His daughter Muqadamma was a noted medievalist.[3]
Early life and education
Mukhtar Ashrafi was born on 29 May (11 June) 1912 in Bukhara.[4] He grew up in the family of his father, a famous Bukhara singer and musician Ashrafzhan Hafiza.[5] At the age of seven, Ashrafi began to play Uzbek folk instruments improvising on the dutar.[2] In 1924, he entered Oriental Music School in Bukhara.[6] In 1928, Ashrafi graduated a dutar class in Bukhara and entered the Samarkand Institute of Music and Choreography.[2]
From 1934 to 1936, he studied in a composition class of Sergei Vasilenko at the Moscow Conservatory.[4] In 1934, Ashrafi wrote Komsomol and pioneer songs, and in 1935-1936, he wrote lyrical songs on the words of Ruzuli, working on his first opera at the same time.[5]
Together with his teacher, Sergei Vasilenko, Ashrafi wrote the first Uzbek opera “Buran” that was staged in 1939, starting the history of Uzbek Opera and Ballet Theater.[5]
In 1941-1944, Ashrafi studied composition at the Leningrad Conservatory.[7] In 1948, he graduated from the conducting faculty of the Leningrad Conservatory as an external student.[4]
Career
In 1942, Ashrafi created the first Uzbek heroic symphony.[8] From 1943 to 1947, Ashrafi was a director of Alisher Navoi Uzbek Opera and Ballet Theater.[6] Since 1944 Ashrafi was a teacher, and since 1953 - a professor at the Tashkent Conservatory.[4]
In 1964-66 he was a director, artistic director and chief conductor of the Samarkand Opera and Ballet Theater, and since 1966 - a director, artistic director and chief conductor of the State Academic Bolshoi Theater of the Uzbek SSR in Tashkent.[7]
From 1971 to 1975, Ashrafi was rector of the Tashkent Conservatory.[2]
Ashrafi is the author of the books "Indian Diaries" (in Russian and Uzbek), "Music in my life", numerous articles in magazines and periodicals.[6]
In 1976, Tashkent Conservatory was named after him.[7] On the occasion of the 70th birthday of Ashrafi, on 11 June 1982, a museum was opened in the house where he lived and worked from 1967 to 1975.[8] In 2019, a memorial evening of Ashrafi was held in the assembly hall of the Union of Composers and Bastakors of Uzbekistan.[21]
Symphony No. 1 "Heroic" (1942; awarded Stalin Prize)
Symphony No. 2 "Glory to the Victors" (1944)
Kantatu o Schast'ye (1952; awarded Stalin Prize)
Oratorio Skazanie o Rustame (1974)
Music for theater, films, etc.
Controversy
Ashrafi was accused of plagiarism in 1959, and Dmitri Shostakovich concluded that the allegations were true.[22][23] He was expelled from the Composers' Union, but later was allowed to return.[24]
^"Указ Президиум Верховного Совета СССР О присвоении почетных званий артистам Узбекской ССР" [Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR On the awarding of honorary titles to artists of the Uzbek SSR]. Sovetskoe iskusstvo (in Russian). 8 December 1951. p. 1.
^"Указ Президиума Верховного Совета СССР О награждении компоситора Ашрафи М.А. орденом Ленина" [Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR On awarding composer Ashrafi M.A. with the Order of Lenin]. Pravda Vostoka (in Russian). 14 June 1972. p. 1.
^"Награждение строителей Большого Ферганского канала имени тов. И. В. Сталина" [Awarding of the builders of the Great Fergana Canal named after Comrade I. V. Stalin]. Pravda (in Russian). 24 December 1939. p. 1.
^"О награждении работников Узбекского музыкального театра и Узбекской филармонии — участников декады Узбекского искусства в Москве" [On the awarding of employees of the Uzbek Musical Theatre and the Uzbek Philharmonic - participants of the decade of Uzbek art in Moscow]. Pravda (in Russian). 1 June 1937. p. 1.
