Ariy Pazovsky

Ariy Moiseyevich Pazovsky (Russian: Арий Моисеевич Пазовский; 2 February [O.S. 21 January] 1887, Perm – 6 January 1953, Moscow), was a Russian Jewish^[1] and Soviet conductor and violinist.

Ariy Pazovsky, 1936

Biography

He was a junior conductor at the Bolshoi from 1923 to 1928, and then director 1943–1948.^[2] As a conductor of the Bolshoi Opera, he is credited with having returned parts of Modest Mussorgsky's opera Boris Godunov which had been censored in the Russian Empire.^[3] On his arrival in 1943 Pazovsky was required to enliven the repertoire with some 19th-century operas, and thus had to postpone Prokofiev's War and Peace, but made this good with putting on Prokofiev's Cinderella.^[4][5]

Awards and honors

• Honored Artist of the Republic (1925)
• Honored Artist of the Ukrainian SSR (1935)
• Order of the Badge of Honour (1936)
• Order of the Red Banner of Labour (1939)
• People's Artist of the USSR (1940)
• Three Stalin Prizes (1941, 1942, 1943)
• Medal "For Valiant Labour in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945"
• Medal "In Commemoration of the 800th Anniversary of Moscow"