VEINBERG (Weinberg), MOISSEY SAMUILOVICH

VEINBERG (Weinberg ), MOISSEY SAMUILOVICH (1919–1996) composer. Veinberg was born in Warsaw, where he studied piano at the conservatory and graduated in 1939. Soon after, he was forced to flee the oncoming German invasion to Minsk, where he studied composition at the Belorussian conservatory. In 1941, with the outbreak of the German Soviet war, he was evacuated to Tashkent. There he met the pianist Emil *Gilels, who became interested in him and performed his second piano sonata (1942) and his piano quintet with the Quartet of the Moscow Bolshoi Theater (1945). In 1943 Veinberg settled in Moscow. His marriage to the daughter of the actor *Mikhoels, a victim of Stalin's anti-Jewish purge, led to his temporary arrest; he was released through the intervention of Shostakovich. His compositions range over many media and are marked by deep emotion and dramatic expression. They include operas: Passazhirka ("The Passenger," 1967–68), Madonna and the Soldier (1970), Lyubov' D'Artanyana ("D'Artagnan in Love," 1972), Congratulations (after S. Aleichem, 1975), Lady Magnesia (after G.B. Shaw, Passion, Poison and Petrification, or the Fatal Gazogene), The Portrait (1980), and The Idiot (1986); a ballet, The Little Golden Key (1962); 25 symphonies written between 1942 and 1992; and many other orchestral works, including instrumental concertos; 18 piano sonatas; over 100 romances; and incidental music.

add. bibliography:

ng²; A. Nikolayev: "O tvorchestve M. Vaynberga," in: Sovetskaya muzyka, 1 (1960), 40–47; L. Nikitina: Simfonii M. Vaynberga (1972); M. Weinberg: "Chestnost', pravdivost', polnaya otdacha," in: Sovetskaya muzyka, 9 (1988), 32–36.

[Michael Goldstein /

Marina Rizarev (2^nd ed.)]