Mstislav Rostropovich has died, aged 80 April 27 2007

I know this is off-topic, but 'Slava' was one of my heroes.  Would that we all had as much courage and character.  Here is his Gramophone obituary:

Cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich, one of the 20th century’s most celebrated musicians, has died aged 80 in a Moscow hospital. His recordings will stand as milestones of the catalogue for their beauty, technical proficiency and humanity.

In a career which spanned six decades he gave 240 world premieres; just a handful of the composers who wrote for him include Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Britten, Arvo Pärt, Henri Dutilleux, Luciano Berio, Alfred Schnittke and more recently, James MacMillan and Rodion Shchedrin.

A friend of artists and statesmen alike, Rostropovich disproved those who claim that art is somehow divorced from “real” life. In 1948 he witnessed Shostakovich being denounced by the Soviet regime. Then in 1968 he found himself playing the Dvorák Cello Concerto – a Czech masterpiece – with the USSR State Symphony Orchestra at the Proms, on the day the Soviet tanks rolled into Prague (against everybody’s advice, and in defiance of the protestors, he insisted on performing – by the second movement he had won over the audience). In November 1989 he played in the street beside the now-fallen Berlin Wall, and later he was in the Kremlin when it was surrounded by an attempted coup. President Putin had recently visited him while in hospital and awarded him a Russian national honour.  MORE>>

For a longer article about him, along with photos from his 80th birthday party, click HERE.