Igor Zhukov August 31, 1936 – † January 26, 2018 (aged 81) Igor Mikhaylovich Zhukov was a Russian pianist, conductor and sound engineer. Russian: Игорь Михайлович Жуков. Zhukov was born in Nizhny Novgorod in 1936 but his family moved to Moscow in the following year. Four years later, they were evacuated to Vyatka (then known as Kirov) as a result of the Second World War. After the war, they returned to Moscow, where Zhukov studied in the Conservatory in 1955, studying first with Emil Gilels and then, in 1955, with Heinrich Neuhaus. He graduated in 1960, having won second prize in the Long-Thibaud Piano Competition in Paris. Apart from a career as a pianist, Zhukov also conducted his own ensemble, the Moscow Chamber Orchestra until his retirement from conducting in 1994, and was the pianist of the long-running Zhukov Piano Trio which was founded in 1963 and continued performing until 1980. The other members were the violinist Grigory Feighin and cellist Valentin Feighin. The trio was noted for its "Historic Concerts" which featured repertoire spanning the 17th to the 20th centuries. Zhukov made recordings on the Melodiya/CBS label, among others (e.g. the complete Scriabin sonatas). Zhukov also had a passionate interest in recording, and said of himself "I'm the best pianist among recording engineers, and the best recording engineer among pianists." Igor Zhukov is a brilliant pianist, a student of the legendary Emil Gilels and Heinrich Neuhaus, laureate of the Marguerite Long and Jacques Thibaud International Competition (Paris, 1957). As a conductor, since 1983 he has headed the Moscow Chamber Orchestra, since 2003 he has actively collaborated with the Nizhny Novgorod Soloists Chamber Orchestra. “Scriabin is one of the comets of our history, but he is not part of any constellation. He is the One and Only, Unique!!!” (I. Zhukov). Biography - short Russian musician Igor Zhukov (1936-2018) was a brilliant pianist, a pupil of the legendary Emil Gilels and Heinrich Neuhaus, winner of the Marguerite Long-Jacques Thibault competition in Paris at 1957. As a conductor, since 1983 he headed the Moscow chamber orchestra, since 2003 he actively collaborated with the “Nizhny Novgorod Soloists” Chamber Orchestra. In Memoriam: Igor Zhukov (1936-2018) by Georg Predota February 2nd, 2018 Truth be told, as a young aspiring pianist I could never get my head around the music of Alexander Scriabin! Despite the best intentions of my teacher, and supreme technical challenges aside, I simply did not understand his musical syntax. His use of extended and enhanced harmonies was not the problem, but his sense of musical line, texture and desired tone color left me utterly befuddled. I am still not proud of it, but I basically gave up on Scriabin. And then I heard a recording by the Russian pianist Igor Zhukov, and everything changed. Like an emotional dream, the kaleidoscope of lines and colors melded into a single fantastic lyricism. Supple rhythms and an almost lazy approach to pedaling congealed the music into an incandescent universe constantly teetering on the verge of collapse. I was absolutely speechless; I had never heard an interpretation like this before, and I certainly did not know Igor Zhukov. Apparently, Zhukov had very little interest in traveling abroad, and not afflicted by the utterly annoying disease of constant self-promotion, he was relatively unknown in the West. Born in Nizhny Novgorod in 1936, his family moved to Moscow, but was evacuated to Kirov during World War II. Once they were allowed to move back to Moscow, Zhukov started his musical training at the Moscow Conservatory preparatory school, and entered the Conservatory proper in 1955. Initially he took lessons from Emil Gilels, and subsequently from Heinrich Neuhaus, and his first significant concert appearance already featured the music of Scriabin. By the time of his graduation in 1960 he already had won second prize in the Long-Thibaud Piano Competition in Paris. However, Zhukov was not only a concert pianist, he also founded the long-running Zhukov Piano Trio in 1963. He was the conductor with the Moscow Chamber Orchestra, worked as vocal accompanist, and produced various editions and arrangements. He gave up conducting in 1994 and concentrated on the mechanics of recording. “I am the best pianist among recording engineers,” he quipped, “and the best recording engineer among pianists.” He left an extended legacy of recordings ranging from Bach to Prokofiev, but his Scriabin — in my humble opinion — is almost without equal. Russia - Solistynn.ru Igor Mikhailovich Zhukov (born August 31, 1936, Gorky) is a Soviet and Russian pianist and conductor. Honored Artist of Russia. As a pianist, he studied at the music school at the Moscow Conservatory with Leonid Roizman, then at the Moscow Conservatory with Emil Gilels and Heinrich Neuhaus. In 1957 he received the second prize among pianists at the Long and Thibaut International Competition in Paris. For 40 years he was a sought-after soloist of the world's best orchestras, gave concerts in many cities of Russia, almost all European countries, in the USA, Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Japan. In 1972, he was the first in the USSR to record all of A. Scriabin's piano sonatas. This edition attracted significant international attention (digital recording was made in 2000 by the German firm TELOS). For a long time he performed as part of an outstanding trio with brothers Grigory and Valentin Feigin. The beginning of his conducting career is associated with the Ulyanovsk Chamber Orchestra (1978-1983). In 1983, Zhukov founded the New Moscow Chamber Orchestra (after the former Moscow Chamber Orchestra, founded by Rudolf Barshai, was reassigned and renamed the State Academic Chamber Orchestra). Zhukov directed it until 1994, performing the widest range of music from different eras, from C. F. E. Bach to Stravinsky. In the last decade of the 20th century it was recorded by Telos, A&E, MCA, RCD, Olympia, Live Classic, BMG and Denon. From 2004 to 2013, Igor Zhukov worked as the principal conductor in the Nizhny Novgorod Soloists Nizhny Novgorod Municipal Chamber Orchestra. Leslie Gerber Igor Zhukov's best known recordings in the West are of virtuosic Russian piano Concertos. On this disc, he demonstrates a considerably wider range of abilities. His Waldszenen may not be as poetic as Sviatoslav Richter's, but it's quite beautiful. And he has the modesty to play the little Prokofiev pieces without trying to inflate them. The early Tchaikovsky pieces are also lovely, and Zhukov's own Bach arrangement treats the original with great respect. This is an intriguing introduction to a lesser-known Russian pianist (CD Russian Piano School, Vol 16 ; editor), who is also known, in Russia, as a conductor and recording engineer. NEWS - January 2018 The Scrabin interpreter and musical intellectual Igor Zhukov died yesterday, January, 26, in Moscow. A student of Gilels and Neuhaus, he conducted the Moscow Chamber Orchestra until 1994 and the Soloists of Nizhny Novgorod. He recorded the complete Scriabin sonatas for Melodiya, along with much else. More than most artists, he had a passionate interest in the mechanics of recording. ‘I am the best pianist among recording engineers, and the best recording engineer among pianists,’ he would say. He had little interest in foreign travel and none at all in personal image. Grigoriev L., Platek Ya. 1990 Every season, the piano evenings of this pianist attract the attention of music lovers with the content of the programs and unconventional artistic solutions. Zhukov works with enviable intensity and purposefulness. Thus, lately he has gained a reputation as a "specialist" in Scriabin, having performed many of the composer's works in concerts and recording all of his sonatas. Such a sonata album by Zhukov was released in collaboration with Melodiya by the American firm Angel. It can also be noted that Zhukov is one of the few pianists who included all three Tchaikovsky's piano concertos in his repertoire. In search of reserves of pianistic literature, he turns to half-forgotten examples of Russian classics (Rimsky-Korsakov's Piano Concerto), and to Soviet music (in addition to S. Prokofiev, N. Myaskovsky, Y. Ivanov, Y. Koch and others), and to modern foreign authors (F. Poulenc, S. Barber). He also succeeds in the plays of the masters of the distant past. In one of the reviews of the magazine "Musical Life" it was noted that he discovers in this music a living human feeling, the beauty of form. "A warm response from the audience was evoked by the graceful "Pipe" by Dandrier and the graceful "Paspier" by Detouches, the dreamy- sad "Cuckoo" by Daken and the impetuous "Giga". All this, of course, does not exclude ordinary concert pieces - the pianist's repertoire is extremely wide and includes immortal masterpieces of world music from Bach to Shostakovich. And this is where the pianist's intellectual talent comes into play, as many reviewers point out. One of them writes: "The strengths of Zhukov's creative personality are masculinity and chaste lyrics, figurative brightness and conviction in what he is doing at every given moment. This is an active style pianist - thoughtful and principled." G. Tsypin agrees with this: "In everything that he does at the keyboard of the instrument, one feels solid thoughtfulness, thoroughness, balance, everything bears the imprint of a serious and demanding artistic thought." The creative initiative of the pianist was also reflected in Zhukov's ensemble music-making together with the brothers G. and V. Feigin. This instrumental trio brought to the attention of the listeners the cycle of "Historical Concertos", which included music from the 17th-20th centuries. In all the undertakings of the pianist, in one way or another, some principles of the Neuhaus school are reflected - at the Moscow Conservatory, Zhukov studied first with E. G. Gilels, and then with G. G. Neuhaus himself. Since then, after the success at the International Competition named after M. Long - J. Thibaut in 1957, where he won the second prize, the artist began his regular concert activity. Now the center of gravity of his artistic career has shifted to another area: music lovers are more likely to meet Zhukov the conductor than the pianist. Since 1983 he has led the Moscow Chamber Orchestra. At present, he directs the Nizhny Novgorod Municipal Chamber Orchestra. [translated by Google translate] Anatoly Lysenkov - Orpheus Radio Unique pianist He always went his own way in art and was devoted only to the music he performed - both on the piano and at the head of the orchestra. Igor Mikhailovich Zhukov received excellent musical training from such luminaries of Soviet piano music as Roizman at the Merzlyakov School, Gilels and Neuhaus at the Moscow Conservatory, but he can hardly be called a typical representative of the creative schools of these masters. He was constantly looking for his own, unlike any other approach to the works he performed, achieving in his interpretations complete independence and independence from any patterns and established ideas. It is no coincidence that he even found the courage to leave the class of Emil Gilels, one of the greatest performers of the 20th century, so as not to become his creative “copy”, and went to his former mentor, the greatest teacher and expert in piano art, Heinrich Neuhaus. Any other musician would consider such an act to be completely reckless, especially since it was under the leadership of Gilels that Zhukov managed to achieve the main success in his career - to take second place in the prestigious Long and Thibault competition in Paris. And yet, for the young pianist, this step was the only sure way to preserve his creative identity and find his own, original and unique path in music. The basis of his performing style is the ability, as it were, to “appropriate” the composer’s idea, to make it his own and present it exactly as it is heard only by him; and at the same time completely immerse yourself in the musical world of the author, "dissolve" in it and thus understand, feel and convey all his inner emotions and moods. Such in andZhukov acquired the knowledge of music thanks primarily to Neuhaus, who managed to reveal to him the highest goals and objectives of true art, which he brilliantly embodied in his practice, especially in relation to those works and their creators that were closest to him. This is, first of all, Scriabin and his 9 sonatas, which he was the first to record all on records, and also partially - Chopin, Schumann and Brahms. Moreover, Zhukov, as a rule, refers not so much to their most popular creations, which are already well known to the general public, but to relatively rarely performed or completely little-known. So, in Chopin, he prefers not the textbook nocturnes, polonaises and the Second Sonata (with a funeral march), but the preludes and sonata No. 3; with Schumann, not Carnival and Fantastic Pieces, but Forest Scenes; The desire to reveal the essence of the music performed and to penetrate deeper into the creative world of this or that composer was also reflected in the performing interests of the pianist. In addition to the piano, he devotes a significant part of his career to chamber and orchestral music: for many years he plays in a trio with the Feigin brothers - a violinist and cellist, and for the entire second half of his life, since 1978, he has been directing various chamber orchestras - Ulyanovsk, New Moscow and Soloists of the Lower Novgorod" - their small homeland. At the same time, Zhukov did not study conducting, unlike most of his colleagues, former instrumentalists who became conductors. It's just that the whole logic of his creative development led to such a decision. He often performed with all kinds of orchestras - both domestic and foreign, under the baton of many famous maestro, having replayed many different piano concertos with them, and at the peak of his solo career somehow quite naturally stood at the conductor's podium, achieving great success in this area of ​​performance. His orchestral interpretations are no less interesting and significant than his piano works. Most of his performances are recorded on records. He released about 40 albums with hundreds of musical works by various authors - from Bach and French harpsichordists to Medtner and Prokofiev. He himself sometimes made transcriptions of music for the orchestra and other instruments. His most famous piano transcription of Bach's "Passacaglia and Fugue" in C minor, which he played wonderfully at concerts and recorded on disc. But the artist’s video works are extremely few, and even those few are far from the best quality, although he lived almost to our time. The reason for this is that Zhukov was an extremely modest musician, he never pursued fame, he was little worried about any external successes and material achievements. He almost did not appear on television and the leading stages of the capital, being content mainly with small halls and provincial concert venues. The pianist died after a serious and prolonged illness, having barely crossed the 80-year life line, and remained in the history of Russian art as one of the most amazing and unusual musicians, whose work amazes connoisseurs and music lovers with a unique original talent. [translated by Google translate] Welcome letter - Grigory Feigin Igor Zhukov's 80th borthday @ Soloists of Nizhny Novgorod. « Dear friends! Few people know that after graduating from school, Igor doubted where he should go next: either to the physics and mathematics department, or to the conservatory. In the end, he chose the latter. And this ability of his for versatility created Zhukov: intelligent, analytically thinking and loving music comprehensively. I know Igor “from and to”, but even now I discover all new advantages by listening to his recordings and our joint ones. We're the same age, I'm about 80 too. Igor, I cried twice in my life: when my brother died and recently after listening to our Tchaikovsky trio. You are always dear to me, the time spent together was not in vain! Your spirit and the power of creativity are more and more appreciated!!! Accept my sincere congratulations on the anniversary! Always be a strong spirit and be proud of your name! Your G. Feigin »