Mstislav Rostropovich

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On March 27, 2002, the day of his 75th Birthday, the London Times proclaimed Mstislav Rostropovich "the world's greatest living musician." To honor this remarkable man and musician special celebrations have been organized worldwide. As perhaps the world's best known classical performer, Mr. Rostropovich is being celebrated in virtually every European country, Japan, and throughout North and South America. On his birthday, London played host to an unparalleled assemblage of today's most beloved performers, including Martha Argerich, Yuri Bashmet, Mariss Jansons, Evgeny Kissin, Gidon Kremer, Zubin Mehta, Seiji Ozawa, and Maxim Vengerov, in a concert with the London Symphony Orchestra, and he was honored with an official state dinner at Buckingham Palace hosted by HRH Queen Elizabeth II.

Immediately following the London celebrations, Mr. Rostropovich flew to North America for a six-week whirlwind tour which included New York City Carnegie Hall concerts with the Boston Symphony Orchestra--which were conducted by Seiji Ozawa and also celebrated the final year of his Music Directorship of the BSO--and a "Shostakovich Festival" at New York's Lincoln Center with the London Symphony Orchestra. He finished his North American celebration conducting a two-week Benjamin Britten Festival with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. "Slava" celebrations were in fact being produced well before 2002, and promise to continue well into 2003.

Widely considered to be the world's greatest cellist, Mstislav Rostropovich--or "Slava"--has recorded virtually the entire cello repertoire and has inspired many of this century's finest composers to create works especially for him. Both Deutsche Grammophon and EMI have released special commemorative CDs honoring Slava's birthday. As a pianist, Maestro Rostropovich has often accompanied his wife, the acclaimed soprano, Galina Vishnevskaya, in recital, and together they have toured the globe. In his capacity as a conductor, Slava served as Music Director of the National Symphony Orchestra for 17 seasons and enjoys close continuing relationships with such esteemed orchestras as the London Symphony Orchestra, the Vienna Philharmonic, and the Orchestre de Paris. He has conducted the best orchestras on virtually each continent.

Maestro Rostropovich has devoted much of his career to the music of the 20th century. With the London Symphony, he has dedicated entire performance cycles to the music of Britten, Shostakovitch, Prokofiev, and Schnittke. Mr. Rostropovich's interest in contemporary music has resulted in his conducting the world premieres of almost 60 orchestral works, as well as three major operas: Schnittke's Gesualdo and Life with an Idiot, and Shchedrin's Lolita. As President of the Evian Festival in France, Mr. Rostropovich conducted the premieres of four chamber operas, including Ligeia, by Augusta Read Thomas, and Aquarium, an opera-ballet by Sofia Gubaidulina. This list of contemporary compositions dedicated to this master of the cello now numbers more than 170 works by composers as diverse as Prokofiev and Shostakovich, Benjamin Britten and James MacMillan, the French master Henri Dutilleux, and Leonard Bernstein to name just a few.

Maestro Rostropovich holds over 40 honorary degrees and over 30 different nations have bestowed more than 130 major awards and decorations upon him. A small sample of these honors include: Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, Commander of the Legion of Honor of France, membership in the Academy of Arts of the `
French Institute (often called the "Forty Immortals"), and the "Preamium Imperiale" from the Japan Art Association, and he was the recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom (USA). In May 1995, Maestro Rostropovich shared the Polar Prize, the equivalent in the music industry of a Nobel Prize, with Elton John. Prior to leaving the USSR on an exit visa in 1974, he had received the Stalin Prize, had been named a People's Artist of the USSR and was a recipient of the Lenin Prize, then that nation's highest honor.

Slava is internationally recognized as an outspoken defender of human rights. His tireless work insuring human dignity and his celebrated actions include his courageous defense of Alexander Solzhenitsyn, and his trip to Moscow in August 1991--unheralded, visa-less, and at great risk to his life and freedom--to join those in the Russian White House resisting the attempted coup. For this support, he was presented with the State Prize of Russia. He has received numerous awards for his efforts on behalf of human rights, among them the Annual Award of the International League of Human Rights. Rostropovich's current efforts for humanitarian aid are channeled towards helping children's health in Russia; since 1992 the Vishnevskaya-Rostropovich Foundation has sent over $5 million in medicine, food, and equipment--from medical to water purification--to children's hospitals in Russia, supporting village clinics as well as big-city centers.