Mstislav Rostropovich.

Mstislav Rostropovich was born on March 27, 1927, in Baku, Azerbaijan, then part of the Soviet Union. His father, Leopold Rostropovich, was a notable cellist and pedagogue of Polish nobility descent; his mother was a concert pianist of Russian-Jewish heritage. At age seven, he began cello lessons, and by 13, he made his concert debut. He studied at the Moscow Conservatory under Dmitri Shostakovich and Sergei Prokofiev, who became lifelong musical influences, and also attended the Gnessin Russian Academy of Music.

In 1951, Rostropovich won the Stalin Prize, 2nd degree after victories at international competitions. He married opera singer Galina Vishnevskaya in 1955, and they frequently performed together with pianists Svyatoslav Richter and Emil Gilels. His close relationships with composers led to dedicated works: Shostakovich’s Cello Concerto No. 1 1959, Prokofiev’s Symphony-Concerto 1952, and Britten’s Cello Symphony 1963, all of which he premiered and recorded. In 1969, he hid dissident Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn at his dacha, prompting Soviet authorities to ban him from international tours. After years of pressure, he fled the USSR with his family in 1974. In 1977, he became music director of the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, D.C., a post he held for 17 years. During the 1970s and 1980s, he maintained a busy concert career as both cellist and conductor, making numerous recordings.

Rostropovich married the renowned opera singer Galina Vishnevskaya in 1955, and they had two daughters, Olga and Elena. The family fled the Soviet Union in 1974, settling in the United States. In 1978, their Soviet citizenship was revoked by Leonid Brezhnev, but restored by Mikhail Gorbachev in 1990. After the fall of the Soviet Union, Rostropovich returned to Russia, maintaining homes in Moscow and St. Petersburg. He died on April 27, 2007, at age 80 from intestinal cancer and is buried at Novodevichy Cemetery in Moscow.

Rostropovich’s recordings and premieres of major works by Shostakovich, Prokofiev, and Britten define his legacy. His political defiance—protecting a dissident at great personal cost—inspired intellectuals worldwide. In 1991, he founded the Vishnevskaya-Rostropovich Foundation to improve children’s healthcare in former Soviet states. He received numerous posthumous honors, including the Order of Service to the Fatherland in 2007. His performance of Bach’s Cello Suites at the Berlin Wall in 1989 remains an iconic symbol of freedom. He is remembered as both a virtuoso cellist and a champion of human rights.