Aram Il’yich Khachaturian was one of the most popular composers of the Soviet period of Russian history, successfully managing to combine the folk music of his native Armenia with the more formal Russian musical tradition as represented by Rimsky-Korsakov. Born in 1903, he showed early signs of a love of music, but his formal training did not begin until 1922, when he was admitted to the famous Gnessin Institute in Moscow (his family having moved there the previous year) and continued at the Moscow Conservatory with the eminent composer Myaskovsky. The first major work of Khachaturian to be performed was his Symphony No. 1 (1934). International acclaim greeted his rumbustious Piano Concerto of 1936, the success of which was quickly duplicated with the Violin Concerto of 1940, and throughout the 1940s Khachaturian composed many successful works, such as the ballet Gayaneh with its famous Sabre Dance (1942), his Symphony No. 2 (1943) and Cello Concerto (1946).

In 1947 Khachaturian was criticized for ‘excessive formalism’ and as a result concentrated on composing film scores, in the early 1950s adding teaching and conducting to his work as a composer. Following the death of Stalin in 1953 he was one of the first musicians to propose greater freedom for composers. In 1954 he composed the ballet Spartacus, the Suite from which is probably his best-known work, not least because of its stunning adagio movement, popularised as the theme for the 1970s British television series The Onedin Line. He died in 1978, an established figure within Russian music.

Although remembered primarily as a composer who was most successful in dealing with pictorial subjects such as ballets, films and incidental music to plays, Khachaturian was quite active in his later years as a conductor, especially of his own works, and was sufficiently trusted by the Communist regime to be allowed to appear in this role in both Europe and the USA. His recorded output was not large, but included for Melodya his Symphony No. 2, Piano Concerto (with Lev Oborin) and Violin Concerto (with David Oistrakh) with the National Philharmonic Orchestra. He made second recordings of both the Piano Concerto (with Ivan Petrov) and the Violin Concerto (with Leonid Kogan), as well as the suite The Battle of Stalingrad, with the USSR State Symphony Orchestra. With the Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra, Khachaturian conducted two recordings of his Concert Rhapsody for Cello and Orchestra (with Petrov and Shakhovskaya) and his Concert Rhapsody for Piano and Orchestra (with Petrov); and with the Bolshoi Theatre Orchestra, he conducted and recorded a suite from Masquerade. In 1955 for EMI, Khachaturian conducted and recorded the Violin Concerto with Oistrakh and the Philharmonia Orchestra, as well as In Memoriam and suites from Gayaneh and Masquerade, returning to the EMI studios in 1977 to record suites from Gayaneh and Spartacus. Khachaturian made probably his best-selling disc in 1962 for Decca: it consisted once again of suites from Gayaneh and Spartacus, but this time in performances with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, captured in sound of the highest quality. It was this recording which was used as the theme music for the television series The Onedin Line. A recording of his Symphony No. 2 was also made by Decca at this time with the same forces.

© Naxos Rights International Ltd. — David Patmore (A–Z of Conductors, Naxos 8.558087–90).