Классическая музыка и высокая культура

Аарон Копленд

Composer of Appalachian Spring; son of Jewish emigrants from Lithuania under the Russian Empire

Александр Глазунов

St. Petersburg's last Romantic, exiled in Paris

Александр Годунов

Bolshoi principal dancer born on Sakhalin; remained in the United States in 1979, danced with American Ballet Theatre and acted in Witness and Die Hard

Даниил Трифонов

Pianist born in Nizhny Novgorod, winner of the 2011 Tchaikovsky and Rubinstein competitions

Дмитрий Тёмкин

Film composer born in Kremenchug; four Academy Awards; produced and arranged the Soviet film Tchaikovsky (1969)

Ефрем Зимбалист

Rostov violin virtuoso who became director of the Curtis Institute and shaped American classical music

Евгений Кисин

Moscow-born pianist who gave his Carnegie Hall recital debut in 1990, aged 18

Джордж Баланчин

Choreographer, trained at the Imperial Ballet School; co-founder of New York City Ballet

Джордж Гершвин

Brooklyn-born son of Odessa, soundtrack of America

Гидон Кремер

Riga-born violin virtuoso who defected from the USSR and became a champion of new music

Григорий Пятигорский

Cellist born in Yekaterinoslav (now Dnipro); principal cellist of the Bolshoi at fifteen, later of the Berlin Philharmonic, then a soloist and teacher in the United States

Григорий Соколов

Leningrad-born pianist who won the Tchaikovsky Competition gold medal in 1966 at 16; releases only live recordings

Игорь Левит

Nizhny Novgorod-born pianist who became Germany's most politically outspoken classical star

Игорь Стравинский

Born near St. Petersburg, composed The Rite of Spring and changed music forever

Ирвинг Берлин

The immigrant who wrote America's anthem

Яша Хейфец

Violinist from Vilna, pupil of Leopold Auer in St Petersburg

Кирилл Петренко

Omsk-born conductor who became Chief Conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic — the world's greatest orchestra

Лев Бакст

Painter and stage designer born in Grodno; designer for the Ballets Russes

Леонард Бернстайн

America's maestro, born of the Pale's diaspora

Леопольд Ауэр

Hungarian-born violin teacher who trained Heifetz, Milstein and Zimbalist — the greatest pedagogue in history

Лера Ауэрбах

Chelyabinsk-born composer and pianist who became one of the most performed living composers in the world

Марта Аргерих

Buenos Aires-born pianist; granddaughter of Jewish immigrants from the Russian Empire to the Hirsch colonies of Entre Ríos

Максим Венгеров

Novosibirsk violin prodigy who became one of the greatest violinists of his generation

Майя Плисецкая

Ballerina of the Bolshoi from 1943 to 1990, born in Moscow; Carmen in the Carmen Suite created for her in 1967

Михаил Фокин

Choreographer born in St Petersburg; created The Dying Swan for Anna Pavlova and The Firebird and Petrushka for the Ballets Russes

Миша Майский

Riga-born cellist who studied with Rostropovich and became one of the most celebrated soloists alive

Мстислав Ростропович

Cellist and conductor born in Baku; Moscow Conservatory pupil of Prokofiev and Shostakovich

Натан Мильштейн

Violinist born in Odessa; pupil of Stolyarsky and Auer, he left the USSR in 1925 with Vladimir Horowitz

Николай Гедда

Son of a Russian Don Cossack — became the most versatile operatic tenor of the 20th century

Николай Медтнер

Moscow-born composer and pianist of German parentage — Rachmaninoff called him the greatest composer of our time

Рудольф Нуриев

The Soviet defector who conquered the world's stages

Семён Бычков

Born in Leningrad — chief conductor of the Czech Philharmonic and one of the world's great maestros

Сергей Кусевицкий

Conductor and double-bass virtuoso born in Vyshny Volochyok; music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, 1924-1949

Серж Лифарь

Born in Kyiv — the most important ballet director in 20th-century France, built the Paris Opera Ballet

Сергей Прокофьев

Composer born in the Russian Empire; lived abroad 1918-1936, then in the USSR

Сергей Рахманинов

Born near Novgorod — the composer whose Second Piano Concerto is the most romantic music ever written

Татьяна Лескова

Born in Paris to Russian émigré parents — became the mother of Brazilian classical ballet

Теодор Курентзис

Athens-born conductor trained in St. Petersburg who became one of classical music's most controversial and brilliant maestros

Туган Сохиев

Born in Vladikavkaz — chief conductor of the Bolshoi Theatre and the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse

Владимир Ашкенази

Born in Gorky — the most recorded classical pianist in history, who defected and became an Icelandic citizen

Владимир Горовиц

Born in Berdychiv, Ukraine — the greatest pianist of the 20th century, who fled Russia with Nathan Milstein in 1925

Владимир Юровский

Moscow-born conductor who leads the Bavarian State Opera and London Philharmonic — the heir to the German conducting tradition

Владимир Спиваков

Born in Ufa to a family of musicians — founded the Moscow Virtuosi and became Russia's most beloved conductor

Иегуди Менухин

Born in New York to parents from Gomel and Yalta, Russian Empire; violinist and conductor

Звика Пик

Георг Александр Альбрехт

Germany's youngest Generalmusikdirektor, three decades in Hannover

Марк Альбрехт

Chief conductor of the Dutch National Opera, fifth generation of the Knoop line

Мариус Петипа

The Frenchman who created Russian classical ballet

Бартоломео Растрелли

Paris-born architect who gave Saint Petersburg its face

Джон Филд

The Irishman who invented the nocturne, in Russia

Этьен Морис Фальконе

Sculpted the Bronze Horseman, Russia's defining monument

Надежда Филаретовна фон Мекк

Tchaikovsky's patron for thirteen years, by correspondence only

Чарльз Камерон

Scottish architect of the imperial summer palaces

Огюст Монферран

Forty years building one cathedral in Saint Petersburg

Яков (Хакобо) Фишер

Composer and violinist born in Odessa in 1896, a founder of Argentina's Grupo Renovación and author of nearly 140 works

Яков Костаковский

Violinist and composer born in Odessa in 1893 who settled in Mexico in 1925; father of the painter Olga Costa

Миша Эльман

Violinist born in Talnoye in 1891, pupil of Leopold Auer, famous for 'the Elman tone'; settled in the United States