Roberts - The Lost Pianos of Siberia

Sophy Roberts’ The Lost Pianos of Siberia (2020) is as equally focused on pianos and music as it is on understanding political life and culture in Russia from the time of Catherine the Great in the late 18^th century to the present. Pianos were so dominant during the entire 19^th century that they were found in the homes of every privileged Russian, with salon performances the norm, and music schools available in most cities. During this time, Piano virtuosos were the rock stars of the day and drew large crowds of admirers whenever and wherever they performed.

The story of the lost pianos of Siberia is one of searching for what is left of the great age of Russian music and performance, which is briefly captured in the video available on the book promotion website. Siberia, with the largest area and most extreme weather in Russia, is a name derived from early Arab traders who crisscrossed its sweeping planes and used the Tatar word sibir, meaning the sleeping land, to describe it. No wonder that in a desolate and sprawling land such as Siberia, that the banished criminals and dissidents who were sent there by the Tsars would be enraptured by great piano music. In Pyotr Tchaikovsky words, “Truly, there would be reason to go mad if it were not for music” (p. 18).

Sophy Roberts tells the story of her journey throughout the full expanse of Siberia. Her writing conveys a deep connection with people, history, and the music that lifted so many above the drudgeries of daily life. In her words, “By following the pathway of an object, I would get closer to understanding the place” (p. 51).

The fascination with pianos flourished in St. Petersburg, the imperial city facing toward Europe both geographically and culturally. It boasted six piano makers by 1810, resulting in it being dubbed ‘pianopolis.’ For most of the 19^th century, music was a past-time of the elite but by the 1860s interest accelerated with the formation of the Imperial Russian Musical Society by the Romanov court. The era that followed resulted in increasingly discerning performance and virtuosic expectations, as musicians moved from mere entertainers to some of the most notable names in the world – the “Mighty Five” including Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Cesar Cui, Modest Mussorgsky, Alexander Borodin, and Mily Balakirev; Tchaikovsky, and others.

This extraordinary flourishing of music began to crumble with the 1905 ‘Bloody Sunday’ killing of one hundred thirty protesters at the Tsars’ Palace. From there, the fall of the Romanov family was irreversible and accelerated toward the 1917 October Revolution. The political turmoil that unfolded, with ‘Reds’ and ‘Whites’ vying for influence, the Bolshevik rebels rising, and the eventual formation of the Soviet Union, resulted in noble families abandoning all their possessions, even their treasured pianos. In this cataclysmic time, Russia was to lose not only its pianos but also the extraordinary talents of the likes of Sergie Rachmaninoff who fled to the United States for safety and fortune. Others such as Shostakovich and Prokofiev stayed in Russia but were forced to compromise their creative spirits in the face of political pressure to compose and perform music pleasing to Soviet officials. In addition to the resilience of these great classical composers, a new kind of music emerged in the East of Siberia, in Harbin, where American jazz took hold in the 1920s as an expression of “anarchic freedom of improvisation” (p. 194) not tolerated elsewhere in the USSR.

The spirit of great Russian music struggled during the Soviet years but was renewed in mid-20^th century. Some would point to the winning performance by the American from Texas, Van Cliburn, at the 1958 International Tchaikovsky Piano Competition as the moment when Russia’s musical soul began to reemerge. Numerous Russian pianists now perform throughout the world. Denis Matsuev is one of the most recognized in this revival.

Roberts wrote in one of the later chapters, “Part of me I had lost in Siberia” (p.  309), a characterization reminiscent of a search that often led to no end. Yet several pages later, she added “My piano hunt and Mary’s (a friend Sophy met along the way) vagrant robin had more in common than it first appeared: neither of us had come for the certainties, but for the outside possibility that a little marvel might appear” (p. 314). The marvel was not only uncovering lost pianos and retelling the history of great music in Russia but of the stunning realization that “in spite of everything, Siberia is fundamentally life-giving all the same – a wellspring of culture, humanity and moral courage in the last place on Earth I expected to find it” (353).