Fyodor Druzhinin

Fyodor Serafimovitch Druschinin (Russian Фёдор Серафимович Дружинин; born April 6, 1932 in Moscow, † 1 July 2007) was a Russian composer and violist and viola teacher.

Life

Fyodor Druschinin was born in Moscow in 1932. He began in 1944 at the Music School of the Moscow Conservatory with the viola studies with Nikolay Sokolov and studied from 1950 at the Conservatory at Vadim Borissowski. In 1964 Druschinin its place in the Beethoven string quartet. He has been a teacher at the Moscow Conservatory, where he was in 1980 appointed Head of the viola section. His most famous student is Yuri Bashmet.

Druschinin is dedicatee of important works for viola, including the composer Mieczyslaw Weinberg, Alfred Schnittke, Grigori Frid and especially the Sonata for Viola Op. 147 (1975) by Dmitri Shostakovich, he also premiered. Druschinin 1957 won the first prize at the Moscow Music Competition. In 1988 he was appointed People's Artist of the RSFSR. In addition to his activities as a teacher and violinist, he also composed several works for viola.