Alexander Veprik

Alexander Moiseyevich Veprik, also Weprik, (Russian: Александр Моисеевич Веприк; 23 June 1899 in Balta, Ukraine – 13 October 1958 in Moscow) was a Russian (Ukrainian; Soviet) composer and music educator. Veprik is considered one of the greatest composers of the "Jewish school" in Soviet music.

Life

Veprik grew up in Warsaw and studied piano with Karl Wendling at the Leipzig Conservatory. At the onset of World War I, the family returned to Russia. Veprik studied composition with Alexander Zhitomirsky (1881–1937) in the Saint Petersburg Conservatory (1918–1921) and Nikolai Myaskovsky at the Moscow Conservatory (1921–1923).

Veprik was active in the musical life of 1920–1930s. In 1923 he was active in the creation of the Society for Jewish Music, a focal point for Jewish composers in Moscow, and Jewish music flourished as a result of the activities of the Society. He taught at the Moscow Conservatory (1923–1941; professor from 1930; dean from 1938). In 1927 during a business trip in Austria, Germany and France, he met Arnold Schoenberg, Paul Hindemith, Maurice Ravel and Arthur Honegger. His music became well known in Europe and the United States during this time: nearly his entire oeuvre was performed by the Berlin Radio Symphony (1928–1929). In March 1933 Arturo Toscanini conducted Veprik's Dances and Songs of the Ghetto at Carnegie Hall in New York.