Nikolai Kapustin


Nikolai Girshevich Kapustin was a Russian composer and pianist. He played with early Soviet jazz bands such as the Oleg Lundstrem Big Band. In his compositions, mostly for piano, he used a fusion of jazz and classical forms. He and other pianists recorded his works.

Early life

Kapustin was born in Horlivka, Ukrainian SSR, USSR. When he was age four, with his father fighting in World War II, his mother and grandmother moved with him and his sister to the Kyrgyz city of Tokmak. He composed his first piano sonata at age 13. From age 14, Kapustin studied piano with Avrelian Rubakh. Beginning in 1945, he discovered jazz. His teacher supported his interest. Kapustin studied from 1956 with Alexander Goldenweiser at the Moscow Conservatory, graduating in 1961. He included Sergei Prokofiev's Piano Concerto No. 2 in his graduation recital.

Career

During the 1950s, Kapustin acquired a reputation as a jazz pianist, arranger and composer. He had his own quintet, which performed at an "upscale restaurant" monthly. He played as a member of Yury Saulsky's big band and later in the Oleg Lundstrem Big Band. In his compositions, he fused the traditions of both classical piano repertoire and improvisational jazz, combining jazz idioms and classical music structures. His Suite in the Old Style, Op. 28, written in 1977, sounds like jazz improvisation but is modelled after Baroque suites such as Johann Sebastian Bach's keyboard partitas. Other examples of his fusion music are 24 Preludes in Jazz Style, Op. 53, 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op. 82, written in 1997, and the Sonatina, Op. 100.
Kapustin regarded himself as a composer rather than a jazz musician: "I was never a jazz musician. I never tried to be a real jazz pianist, but I had to do it because of the composing. I'm not interested in improvisation – and what is a jazz musician without improvisation? All my improvisations are written, of course, and they became much better; it improved them."
Among his works are 20 piano sonatas, six piano concertos, other instrumental concertos, sets of piano variations, études and concert studies.
Record labels have released several recordings of the composer performing his own music. His music has been played by leading pianists including Ludmil Angelov, Marc-André Hamelin, Masahiro Kawakami, Thomas Ang, Nikola Petrov, Steven Osborne and Vadim Rudenko, and by cellists such as and.

Personal life

Kapustin has a son, Anton Kapustin, who is a theoretical physicist.

Death

Kapustin died on 2 July 2020 in Moscow at the age of 82.