Glazunov, Aleksandr

 (1865-1936)

Russian composer, the last important composer of the Russian national school founded by Mikhail Glinka, born in St Petersburg.

Glazunov studied principally with the eminent Russian composer Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov. His work also shows the influence of the Hungarian composer Franz Liszt and the German composer Richard Wagner.

In 1889, together with Rimsky-Korsakov, Glazunov completed the opera Prince Igor, which had been left unfinished by the Russian composer Aleksandr Borodin on his death in 1887. Glazunov taught at the St Petersburg Conservatory between the years 1900 and 1906 and was its director from 1906 to 1917. He left the Soviet Union in 1928 and thereafter lived in Paris except for a visit to the United States.

His compositions include eight symphonies, the symphonic poems Stenka Razin and The Kremlin (1892), the ballets Raymonda (1898) and The Seasons (1901), the violin concerto op. 82 (1904), chamber music, and music for piano and for voice.