works (from 1902) and Chopin’s sonatas (1908). In the final period of his life, Balakirev worked intensively, focusing chiefly on completing and revising compositions from his youth (Symphony No. 1 and the symphonic poem In Bohemia), as well as on realising earlier sketches and long-standing compositional projects (Symphony No. 2).

Balakirev’s early works were clearly influenced by Glinka and paid homage to this composer (Réminiscences de l’opéra „La vie pour le czar”). They were arrangements of Glinka’s themes (Spanish Overture, Spanish Serenade), piano transcriptions of his works (the popular Zhavoronok) or referred to his vocal style (Oboymi) and symphonic style from the Kamarinskaya fantasy (Overture on the Themes of Three Russian Songs).

By 1860, Balakirev’s individual style had become increasingly evident, appearing first in his solo songs. These works reveal a tendency toward expanded and internally differentiated forms (often recomposed), the use of strong expressive contrasts (Isstuplenije, Vvedi menya), and a drive to assimilate folk motifs, particularly those of Oriental origin. Initially, these were reminiscences of, for example, the Arab melodies from Glinka’s Ruslan and Lyudmila in Pridi ko mne, followed by attempts to evoke Eastern colour according to Romantic models (the ballad-like Pesnya Selima, the pathetically expressive Yevreyskaya melodiya). Later, in the Georgian Song (c. 1864), Balakirev developed an original method for transforming the melodic, rhythmic, and textural characteristics (especially in the piano part) of music from the Caucasus region, without relying on authentic folk material. He applied this method in his symphonic poem Tamara, dedicated to Liszt, subjecting his own folk-dance-like thematic material in the central Allegro section to elaborate variation, contrapuntal, and orchestration techniques, thereby achieving the effect of Eastern ornamentation and rich tonal colour. A continuation of this approach in piano music is the fantasy Islamey, Balakirev’s most frequently performed work (also arranged by A. Casella). In it, the composer used authentic themes: a Kabardian-Adyghe folk dance of the same name (Islamey) and a Tatar melody, which – like in Tamara – he treated variationally within the overall framework of sonata form. A particularly novel feature for the piano music of the time was the piece’s distinctive sound style, linked to an original toccata-like texture inspired by Eastern techniques for plucked and percussive instruments.

A second trend in Balakirev’s work during this period was his orchestral compositions based on Russian national themes, and occasionally on themes from other European countries. These works range from programmatic overtures, such as the Spanish Overture and the overture to Shakespeare’s King Lear, to symphonic poems like Russia and In Bohemia and reflect the influence of Romantic programmatic symphonies by composers such as Berlioz and Liszt, whose approach Balakirev was the first to introduce to Russia.

Balakirev’s late work – composed after a ten-year break in his compositional activity between 1882 and 1892 – no longer had the same impact as his works from the 1860s. The former creative vigour, freshness of invention, and innovative treatment of musical folklore gave way to a more reflective aesthetic, marked by mature deliberation in compositional technique, especially in large-scale forms (the two symphonies, the Piano Sonata in B minor), as well as by concentrated lyricism and meticulous attention to detail in solo songs (Shepot, robkoye dïkhan’ye) and piano miniatures. Whereas his earlier style had been more eclectic, it now evolved into a synthesis of Russian and Oriental elements, and to some extent Polish influences (Polonaise and Mazurka rhythms). This synthesis manifested both across genres (for example, the combination of Eastern and Russian themes in the Mazurka in F minor and E-flat minor Nos. 6 and 7) and within single works, as in Symphony No. 1 and No. 2. Despite the high artistic quality of these late compositions, his youthful works continued to resonate more widely. Performances in Paris (1889 – Overture on Themes from Three Russian Songs, 1894 – Tamara) drew the attention of French composers, including Debussy (Monsieur Croche), and, alongside the fantasy Islamey, influenced their sense of tonal colour.

Balakirev rendered invaluable service to Polish culture as the initiator of a properly understood cult of Chopin. In 1891, he visited Żelazowa Wola, and, upon discovering the dilapidated state the composer’s family home alerted the Warsaw press and advocated for its restoration and the erection of a monument to Chopin on the site. He returned in 1894, speaking at the monument’s unveiling, participating in a commemorative concert, and performing at the salons of the Grand Theatre in Warsaw on 5 October, donating the proceeds to the Chopin Scholarship Fund. In addition, Balakirev did much to promote Chopin’s music in Russia, not only as a pianist and co-founder, alongside A. and N. Rubinstein, of the Russian performance tradition, but also as a publisher of Chopin’s sonatas and the author of numerous arrangements of his works for orchestra, piano, and choir. His final initiative in this regard was to organise a centenary concert in St Petersburg on 22 February 1910, featuring J. Hofmann and S. Lyapunov, although Balakirev himself was unable to take part.

Literature: 

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