Music of ST-Petersburg
Classical music is interwoven into the streets of ST-Petersburg.
“Music of ST-Petersburg” is a city highlight tour with a special stress on past and present musical life of the Russian cultural capital, musical venues, and monuments to the prominent Russian Composers, most of who used to live and work here. Just to name a few: Michael Glinka, the unchallenged founder of Russian classical music, Modest Mussorgsky, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Anton Rubinstein, the talented composer and pianist who initiated the first Russian conservatoire in 1862; one of the first graduates of this conservatoire was Peter Tchaikovsky.
Many streets of ST-Petersburg are reminiscences of these names: Glinka St., Tchaikovskogo St., Pr. Rimskogo-Korsakova, Rubinsteina St.; the Big Philharmonic Hall is named after Dmitry Shostakovich who lived in the city till 1942, including the first months of a 900-day siege of Leningrad. One of his most breath-taking pieces, the Seventh (Leningrad) Symphony, was written and performed in the besieged Leningrad.
Along the way you will visit the cemetery (Necropolis of Master of Arts) where most of Russian composers are buried along with Feodor Dostoevsky and other prominent Russian writers, actors, ballet dancers and choreographers. ST-Petersburg, being undoubtedly famous for its ballet school (Anna Pavlova, Waslaw Nijinsky, Michael Fokine, Rudolf Nuriyev, Natalya Makarova and Michael Baryshnikov), has also brought up splendid opera singers, soloists and conductors.
We advise to combine the city tour with a back stage tour of Mariinsky Theatre (former and still more known abroad as Kirov Theatre of Opera and Ballet), an unmistakable gem of any visit to ST-Petersburg. Valery Gergiev, the director and the chief Conductor of Mariinsky Theatre, works hard to keep alive the best of the Russian classical music traditions(advance booking is required for the back-stage tours of Mariinsky Theatre).
