Music History Monday: Fyodor Ignatyevich Stravinsky

We mark the birth on June 20, 1843 – 179 years ago today – of the Russia bass opera singer Fyodor Ignatyevich Stravinsky, in the city of Minsk, which is today the capitol of Belarus but was then part of the Russian Empire. Considered one of the greatest singers of his time, Fyodor Ignatyevich has largely been forgotten because, one, he never recorded and, two, he’s been eclipsed by the fame of his son, the composer Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971). We’ll get to Maestro Fyodor Stravinsky in a bit. But first, we must observe that June 20 is one of those crazy, special dates, a date on which it would appear that a really disproportionate number of people have been born. I’m basing that statement on the number of notable musicians, writers, actors, and entertainment industry people who were born on June 20th, as revealed during my research for this post. He was born of Polish descent in the “Government (province) of Minsk”, in what had been part of Poland until 1793, when the Russian Empire sliced off and annexed a large chunk of Poland in what is euphemistically called the “second partition of Poland.” (Today, the “province of Minsk” is part of the “nation” of Belarus, which is advised to mind its P’s and Q’s, as Tsar Putin no more considers Belarus to be separate country than he does Ukraine. Not that you need me to point this out, but I’ll do it anyway: the “annexation” of Crimea in 2014 and the present attempts to destroy Ukraine and annex the Donbas demonstrate that Russian actions towards its neighbors have not changed a whit in hundreds of years: invade, occupy, and annex; invade, occupy, and annex; repeat as necessary until the desired result has been achieved.) In 1959, Igor Stravinsky explained the origin of his family’s name: “‘Stravinsky’ comes from ‘Strava’, the name of a small river, tributary to the Vistula, in eastern Poland. We were originally called Soulima-Stravinsky – Soulima being the name of another Vistula branch – but when Russia annexed this part of Poland the Soulima was for some reason dropped.” … See the full transcript, photos, and without ad breaks, on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/posts/67954381/ See the latest Robert Greenberg Great Courses On Sale at https://robertgreenbergmusic.com/sale