Metadata: M. A. Mil’ner
Collection
- Country:
- Russia
- Holding institution:
- Russian Institute of Art History
- Holding institution (official language):
- Российский институт истории искусств
- Postal address:
- 190000, St. Petersburg, Isaakievskaia pl., d. 5
- Phone number:
- (812) 315-45-49
- Web address:
- http://artcenter.ru/structure/kabinet-rukopisej/
- Email:
- spb@artcenter.ru
- Reference number:
- F. 42
- Title:
- M. A. Mil’ner
- Title (official language):
- Мильнер М. А.
- Creator/accumulator:
- Mil’ner, Mikhail Arnol’dovich
- Date(s):
- 1906/1960
- Language:
- Russian
- Yiddish
- Hebrew
- Extent:
- 186 archival storage units
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Photographic images
- Graphic material
- Physical condition:
- Good
- Scope and content:
-
[See also the description of f. 1067 (“M. A. Mil’ner”) of the Manuscripts Department of the National Library of Russia.]
The materials in this fonds may be provisionally divided into six thematic groups:
1) Handwritten sheet music by Moisei Milner, including the arrangement of the opera The New Way; music for drama performances: Jacob’s Dream (Habimah Theatre Studio); The Wailing Wall (Moscow State Yiddish Theatre), arrangement; Wandering Stars and The Witch (Belorussian State Yiddish Theatre), arrangement; Bar Kokhba (Kiev State Yiddish Theatre), score (fragment), arrangement; drafts of music for performances of Tevye the Dairyman, based on the novel by Sholem Aleichem; Sisters by L. B. Reznik (based on the novel by Yitskhok Leybush Peretz); “The Sun Does Not Set” by Itsik Fefer; etc.; compositions for piano: “Lullaby” and “Musical Silhouettes”; variations and fugues, sonatas and ballads, and other compositions for cello and piano; vocal compositions: the suite “Mother and Child”, set to words by Yitskhok Leybush Peretz; “Sulamita” (fragment); “El Hatsipor”, set to words by Ḥayim Naḥman Bialik; songs for mixed and children’s choirs accompanied by piano, set to lyrics by Itsik Fefer, L. B. Reznik, Yitskhok Leybush Peretz, and I. M. Dobrushin (1916-51).
2) Manuscripts of Moisei Milner, including notes on music for productions of The New Way, The Witch, etc.; the libretto of the opera Di Himlen brenen (The Heavens Are Ablaze, 1923); autobiographical pieces supplemented by extracts from minutes of sessions of the secretariat of the Leningrad branch of the Union of Soviet Composers and the art council of the State Academy Malyi Opera Theatre (MALEGOT) devoted to his opera The New Way (1923-33).
3) Letters to Moisei Milner from S. An-skii (1914), M. Ia. Beregovskii (1939), V. Ia. Golovchiner (1939, 1941), M. I. Gol’dblat (1945, 1946), I. E. Goliand (1925), A. Z. Gumenik (1930s), A. I. Dzimitrovskii (1930, 1940), S. M. Dimanshtein and I. M. Rashkes (1937), Leyb Kvitko (1937), A. A. Krein (1928), I. M. Krol’ (1941), I. V. Lashevich (1930s), S. Iu. Levik (1940, 1943), Efraim Loyter (1941), S. A. Margolin (1930, 1937, 1939), I. B. Rabichev (1953), N. L. Tsemakh (1925) and D. S. Shor (1921, 1925); as well as dedicatory inscriptions to Moisei Milner from Sussmann Kisselhof, S. V. Polonskii and E. P. Sheinin (1906-50s).
4) A collection of posters and programs from concerts featuring works or performances by Moisei Milner (1912–1944) and of shows featuring music by him (1923-49).
5) Materials of other persons, in particular, an article by S. Iu. Levik on Moisei Milner’s creative path (1947); reviews of Moisei Milner’s works (newspaper and magazine clippings); plays and librettos (in Russian and Yiddish), in particular, of The New Way (Ia. M. Galitskii), Bar Kokhba (Shmuel Halkin), The Witch (Avrom Goldfadn) and Hirsh Lekert (A. Kushnirov); sheet music editions of works by various authors: I. S. Aisberg, Joseph Achron, A. I. Dzimitrovskii, P. R. L’vov, L. I. Saminskii, Efrayim Shkliar, Iu. D. Engel’ and L. G. Iampol’skii (1910s-50s).
6) Photos of Moisei Milner, individually and in groups with M. A. Norvid and A. G. Tyshler; with members of the Evokans Jewish chamber vocal ensemble, the Moscow State Yiddish Theatre, and a collective from the Birobidzhan Theatre (1920-40, and undated).
- Administrative/biographical history:
-
Mikhail (Mosei) Arnol’dovich Mil’ner (Moisei Milner) (1886-1953) was a composer and conductor. As a child, he sang in the choir of Cantor Ia. Sh. Morogovskii, then at the Brodskii Synagogue in Kiev. With the financial support of its founders, the Brodskii family, he was able to study piano with A. I. Dzimitrovskii (the choir director) and O. Vekker. In 1904-06, he studied piano at the Kiev Music Academy with Prof. V. V. Pukhal’skii. From 1907 to 1915, he studied at the St. Petersburg Conservatory with Profs. A. M. Miklashevskii, M. Barinova, A. K. Liadov, M. O. Shteinberg and others. He was an active member of the Jewish Folk Music Society since its foundation in 1908; among the society’s first publications was Moisei Milner’s piano piece “Baym rebn tsu melave malke” (“At the Rebbe’s, Bidding Farewell to Queen Sabbath”; 1914). From 1915 to 1918, he was a military conductor. He also directed the choir of the Jewish Folk Music Society (1911-23) and that of St. Petersburg’s Great Choral Synagogue (1912-19). From 1921-24, he was a vocal teacher and choirmaster of the Proletkul’t and at the same time served as head choirmaster of the Opera House of the People’s House in Petrograd. In 1924-25, he was music director of the State Yiddish Theatre (GOSET) in Moscow. From 1926 to 1929, he was in charge of music instruction in secondary schools of Leningrad. From 1929 to 1931, he was conductor of the Khar’kov GOSET and from 1931 to 1941, art director of the Evokans Jewish chamber vocal ensemble in Leningrad. Moisei Milner’s works include the operas Di Himlen brenen (The Heavens Are Ablaze, 1923), The New Way (1933), Josephus Flavius (1943, unfinished), etc.; a number of symphonic, chamber, instrumental, piano, and vocal works, including the symphonic poem On the Dnieper, a cycle of piano pieces titled “Silhouettes of the Patriotic War”, a sonata for cello and piano, and songs set to poems by Jewish poets; and film scores.
The Russian Institute of Art History (RIII RAS) is a research institute of the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation. It was founded in 1912 by Count V P Zubov on the model of Florence’s Istituto statale d’arte. Originally it was called the Institute of Art History and was housed in the mansion of V P Zubov. After the October Revolution, Zubov transferred his home to the new government and the institute became a state institution, in 1920 receiving the new title of Russian Institute of Art History. It has undergone several name changes over the course of its existence – from 1924-31, it was called the State Institute of Art History; from 1933-37, the State Academy of Art History; from 1958-62, the State Research Institute of Theatre, Music, and Cinematography; and since 1992, the Russian Institute of Art History. The institute’s staff included Iu N Tynianov, B M Eikhenbaum, B V Asaf’ev, V M Zhirmunskii, A V Preobrazhenskii and other well-known literary critics and musicologists.
The Manuscripts Office (formerly the Historiography Office, the Office of Archival Fonds) of the Russian Institute of Art History features a collection of unique documents covering Russian musical and theatre life of the 18th to 20th centuries. It was organised in 1938, when the institute received collections of the Leningrad Philharmonic’s Museum of Music History. The Manuscripts Office currently has 130 fonds of personal provenance, as well as a number of other collections.
- Access points: locations:
- Russia
- St Petersburg
- System of arrangement:
- The fonds comprises a single series arranged by structure.
- Finding aids:
- An inventory is available.
- Yerusha Network member:
- Jewish Theological Seminary
