From the magazine

The awful calamity of Stalin being a music lover

The dictator obsessed over new recordings and was a frequent visitor to the Bolshoi; but he treated even the greatest musicians arbitrarily, consigning many to the Gulag for no reason

Mathew Lyons
A ceremony at the Bolshoi Theatre in 1949 to celebrate Stalin’s 70th birthday. Getty Images
EXPLORE THE ISSUE 18 January 2025
issue 18 January 2025
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  • The Sound of Utopia: Musicians in the Time of Stalin

    Michel Krielaars

    Pushkin Press, pp. 336, £25

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