Nikolay Peyko
Nikolay Ivanovich Peyko or Peiko (Николай Иванович Пейко) (25 March 1916 in Moscow – 1 July 1995 in Moscow) was a Russian composer and professor of composition. Early life. Peyko began his music education at the Academic Music College from 1933 through 1937 where his teachers included Igor Vladimirovich Sposobin (harmony) and Genrik Litinsky (composition). This was followed by three years of training at the Moscow Conservatory where his teachers included Nikolay Myaskovsky (composition), Nikolai Rakov (orchestration), and Zukkerman (analysis). He graduated in 1940. Career. Peyko worked in a military hospital during the Second World War and taught at  the Moscow Conservatory from 1942 to 1949. After working since 1941–1943 in Ufa at a military hospital, NIkolay partly worked with and was influenced by Dmitri Shostakovich. From 1959 till retirement Peyko was professor of composition at the Gnessin State Musical College where his students included Sofia Gubaidulina, Alexander Arutiunian, and Inna Abramovna Zhvanetskaia. Peyko taught his students twelve-tone technique. Nikolay's first successful work was "From the Legends of Yakuta" (1940). During World War II, he worked in a military hospital and composed several patriotic pieces, including "Dramatic Overture" (1941) and "Symphony" I (1944-1946). They were appreciated  by Myaskovsly and Schostakovich. His classical archives include "Moldavian Suite for Orchestra" (1950), "Tsar Ivan's Night", "Jeanne d'Arc", "Ballada, for piano", "Piano Sonata No.1", "Variations for piano", "Sonatina for piano No.2", "Bylina, for Piano", "Piano Sonata No. 2", and "Concert Triptych for 2 pianos". Nikolay worked on a genre of "pure" sympathy composed music for theater plays. Nikolay was more of a traditional composer who absorbed folk music in his musical language. His music is known for a harsh, distant sound. His music has been described as driving march-rhythms with good humor, decorated with the sound of bells . In 1964 he was honored as a Honored Art Worker of the RSFSR. Nikolay began working with 12-note scales in the 1960s. In 2012 he performed in the Irish-Russian chamber-music festival in Moscow. Recognition. Nikolay won many awards, including two Stalin prizes for his "First Symphony" (1947) and his "Moldavian Suite" (1950–51). He is unknown in the west. His first two CD's cover his piano music and were the first time any music by Peyko was recorded on a western label (though several Soviet recordings of his music reappeared in the West, e.g. his setting of  Gogol's "The Overcoat" on Monitor LPs, or more recently a violin & orchestra fantasia in Brilliant Classics "Tretiakov Edition" (a 2007 CD set of recordings of Tretiakov's performances.))