Sergei Prokofiev

Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev (1891–1953) was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor whose work stands as one of the supreme achievements of twentieth-century music. Born in Sontsovka, Ukraine, he studied at the St Petersburg Conservatory under Rimsky-Korsakov and Lyadov, graduating with the gold medal and establishing himself early as a brilliant, iconoclastic talent.

His three great ballet scores — Romeo and Juliet (1936), Cinderella (1945) and The Tale of the Stone Flower (1948–50) — were composed for the Bolshoi Ballet and transformed the genre. Romeo and Juliet in particular is widely regarded as the greatest ballet score of the twentieth century: sweeping, dramatically acute, and memorable in almost every bar. Its famous 'Dance of the Knights' (the Montagues and Capulets) is among the most recognisable passages in all orchestral music. Cinderella, while more lyrical and overtly charming, is equally inventive, full of wit and tenderness.

Prokofiev also wrote seven symphonies — the Classical Symphony (No. 1) and the Fifth Symphony are his most celebrated — five piano concertos, two violin concertos, the opera War and Peace, and the children's classic Peter and the Wolf. He returned to the Soviet Union from emigration in 1936, but fell foul of the Zhdanov cultural decrees of 1948, which condemned his music as 'formalist'. He died on 5 March 1953, the same day as Stalin, and his death went largely unnoticed in the Soviet press.