Semyon Isaakovich Shlifshteyn

Semyon Isaakovich Shlifshteyn (Saratov, 1903 – Moscow, 1975) was a Russian musicologist and critic whose work focused on Russian and Soviet music, particularly on composers such as Glinka, Prokofiev, Myaskovsky and Tchaikovsky. Born in Saratov, he settled in Moscow in his youth, and the city was where most of his professional career unfolded.

During the 1940s and 1950s he worked in several Moscow musical institutions, including the Moscow Philharmonic and the committee for artistic affairs of the Council of Ministers of the USSR. It was during these years that he wrote most of his works, such as the book Glinka i Pushkin and a series of popular booklets on Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev and Myaskovsky, published within the series Para ayuda del oyente de música. He also prepared editions of materials on Prokofiev and, in 1962, two reference works on Prokofiev and Myaskovsky.

In the 1960s he contributed articles and reviews, focusing above all on Russian and Soviet music, to the journals Sovetskaya muzika and Muzikal'naya zhizn'. In 1948, together with other more renowned Soviet musicologists, he was attacked by the authorities, who accused him of "anti-patriotic and harmful activity".

Shlifshteyn's importance lies chiefly in his documentary and popularising work: his editions and catalogues on Prokofiev and Myaskovsky remain useful references for the study of both composers, and his writings helped to spread Soviet music among concert audiences.