His life
in a time table
| Year | Event | Major works |
|---|---|---|
| 1906 | 25th September: Dmitri Shostakovich born in St Petersburg (Petrograd, Leningrad). | |
| 1915 | First piano lessons from his mother. Later lessons at Ignatiy Gliasser's Music School. |
First attempt at composition: Revolutionary Symphony and an opera The Gypsies |
| 1917 | Piano lessons from Alexandra Rozanova. | some lost piano works: Hymn to Freedom and The Soldier |
| 1919 | Enters the Petrograd Conservatory. | Scherzo in F sharp minor for orchestra, op.1 |
| 1920 | Piano lessons from Leonid Nikolayev. | Eight Preludes for piano, op.2 |
| 1922 | 24th February: death of his father. To earn a living for the family Dmitri gets a job as a pianist in a cinema. | Two Fables on Krylov, op.4; Three Fantastic Dances, op. 5; Suite in F sharp minor for two pianos (as an In Memoriam for his father) |
| 1923 | Graduates from Conservatory program in piano. Suffers from lymphatic and bronchial tuberculosis; recovers in a sanitarium in the Crimea. |
Trio No.1, op.8 |
| 1925 | 20th March: Shostakovich performs own piano works in Moskow. | First Symphony written as his graduation piece. |
| 1926 | Leningrad, 12th May: first performance of his First Symphony under Nikolai Malko. | Sonata No.1 for Piano, op. 12 |
| 1927 | Wins an "honorable mention" at the Chopin International Piano Competition in Warsaw. Beginning of the friendship with Ivan Sollertinsky. |
Aphorisms, op.13 and the Second Symphony, op.14 |
| 1928 | Joins Meyerhold's theatre company as pianist and musical collaborator. | Opera The Nose, op.15; music for the film New Babylon |
| 1929 | The Bedbug, op.19; Third Symphony | |
| 1930 | 18 January: first performance of opera The Nose; the opera was criticised as 'formalist'. | Music for the ballet The Golden Age |
| 1931 | ballet The Bolt, op.27 | |
| 1932 | Elected to the directorate of the Leningrad division of the newly-formed Union of Soviet Composers. 13th May: marriage to his first wife Nina Varzar. |
Opera Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk district, op.29 |
| 1933 | 24 Preludes for piano, op.34; Concerto No.1 in C minor for Piano, Strings and Trumpet, op.35 | |
| 1934 | 22nd January: first performance of the opera Lady Macbeth in Leningrad. Two days later first performance in Moskow. The opera was given a triumphant reception in both cities. | Sonata in D minor for cello and piano, op.40 |
| 1935 | 26th December: Stalin attends a performance of Lady Macbeth. | |
| 1936 | 28th January: In Pravda an article entitled "Muddle Instead of Music" appeared: a devastating critics on Lady Macbeth. The opera is taken from the play lists. April: Fourth Symphony withdrawn. 30th May: birth of daughter Galina. |
|
| 1937 | Appointed temporary professor of the Leningrad Conservatory in instrumentation. 21st November: first performance of the Fifth Symphony. Triumphant reception: the concert hall shuddered from applause. |
Fifth Symphony |
| 1938 | 10th May: birth of his son Maxim. | String Quartet No.1 |
| 1939 | Sixth Symphony | |
| 1940 | Piano Quintet in G minor, op.57 | |
| 1941 | In besieged Leningrad Shostakovich started writing on his Seventh Symphony. October: Shostakovich evacuated to Kuibyshev. |
|
| 1942 | 5th March: first performance of the Seventh Symphony under S. Samosud in Kuibyshev. 9th August: performance of the Seventh under Karl Eliasberg in besieged Leningrad. |
Seventh Symphony |
| 1943 | Eighth Symphony | |
| 1944 | 11th February: death of Shostakovich's friend Ivan Sollertinsky. | Piano Trio No.2, op.67; String Quartet No.2 |
| 1945 | Shostakovich moves to Moscow. | Ninth Symphony |
| 1946 | String Quartet No.3 | |
| 1947 | Elected president of the governing board of the Leningrad branch of the Composers Union. | |
| 1948 | 10th February: Denounced by Zhdanov as a 'formalist' in the Central Committee of the Communist Party. | Violin Concerto No.1 and the song cycle From Jewish Folk Poetry. Performances of both works postponed. |
| 1949 | cantata Song of the Forests; String Quartet No.4 (first performed in 1953) | |
| 1951 | 24 Preludes and Fugues, op.87 | |
| 1952 | String Quartet No.5 | |
| 1953 | 5th March: death of Stalin. | Tenth Symphony |
| 1954 | Death of his wife Nina. | Festive Overture, op.96 |
| 1955 | Death of his mother. | The Gadfly, op.97 |
| 1956 | Marriage to his second wife Margarita Kainova. | String Quartet No.6 |
| 1957 | Elected secretary to the governing board of the Composers Union. | Piano Concerto No.2; Eleventh Symphony |
| 1958 | Divorce from Margarita. Directive of the Central Committee of the Communist Party rescinding denunciation of 1948. |
|
| 1959 | Pain in right hand begins (will afflict him to the end of his life). | Cello Concerto No.1 |
| 1960 | String Quartet No.7; String Quartet No.8 | |
| 1961 | September: Shostakovich becomes a full member of the Communist Party. | Twelfth Symphony |
| 1962 | Elected deputy to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. Third marriage: to Irina Antonovna Supinskaya. |
Thirteenth Symphony |
| 1964 | String Quartet No.9; String Quartet No.10 | |
| 1966 | End of May: first heart attack. | String Quartet No.11; Cello Concerto No.2 |
| 1967 | Violin Concerto No.2 | |
| 1968 | String Quartet No.12; Sonata for Violin and Piano, op.134 | |
| 1969 | Fourteenth Symphony | |
| 1970 | String Quartet No.13 | |
| 1971 | September: second heart attack. | Fifteenth Symphony |
| 1974 | String Quartet No.15 | |
| 1975 | 9th August: Shostakovich dies of an heart attack in Moscow. 14th August: funeral at the Novodevichy Cemetery in Moscow. |
Viola Sonata, op.147 |
