Boris Asaf'ev and the Soviet Musicology - E-thesis

“leftist” 11 mark on his works when he was formulating his musical aesthetics in a style
of literature statements. However, Futurist stamp is somewhat difficult to apply on
Asaf’ev. He was never against Russian tradition and classical culture, even though he
was to some extent against traditional conservatory training and thus academicians. I
see that he was closiest to Futurists and Formalists within his semiotic approach.
Orlova’s writings reflect interestingly the intellectual contradiction that took place in the
Soviet Union. She has listed all the “decadent” philosophers in detail who affected
Asaf’ev and criticizes the false idealist trait the “careless idealistic position” and “the
chaotic idealistic view” 12 that appear in Asaf’ev’s early works. 13 As a result, Orlova
tries to convince her readers that Asaf’ev was moving consistently towards the socialist
realist aesthetic theory which was crystallized in his main work Intonation.
Despite her criticism, Orlova defended Asaf’ev’s actions to Soviet audience. 14 She
emphasized for example that Asaf’ev was provably against plain aesthetism – art for
art’s sake – ‘formalist aesthetics’ that was unaccepted in the Soviet Union. 15 Yet, she
tried to moderate Asaf’ev’s “subjective-idealist” formulations influenced by different
idealist philosophers: “However, one can not say that all of his essentials are of that
11 By this Orlova as well as other Soviet critics usually refers to the ultra-modernist artists or Lef, i.e.
Futurist organization The Left Front of Arts. During the revolution artistic field could be said to have
been divided into three main blocs: The Right – Academicians (the official art during the Tsarist regime),
Realists, The Centre – “Mir Iskusstvniki” [The World of Art Group] and Left – Proletkul’t, Futurists etc.
who were against the two aforementioned. (Krusanov 2003, p. 7.)
12 Biography 1984, p. 84.
13 Orlova writes: “But when reading Symphonic Etudes one must not forget that Asaf’ev, like many others
of his generation, was in those years far from knowing the theory of dialectical-materialism – the main
approach in the development of Russian philosophical thought on the 20 th century, which enriched itself
on that time with such kind of classical works as Materialism and empirical criticism of V. I. Lenin. As it
is well known, till the end of the 1920s the classical Marxist-Leninist works were not in Asaf’ev’s sight.”
Right up to 1918 the fundamental idealistic press organ “Voprosy filosofii i psihologii” continued
publishing, three numbers of writings of ‘bourgeois’ philosophers E. Radlovyj and N. Losskij. Their
articles were released in 1921 in Petrograd in the journal called Mysli. (Orlova in Asaf’ev: Simf.E 1970, p.
6. Orlova’s notion is made by A. I. Novikov, the author of the book Leninizm i progressivnye tradicii
obščestvennoj mysli.)
14 For example, she noted, that the outline of the problems discussed on the pages of the intended
symbolist journal Muzykal’naja mysl’ were always related to Russian music: “We understand music not
as a particular art, closed within itself, but as an effective living principle…our task is postulation and
elaboration of musical principles or ‘musical’ regardless of its presence in the sphere of that or another
sphere of art, but mainly of course in music.” (A letter of Asaf’ev and Suvčinskij to V. N. Bugaev [Andrej
Belyj]; quoted in Biography, 1984 pp. 83–84.)
15 Ibid., p. 84. Boris Asaf’ev wrote in his letter to Evgenij Basil’evič Bokoslovskij: “It is essential to
explain the role of clear aestetism and admit its insignificant meaning for art as ‘reformative creation’. As
far as I know, you are not a defender of aesthetism.”
6