Talk:Tikhon Khrennikov

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In a brief conversation with Neeme Järvi, I mentioned to him Tikhon Khrennikov. He seemed a little upset, but due to the brevity of the conversation, did not ellaborate, only saying that Khrennikov did bad things to Prokofiev and Shostokovich, but also somehow protected younger Russian composers. Del arte 20:45, 5 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I seem to remember not-very-positive things about him in Testimony, though I may be mistaken: it's a few years since I read it, and I don't have a copy to hand. You might want to check it out if you're looking to expand the article. --Camembert

[edit] He did more good than he is credited for

Let's put his actions in prospective and look at the big picture of life under the Stalin's dictatorship.

Khrennikov acted as a moderator, or a cushion between the Stalin's political gang of censors and prosecutors, and the group of highly creative composers and other intellectuals. Could anybody else do what Khrennikov did in his position "between a rock and a hard place" - we do not know, because nobody wanted to be in that position under Stalin. In 1935 and 1936 Stalin personally attacked Shostakovich and Aleksei Dikiy, after seeing Katerina Izmailova. At that time Khrennikov was still a student who saw the attack on Shostakovich and Dikiy in Pravda in January of 1936, so he had to behave with caution under the Stalin's regime. Caution secured his stay in the office in order to protect his other colleagues during the hard times, and he did help many people. It was a thankless job, because envy was almost as bad a factor as was the fear of Stalin, many lives were ruined by false accusations and anonymous reports. A thankless and dangerous job, albeit Khrennikov did it with a much less bloody outcome, compared to what was going on in the Union of Soviet Writers.

Just imagine a young graduate in 1936 or 1937 opposing Stalin..., he would be exterminated, and we could have a much worse scenario in music life without Khrennikov, than we had with him. Let's not forget also that it was Kabalevsky (and older colleague of Khrennikov), who personally censored Shostakovich's opera with his hypocritical words: "It is about infidelity and murder" (isn't that in almost every classic opera?!). At that time Khrennikov acted as a buffer between many conflicting forces, and he managed to deal with all sorts of people and groups of interests.

Things became a bit different after Stalin's death in 1953, but the political struggle between the top communists had never stopped, and it was hurting intellectuals. A stable figure, such as Khrennikov, was better than the alternative. Envy and fear did not disappear from the Soviet reality, so Khrennikov was repeatedly "elected" as a stabilizing figure, as a steady and reliable buffer between many factions. He was the one who contributed to the Composers Union in many ways. He should be credited for many improvements and upgrades to living and working conditions of many hundreds of composers, and for helping their works being published, recorded and performed by major state orchestras (we do not have the same picture today). He also credited his good adviser, actually a circle of wise people around him, who were instrumental in complex relations with the everchanging Soviet leadership. I met Tikhon Nikolaevich in person, he was a warm and thoughtful man. Steveshelokhonov 20:24, 14 August 2007 (UTC)