Musili, Ilya (Alexandrovich)
Musili, Ilya (Alexandrovich)
Musili, Ilya (Alexandrovich), Russian conductor and pedagogue; b. Kostroma, Jan. 6, 1904; d. St. Petersburg, June 6, 1999. He received training at the Petrograd Cons. In 1926 he joined the faculty of the Leningrad (formerly Petrograd) Cons. In 1937 he became an asst. conductor of the Leningrad Phil, under Nicolai Malko. Musin’s Jewish heritage and his refusal to join the Communist Party proved to be major obstacles to his advancement, and he soon was sent to the Minsk Phil, to serve as its music director. After World War II, he was allowed to rejoin the faculty of the Leningrad Cons. However, his career as a conductor was thwarted by the Soviet authorities who allowed him only to make infrequent guest appearances with Russian orchs. After the collapse of the Soviet regime, Musin was invited to make his belated debut in the West as a guest conductor of the Royal Phil, in London in 1996 at the age of 92. In his last years, he continued to teach at the Leningrad Cons, and gave master classes abroad.
—Laura Kuhn/Dennis Mclntire