Tortured Muses? Soviet Composers, 1932-1953

斯大林时代几乎没有一位作曲家成为苏联政权恐怖统治的牺牲品。如何解释这个例外？该研究项目将研究斯大林主义文化政策和意识形态中反映的着名和几乎被遗忘的作曲家的生活和工作。该提案的关键假设是，斯大林主义机构对音乐生活的监管及其对作曲家个人的影响不如文学或视觉艺术那样连贯一致。一个可能的解释可以在音乐的独特语言中找到：音乐被音符打乱，在一个抽象的层面上起作用，这是消费者非视觉和主观情感上接受的。尽管斯大林的文化官僚机构使用类似的管理手段，通过创建艺术家联盟和组织意识形态运动来实现对艺术家和创作工作的广泛控制，但音乐在苏联文化生活中扮演着特殊的角色，这不仅仅是因为斯大林对音乐的个人兴趣。通过研究作曲家的个人生活和经历，该研究项目将提供对现代作曲家的运作的见解。

Hardly any composer of the Stalin era fell victim to the Soviet regime's terror. How to explain this exception? The research project will examine life and work of famous and nearly forgotten composers as reflected in Stalinist cultural policy and ideology. The key supposition of the proposal is that the regulation of musical life by the Stalinist apparatus and its consequences for the individual composers was less coherently organized than in literature or visual arts. A possible explanation can be found in the unique language of music: Scrambled by notes, music acts on an abstract level which is non-visually and subjective-emotionally adopted by consumers. Due to this specific characteristic, it seems to be more difficult to instrumentalize music than other genres of art. Although Stalin's cultural bureaucracy used similar techniques of regulation by creating Artists Unions and organizing ideological campaigns aiming to achieve extensive control over artists and creative work, music was taking on a specific role within Soviet cultural life, not least because of Stalin's personal interest in music. By examining the composer's individual lives and experiences, the research project will provide insights into the functioning of modern dictatorships.