Renowned cellist made Herkimer County his adopted home
By DAVID M. DELLECESE JR
Observer-Dispatch
April 28, 2007
MOSCOW- The late Mstislav Rostropovich is known worldwide as a master cellist who fought for the rights of Soviet-era dissidents and later triumphantly played Bach suites in 1989 below the crumbling Berlin Wall.
But he's known in the Mohawk Valley as a major force in the restoration of the Stanley Theatre, as an enthusiast for the region's countryside and as a good neighbor in Herkimer County.
Rostropovich died Friday in a Moscow cancer hospital. He was 80.
Rostropovich owned an estate in Jordanville, near Mohawk, for several years but rarely visited. It was sold in November 2005 for $1.15 million. It features 790 acres of woods, pastures and a large pond, along with five buildings.
"I have traveled all my life," he said in a 1982 Utica Newspapers article, "and been exposed to so much. But here in the Mohawk Valley, with its hills and valleys of great beauty, I feel I can experience everyday life afresh. I can see with new eyes."
'Inner beauty' in Valley
In May 1995, Rostropovich received an honorary doctorate of music from Utica College.
"There is an inner beauty that I see in the valley, and it is in the people," he said. "The people that I meet are simple and sincere, and religious. They are not spoiled by the outside world."
Time magazine called Rostropovich one of the 20th century's greatest musicians and without a doubt the world's finest cellist. He held the highest honors the Russian state gives- the Lenin Prize, two Stalin Prizes and the People's Artist of the USSR Award.
In 1982, Rostropovich brought that talent to Utica as he performed a benefit concert for the Stanley Performing Arts Center. His wife, the highly acclaimed soprano Galina Vishnevskaya, along with daughter Elena, a pianist, and son-in-law Pieter Daniel, a violinist, performed with him.
The family donated its services for the Thanksgiving Day event, making it their first performance together in the United States. The concert drew music lovers from all over the country for what was a virtual sellout.
Catalyst for Stanley
For the Stanley restoration effort, the benefit of the concert went well beyond the $60,000 raised that day.
"That was a catalytic moment and revolutionary moment that started the whole process of the interiors and getting us to this point where we are, looking at enlarging the stage," said Ron Thiele, executive director of the Central New York Community Arts Council.
The Stanley is dark for much of 2007 as its expansion project moves forward.
"In my difficult life, I have learned what is important: beauty, love," Rostropovich said in 1982. "I helped the Stanley Theater to exist as a gift to beauty. We need beauty in our lives."
"Before our time is ended, we should all find beauty in our lives," the cellist said. "Love each other."
House a surprise for wife
Herkimer attorney George Aney knew Rostropovich when he first came to this country after defecting from the Soviet Union.
Rostropovich came to the area with the singular purpose of visiting the Holy Trinity Monastery and Seminary in Jordanville, Aney said.
At the monastery, Aney, said, Rostropovich was told of the mansion that would later become the cellist's area home.
"When he walked in it, reminded him greatly of Moscow," Aney said. "He fell in love with that place and the Mohawk Valley, buying the land and building a large home as a surprise for his wife."
Rostropovich and his wife built a four-story house on the grounds of 148-year-old Gelston Castle, a historical landmark in Herkimer County that they purchased in 1979.
'You cannot compare him'
In the years after the purchase, they barely spent time there, with Rostropovich's busy schedule as a conductor of the National Symphony of Washington, D.C., taking him to hundreds of cities throughout the U.S. And Europe.
"You cannot compare him to anyone else I know or anyone else knows," Aney said. "He was his own true individual, and unquestionably a genius in more ways than one."
Aney and Thiele had talked of bringing his friend back to the Stanley to see its improved state when it re-opens in late 2007.
"We are going to miss him dearly, not just because of his early involvement but because he's such a great musician," Thiele said.
In his own words
Memorable quotes by cellist and former Soviet dissident Mstislav Rostropovich, who died Friday:
"When Leonid Brezhnev stripped us of our citizenship in 1978, we were obliterated. Russia was in my heart - in my mind. I suffered because I knew that until the day I died, I would never see Russia or my friends again." -1997 interview in Strad magazine
"Art and literature should be judged by the conscience of the creator, his peers in his field and all of the people, not by a separate
bureaucracy, artificially compressing the arteries and veins of this life-sustaining circulation." - Testifying at a 1990 Senate hearing
"If I have another life - a thousand lives - it (would) be exactly the same." - In 1994 on whether he had any regrets about his life
Observer-Dispatch
April 28, 2007
MOSCOW- The late Mstislav Rostropovich is known worldwide as a master cellist who fought for the rights of Soviet-era dissidents and later triumphantly played Bach suites in 1989 below the crumbling Berlin Wall.
But he's known in the Mohawk Valley as a major force in the restoration of the Stanley Theatre, as an enthusiast for the region's countryside and as a good neighbor in Herkimer County.
Rostropovich died Friday in a Moscow cancer hospital. He was 80.
Rostropovich owned an estate in Jordanville, near Mohawk, for several years but rarely visited. It was sold in November 2005 for $1.15 million. It features 790 acres of woods, pastures and a large pond, along with five buildings.
"I have traveled all my life," he said in a 1982 Utica Newspapers article, "and been exposed to so much. But here in the Mohawk Valley, with its hills and valleys of great beauty, I feel I can experience everyday life afresh. I can see with new eyes."
'Inner beauty' in Valley
In May 1995, Rostropovich received an honorary doctorate of music from Utica College.
"There is an inner beauty that I see in the valley, and it is in the people," he said. "The people that I meet are simple and sincere, and religious. They are not spoiled by the outside world."
Time magazine called Rostropovich one of the 20th century's greatest musicians and without a doubt the world's finest cellist. He held the highest honors the Russian state gives- the Lenin Prize, two Stalin Prizes and the People's Artist of the USSR Award.
In 1982, Rostropovich brought that talent to Utica as he performed a benefit concert for the Stanley Performing Arts Center. His wife, the highly acclaimed soprano Galina Vishnevskaya, along with daughter Elena, a pianist, and son-in-law Pieter Daniel, a violinist, performed with him.
The family donated its services for the Thanksgiving Day event, making it their first performance together in the United States. The concert drew music lovers from all over the country for what was a virtual sellout.
Catalyst for Stanley
For the Stanley restoration effort, the benefit of the concert went well beyond the $60,000 raised that day.
"That was a catalytic moment and revolutionary moment that started the whole process of the interiors and getting us to this point where we are, looking at enlarging the stage," said Ron Thiele, executive director of the Central New York Community Arts Council.
The Stanley is dark for much of 2007 as its expansion project moves forward.
"In my difficult life, I have learned what is important: beauty, love," Rostropovich said in 1982. "I helped the Stanley Theater to exist as a gift to beauty. We need beauty in our lives."
"Before our time is ended, we should all find beauty in our lives," the cellist said. "Love each other."
House a surprise for wife
Herkimer attorney George Aney knew Rostropovich when he first came to this country after defecting from the Soviet Union.
Rostropovich came to the area with the singular purpose of visiting the Holy Trinity Monastery and Seminary in Jordanville, Aney said.
At the monastery, Aney, said, Rostropovich was told of the mansion that would later become the cellist's area home.
"When he walked in it, reminded him greatly of Moscow," Aney said. "He fell in love with that place and the Mohawk Valley, buying the land and building a large home as a surprise for his wife."
Rostropovich and his wife built a four-story house on the grounds of 148-year-old Gelston Castle, a historical landmark in Herkimer County that they purchased in 1979.
'You cannot compare him'
In the years after the purchase, they barely spent time there, with Rostropovich's busy schedule as a conductor of the National Symphony of Washington, D.C., taking him to hundreds of cities throughout the U.S. And Europe.
"You cannot compare him to anyone else I know or anyone else knows," Aney said. "He was his own true individual, and unquestionably a genius in more ways than one."
Aney and Thiele had talked of bringing his friend back to the Stanley to see its improved state when it re-opens in late 2007.
"We are going to miss him dearly, not just because of his early involvement but because he's such a great musician," Thiele said.
In his own words
Memorable quotes by cellist and former Soviet dissident Mstislav Rostropovich, who died Friday:
"When Leonid Brezhnev stripped us of our citizenship in 1978, we were obliterated. Russia was in my heart - in my mind. I suffered because I knew that until the day I died, I would never see Russia or my friends again." -1997 interview in Strad magazine
"Art and literature should be judged by the conscience of the creator, his peers in his field and all of the people, not by a separate
bureaucracy, artificially compressing the arteries and veins of this life-sustaining circulation." - Testifying at a 1990 Senate hearing
"If I have another life - a thousand lives - it (would) be exactly the same." - In 1994 on whether he had any regrets about his life
