is worth summarizing briey some of the main features of musical life in Russia, specically St.

Petersburg and Moscow, at the start of the 1850s.

It was without doubt the operatic stage that attracted the broadest sections
of Russian society, and for that reason it is hardly surprising that the rst major
successes achieved by native composers were in this eld: specically the operas
of Glinka and Dargomzhsky. For more than twenty years, however, the Italian
troupe had consistently enjoyed the favors of the court, which, in effect, chose
the repertory of the imperial theaters. During the years from 1828, when the
emperor recalled the Italian opera from Moscow to St. Petersburg, the troupe
had staged several of Rossinis operas, Mozarts Don Giovanni, and many of
Verdis early operas: for example, Ernani in 1846, I Due Foscari in 1847, and
Giovanna dArco in 1849. While great Italian singers such as Rubini, Lablache,
Tamberlick, Giovanni Mario, his wife Giulia Grisi, and Pauline Viardot were lavishly feted, Russian artists struggled to gain recognition. One of the few exceptions was the great bass Osip Petrov who had made his dbut as Sarastro in
Mozarts Die Zauberte in October 1830, and four years later went on to sing
Figaro in Il Barbiere di Seviglia and Bertram in Robert le Diable with brilliant
success. His greatest achievement came in 1836 when he created the role of Ivan
Susanin in the premiere of Glinkas Zhizn za Tsarya [A life for the tsar]. The
prevailing taste for Italian opera at this time did not entirely suppress the works
of native composers. Apart from Glinka, whose two operatic masterpieces eventually eclipsed all other Russian operas of the 1830s and 1840s, there were a
number of other industrious composers working alongside the creator of A Life
for the Tsar. Among the most important were Cavos (Italian by birth, but resident for most of his life in Russia), Dmitry Struysky, Verstovsky, and Dargomzhsky whose Esmeralda had been rst heard in Moscow in 1847. Such was
the indifference to Russian opera, however, that when Esmeralda was later revived at the Aleksandrinsky Theater in St. Petersburg on 29 November/11 December 1851, it was so badly staged that it closed after only three performances.
While opera enjoyed great privilege and was patronized by the crown, the
performance of orchestral music was rather less frequent. Consequently, in
1842, Aleksandr Fitsum von Eckstedt, the inspector of St. Petersburg University,
organized a series of public concerts and invited Carl Schuberth to direct them.
These concerts were known at rst as Musical Exercises for Students of the
Imperial University and later as University Concerts.11 The orchestra, made
up of fty to sixty players, gave ten concerts during the winter season on Sunday
mornings. The programs consisted mainly of the classical repertory, including
all the symphonies of Beethoven, as well as those of Haydn, Mozart, Mendelssohn, and Schubert, but also a good deal of new music including works by several Russian composers. Although Schuberth was an able musician, the concerts
did not adhere to a high standard and this was aggravated by the lack of rehearsals. Rubinstein appeared several times as soloist and occasionally even deputized for Schuberth as conductor. With the formation of the orchestra of the
Russian Music Society, these University Concerts gradually ceased.
In addition to the University Concerts, a few concerts were also given in
26 Anton Rubinstein