Yuriy Keldïsh: Biography and Texts

This article is the first attempt to trace the stylistic evolution in the writings of the authoritative music scholar Yuriy Keldïsh (Keldysh, 1907–1995) – from his harsh polemical statements in the RAPM press to a balanced, objectivist narrative in his fundamental music-historical reviews and monographs. The study is based on Keldïsh’s published works, as well as on his oral statements preserved in archival sources. The scholar’s biography provides rich material for this kind of research. At all its stages, Keldïsh took an active socio-political position, which could not but affect the development of his writing talent. Analysis of texts from different periods – the 1920s, 1940s, 1960s – leads to the natural conclusion that the stylistic divide between polemical publications “on the topic of the day” and serious works “for eternity” runs through the second half of the 1940s. Those difficult years formed Keldïsh’s unique style, which until the mid-1960s was virtually indifferent to inner and outer emotional impacts, not leaving the reader with an unambiguous feeling of sincerity or falsehood even in short excerpts of the narrative. The article concludes with a discussion on Keldïsh’s later works and is supplemented with a list of his career achievements.