Russian
Beethoven, Russian
Chopin - that's what composer
Alexander Nikolayevich Scriabin was called. And his fate was very difficult ...
It all began with the fact that the mother of little Sasha, "Shurinka", as he was called at home, died when the son was a little over a year old. His father, Nikolai Alexandrovich worked in the embassy in Constantinople, and Sasha was left with an aunt, Lubovia Alegsandrovna, and two grandmothers - a native and a great-aunt. The latter was also the boy's godmother. Sometimes Alexander visited and uncles - all military. And although Sasha very rarely saw his father, they managed to maintain a warm relationship.
Alexander Scriabin was what is called a musical prodigy: at the age of five he knew how to play the piano, and at eight he began trying to compose music. Already in his lifetime he was recognized as a genius, but he had a reputation for being obsessed with mystical ideas, and besides, he was scandalous. He was a philosopher, a romantic and a fantasist. By the way, do you have a wireless speaker or music center at home? They often have built-in colored lights - "light-music". This word was invented by our hero, Alexander Nikolayevich Scriabin.
At the age of 20, Alexander Nikolayevich graduated from the Conservatory with a gold medal in piano. This was not prevented even by the fact that at the age of seventeen A. Scriabin overplayed his right hand.
Until his death, he was tormented by spasms and pains in his right hand and doubts - did he play as well as he should? So among his plays were "Etude for the Left Hand", "Prelude for the Left Hand" and "Nocturne for the Left Hand". Alexander Nikolayevich invented such "therapeutic physical training" for himself.
However, A. N. Scriabin's character was far from being a gift. Anyone whose work is connected with music will tell you that in order to become famous, any composer needs to compose something that could conventionally be called a "hit". Something that is both bright and memorable - but at the same time not difficult to perceive, not difficult to learn and perform, "folk", easy to "sing", "playing in your head". Almost all composers had such hits -
S. Rachmaninoff,
C. Prokofiev,
Kamille Saint-Saens and many others.
Photo:afisha.london
And what about "Shurinka" Scriabin? He refused to compose "simple waltzes at twenty-five rubles a piece" fiercely, on principle and angrily. His blazing genius demanded music "at the highest level", "without regard to faces", in addition, fueled the fire by his wife, who hysterically shouted at everyone that her husband receives a negligible amount, and at every opportunity demanded unthinkable royalties. In addition, Alexander Nikolaevich always needed money for rehabilitation. That's why it never came to a hit, and it's not easy to listen to (much less play) this composer.
Scriabin's family life was not easy either: without bothering to divorce his first wife, he began to live with his second. When A. Scriabin and his second wife lived in America, and before the concert it turned out that he was a bigamist, a real harassment began. Three of A. Scriabin's children never became adults: Rimma died at the age of seven, Lev did not live to the age of eight months, and Julian (from his second marriage), drowned at the age of eleven. Another of his daughters, Ariadna, when she was already an adult, was shot by the Nazis.
Some researchers of A. Scriabin's work speak of a "mystical curse" that haunted the composer all his life. And how not to think about it, if in 1938 engineer Evgeny Murzin created a synthesizer, which he named after his favorite composer ANS. And although leading Soviet composers worked with this synthesizer, E. Murzin was never able to launch his invention in series. The ANS synthesizer remained in existence in a single experimental copy - today it is kept in the Museum of Music in Moscow, but... are there any specialists who could make the unique instrument sound?