Rodion Shchedrin: Farewell to a Composer of Eternal Music…

Yesterday, on August 29, 2025, composer Rodion Shchedrin passed away, but his music remains. His first ballet — The Little Humpbacked Horse — was not merely music to Ershov’s fairy tale. It was a declaration of love, addressed to his one and only, the incomparable Maya Plisetskaya. Thus, music became a biography of feelings, and art — eternity.

Shchedrin was the author of more than 100 works, including operas (Dead Souls, Lolita), ballets (Carmen Suite, Anna Karenina, The Little Humpbacked Horse), symphonies, orchestral concertos, as well as choral and chamber compositions. He combined the Russian classical tradition with avant-garde techniques, creating a unique musical style. His works were performed on leading stages around the world, including the Mariinsky and Bolshoi Theatres.

There were two composers who created ballets based on Pyotr Pavlovich Ershov’s fairy tale “The Little Humpbacked Horse.”

The first ballet was written by the Italian composer Cesare Pugni. His production, titled “The Tsar Maiden, or The Little Humpbacked Horse,” appeared in the mid-19th century and became a favorite ballet of the last Russian Emperor, Nicholas II. Premiered in the 18..s, it remained on stage for about one hundred years. Even Maya Plisetskaya danced in it.

A century later, Rodion Shchedrin composed his own version of the ballet — written especially for Maya Plisetskaya. His “The Little Humpbacked Horse” premiered in the early 1960s. “The music for the ballet The Little Humpbacked Horse is my early, very early work. But it was a landmark work, important for my creative self-affirmation, one that determined much in my life. It was on this work that I ‘caught in my musician’s hands’ the unearthly Firebird — Maya Plisetskaya. To her this score is dedicated…” wrote Shchedrin in his memoirs of the 1960s.

Both Pugni’s and Shchedrin’s works are considered milestones in the history of Russian ballet, each reflecting the spirit of its time while preserving the charm of Ershov’s timeless fairy tale.

Два композитора создали балеты по сказке Петра Павловича Ершова «Конёк-Горбунок».

Первый балет написал итальянский композитор Цезарь Пуни. Его постановка под названием «Царь-Девица, или Конёк-Горбунок» появилась в середине XIX века и стала любимым балетом последнего российского императора Николая II. Спектакль продержался на сцене около ста лет. В нём танцевала и Майя Плисецкая.

Спустя столетие Родион Щедрин создал собственную версию балета — специально для Майи Плисецкой.

И балет Пуни, и балет Щедрина считаются вехами в истории русского балета — каждый отражает дух своей эпохи, сохраняя очарование бессмертной сказки Ершова.