Alexander Gauk

Alexander Vasilyevich Gauk (1893–1963) was a Soviet conductor and composer, awarded the title People’s Artist of the RSFSR in 1954. He was born in Odessa in the Kherson Governorate of the Russian Empire and died in Moscow in the USSR.

He studied at the Petrograd Conservatory, taking composition with Alexander Glazunov, Vasily Kalafati, Jāzeps Vītols, and Mikhail Chernov, and conducting with Nikolai Tcherepnin. In 1917 he became a conductor at the Petrograd Theatre of Musical Drama; his debut took place on 14 November 1917 (New Style) with Tchaikovsky’s opera “Cherevichki”.

From 1923 to 1931 Gauk worked at the Leningrad Theatre of Opera and Ballet, conducting mainly ballet performances. He led the Leningrad Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra from 1930 to 1934, moved to Moscow in 1933, and served as chief conductor of All-Union Radio until 1936. In 1936 he became the first chief conductor of the newly founded USSR State Academic Symphony Orchestra, directing it until 1941. From 1953 to 1963 he again headed the Symphony Orchestra of All-Union Radio.

Gauk was also an active teacher, working at the Leningrad Conservatory (1927–1933 and 1946–1948), the Tbilisi Conservatory (1941–1943), and the Moscow Conservatory (1939–1963; professor from 1948). Among his students were Yevgeny Mravinsky, Alexander Melik-Pashayev, Konstantin Simeonov, Eduard Grikurov, Nikolai Rabinovich, Yevgeny Svetlanov, and Gennady Provatorov.

As a composer he wrote original works including symphonies, piano concertos, a harp concerto with orchestra, and piano and chamber pieces. He also produced orchestrations of works by Mikhail Glinka (“Patriotic Song”), Pyotr Tchaikovsky (“The Seasons”), and Modest Mussorgsky (the unfinished opera “Marriage”).

Noted for his sense of orchestral ensemble and stylistic awareness, he conducted both contemporary and classical repertoire, presenting music by Khachaturian, Myaskovsky, Shaporin, Shostakovich, Ovchinnikov, and others—often in first performances—alongside works by composers such as Handel, Bach, and Berlioz. On 13 November 1945 he conducted the restored First Symphony of Rachmaninoff, which had not been performed for nearly 50 years, and he toured internationally. A volume titled “Memoirs, Selected Articles, Recollections of Alexander Gauk’s Contemporaries” was published in 1975.

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