Composer, Conductor. An important figure in Russian music in the years before World War I. His short career was devoted to the theatre, and his use of what were then radical techniques reflected his pursuit of new dramatic effects. He experimented with quarter tones and microtonal music, incorporated ambient noise into the texture of his scores, and was one of the first to write for "prepared piano", in which metal rods and other foreign objects were placed inside the instrument to alter its sound. In this he anticipated European and American avant-garde composers by decades. His greatest popular success was his incidental music for the world premiere of Maurice Maeterlinck's play "The Blue Bird", staged by the Moscow Art Theatre in 1908. Ilya Aleksandrovich Sats was born in Chernobyl, the son of a Jewish attorney. He studied at the Kiev School of Music from 1891 to 1897 and at the Moscow Conservatory from 1897 to 1899. His teachers included Sergei Taneyev. In 1900 he was arrested for pro-revolutionary sympathies and served three years in Siberian exile, where he pioneered in collecting Russian Jewish folk music. Upon his return to Moscow he plunged into the city's cultural scene. From 1906 until his death he was music director of the Moscow Art Theatre, while also working with directors Vsevolod Meyerhold and Vera Kommissarzhevskaya and at the famous cabaret "The Cracked Mirror". When Meyerhold and MAT director Konstantin Stanislavsky mounted rival versions of Leonid Andreyev's play "The Life of Man" in 1907, Sats supplied the music for both. He also scored 13 other plays and wrote three short parody operas and songs for cabaret performance. His last major work, the ballet "The Goatfooted" (1912), caused the audience to riot and got him an invitation to work with director Max Reinhardt in Berlin. He succumbed to heart disease before he could accept. He was 37. Sats's death just as he was beginning to gain international recognition, followed by the upheaval of war and revolution, muted the impact of his work. His daughter, stage director Natalya Sats, paid tribute to his memory by making a bluebird the symbol of her famous children's theatre in Moscow.
Composer, Conductor. An important figure in Russian music in the years before World War I. His short career was devoted to the theatre, and his use of what were then radical techniques reflected his pursuit of new dramatic effects. He experimented with quarter tones and microtonal music, incorporated ambient noise into the texture of his scores, and was one of the first to write for "prepared piano", in which metal rods and other foreign objects were placed inside the instrument to alter its sound. In this he anticipated European and American avant-garde composers by decades. His greatest popular success was his incidental music for the world premiere of Maurice Maeterlinck's play "The Blue Bird", staged by the Moscow Art Theatre in 1908. Ilya Aleksandrovich Sats was born in Chernobyl, the son of a Jewish attorney. He studied at the Kiev School of Music from 1891 to 1897 and at the Moscow Conservatory from 1897 to 1899. His teachers included Sergei Taneyev. In 1900 he was arrested for pro-revolutionary sympathies and served three years in Siberian exile, where he pioneered in collecting Russian Jewish folk music. Upon his return to Moscow he plunged into the city's cultural scene. From 1906 until his death he was music director of the Moscow Art Theatre, while also working with directors Vsevolod Meyerhold and Vera Kommissarzhevskaya and at the famous cabaret "The Cracked Mirror". When Meyerhold and MAT director Konstantin Stanislavsky mounted rival versions of Leonid Andreyev's play "The Life of Man" in 1907, Sats supplied the music for both. He also scored 13 other plays and wrote three short parody operas and songs for cabaret performance. His last major work, the ballet "The Goatfooted" (1912), caused the audience to riot and got him an invitation to work with director Max Reinhardt in Berlin. He succumbed to heart disease before he could accept. He was 37. Sats's death just as he was beginning to gain international recognition, followed by the upheaval of war and revolution, muted the impact of his work. His daughter, stage director Natalya Sats, paid tribute to his memory by making a bluebird the symbol of her famous children's theatre in Moscow.
Bio by: Bobb Edwards
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