Yevstigney Fomin
Encyclopedia
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
– died St. Petersburg
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
c ) was a Russian opera composer of the 18th century.
Biography
Fomin was born in St. Petersburg into the family of a cannonCannon
A cannon is any piece of artillery that uses gunpowder or other usually explosive-based propellents to launch a projectile. Cannon vary in caliber, range, mobility, rate of fire, angle of fire, and firepower; different forms of cannon combine and balance these attributes in varying degrees,...
eer, an artillery soldier of the Tobolsk infantry regiment. His father died when he was 6, and he passed into the care of his stepfather, I. Fedotov, a soldier. Fedotov took him to the Academy of Fine Arts
Imperial Academy of Arts
The Russian Academy of Arts, informally known as the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts, was founded in 1757 by Ivan Shuvalov under the name Academy of the Three Noblest Arts. Catherine the Great renamed it the Imperial Academy of Arts and commissioned a new building, completed 25 years later in 1789...
in St. Petersburg on 21 April 1767, where Fomin studied architecture. As a full student there, he began learning the harpsichord
Harpsichord
A harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...
in 1776 with Matteo Bumi. From 1777 he studied theory and composition with Hermann Raupach
Hermann Raupach
Hermann Friedrich Raupach was a German composer.-Biography:Hermann Raupach was born at Stralsund in Germany, the son and pupil of composer and organist Christoph Raupach and the nephew of Lutheran church historian Bernhard Raupach...
, and from 1779 with Blasius Sartori.
In 1782 he went to Bologna to study with Padre Martini and Stanislao Mattei
Stanislao Mattei
Stanislao Mattei was an Italian composer, musicologist, and teacher. A pupil of Giovanni Battista Martini, Mattei's music bares a close resemblance to his style of composition...
; three years later he was accepted into the Accademia filarmonica. Returning to St. Petersburg in 1785, he taught at the theatrical school and composed operas. From 1797 he was répétiteur for the imperial theater under Paul I. He composed about 30 operas including Yamshchiki na podstave [The Coachmen at the Relay Station] (1787); Vecherinki [Soirées] (1788); Orfey i Evridika (1792), Amerikantsy [The Americans] (a comic opera) (1800), and Zolotoye yabloko [The Golden Apple] (performed after the composers death in 1803). The most successful for decades was his opera-melodrama Orfey i Evridika to a text by Yakov Knyazhnin
Yakov Knyazhnin
Yakov Borisovich Knyazhnin was Russia's foremost tragic author during the reign of Catherine the Great. Knyazhnin's contemporaries hailed him as the true successor to his father-in-law Alexander Sumarokov, but posterity, in the words of Vladimir Nabokov, tended to view his tragedies and comedies...
. It was re-staged in Soviet times in 1947 in Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
, and in 1953 and in 1961 in Leningrad
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
.
The famous one-act opera Anyuta
Anyuta
Anyuta is a one-act comic opera to a libretto by Mikhail Popov. First performed in 1772, it was one of the first operas written in the Russian language ....
to a text by Mikhail Popov
Mikhail Vasilyevich Popov
Mikhail Ivanovich Popov was a Russian writer, poet, dramatist and opera librettist of the 18th century.-Biography:Born into a merchant family, he was a pupil of Fyodor Volkov. After 1757 he was an actor at the Court Theatre in St Petersburg. He entered Moscow University in 1765, and began to...
has been occasionally attributed to Fomin (which is not a certainty). In addition, Fomin has been credited with the music of another successful Russian opera Melnik – koldun, obmanshchik i svat (The Miller who was a Wizard, a Cheat and a Match-maker, Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
, 1779), on a subject resembling Rousseau’s Le devin du village
Le Devin du Village
Le devin du village is an interméde, a one-act opera by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who also wrote the libretto.It was first performed before the court at Fontainebleau on 18 October 1752 and at the Paris Opéra on 1 March 1753. King Louis XV loved the work so much that he offered Rousseau the great...
: it is possible that this was his revision of the music compiled by a theatre violin player, Mikhail Sokolovsky.
Operas
- The Novgorod Hero Boyeslayevich (Новгородский богатырь Боеслаевич – Novgorodskiy bogatyr’ Boyeslayevich, opera-ballet. Libretto by the Empress Catherine II, 12 December 1786 St Petersburg)
- The Coachmen at the Relay Station (Ямщики на подставе - Yamshchiki na podstave 13 January 1787 St Petersburg)
- Soirées (Вечеринки или гадай, гадай девица — Vecherinki, ili Gaday, gaday devitsa, 1788 St Petersburg)
- Magician, Fortune-teller and Match-maker (Колдун, ворожея и сваха - Koldun, vorozheya i svakha, 1789 St Petersburg)
- Orpheus and Eurydice (Орфей и Эвридика — Orfey i Evridika, melodrama. Text by Yakov KnyazhninYakov KnyazhninYakov Borisovich Knyazhnin was Russia's foremost tragic author during the reign of Catherine the Great. Knyazhnin's contemporaries hailed him as the true successor to his father-in-law Alexander Sumarokov, but posterity, in the words of Vladimir Nabokov, tended to view his tragedies and comedies...
, 13 January 1792 St Petersburg) - The Miller who was a Wizard, a Cheat and a Match-maker (Мельник - колдун, обманщик и сват — Melnik - koldun, obmanshchik i svat (1779 MoscowMoscowMoscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
, c.1795 St Petersburg) [revision of the music by Sokolovsky (?)] - The Americans (Американцы - Amerikantsy, comic opera, 19 February 1800 St Petersburg)
- Chloris and Milo (Клорида и Милон – Klorida i Milon, 18 November 1800 St Petersburg)
- The Golden Apple (Золотое яблоко — Zolotoye yabloko, 27 April 1803 St Petersburg)
also:
- Yaropolk and Oleg (Ярополк и Олег - Yaropolk i Oleg) - Choruses to a tragedy by Vladislav OzerovVladislav OzerovVladislav Aleksandrovich Ozerov was the most popular Russian dramatist in the first decades of the 19th century....
(1798)
Discography
Opera- Orfey i Evridika (sung in Russian) European Festival Orchestra, conductor William Keitel, 20 July 2004, 1CD, Arte Nova Records
- The Americans (sung in Russian) cond. Vladimir Andropov. USSR Bolshoi TheatreBolshoi TheatreThe Bolshoi Theatre is a historic theatre in Moscow, Russia, designed by architect Joseph Bové, which holds performances of ballet and opera. The Bolshoi Ballet and Bolshoi Opera are amongst the oldest and most renowned ballet and opera companies in the world...
Chamber Orchestra (rec. 1988) C10 28271 009 - The Coachmen (Ямщики на подставе) cond. Vladimir Chernushenko. LeningradSaint PetersburgSaint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
State Conservatory Opera Orchestra (rec. 1982) C10 19625 009 - The Coachmen (Ямщики на подставе) cond. Nikolai AnosovNikolai AnosovNikolai Pavlovich Anosov was a Russian conductor and pedagogue who conducted the Moscow State Symphony Orchestra after Lev Steinberg...
. (rec.1947) tapes in All-Union Radio Archive. ~ first revival since premiere.
Orchestral, chamber and instrumental
- The Golden Age - Moscow Concertino ensemble of soloists (CD)
Quotations
"Yevstigney Fomin, one of the most talented composers of his day and age and the founding father of Russian musical drama, also [like Vasily PashkevichVasily Pashkevich
Vasily Alexeyevich Pashkevich also Paskevich was a Russian composer, singer, violinist and teacher who lived during the time of Catherine the Great.-Biography:...
] died in poverty... His melodrama, based on the well-known legend about Orpheus and Eurydice, is a real masterpiece whose red-hot passions and tragic collisions have since been put to music with equal excellence. Orpheus premiered at Count Nikolai Sheremetev’s theatre in 1792 to the strains of a choir, orchestra and with a large cast of ballet dancers and actors. For more than two decades Orpheus ran thousands of times to invariable applause of local and visiting theatergoers. And still, the money Fomin earned for his labors was dwarfed by the exorbitant royalties picked up by his Italian colleagues invited to work in St. Petersburg. "The Voice of Russia 2003"