Konstantin Ivanov was born in Yefremov, located in the Tula district of Russia, and began his musical life as a trumpet player in the army. Following the death of his father, in 1920 he was adopted by one of the Red Army regiments and served as a trumpet player in several military orchestras. He went on to study conducting at the Moscow Conservatory, firstly in the section devoted to training conductors for the army, but his ability was so pronounced that he was then invited to study with Leo Ginzburg in the class devoted to symphony orchestra conducting. Ivanov had in fact already been conducting at the Red Army Theatre for two years prior to his graduation from the Moscow Conservatory in 1937 and the following year he took third prize in the first All-Russia Conductors’ Competition, the other prizewinners being Evgeny Mravinsky, Nathan Rakhlin and Kirill Kondrashin. He then held in relatively quick succession three conducting appointments: with the USSR State Symphony Orchestra (1938– 1939), the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Musical Theatre (1939–1941), and the All-Union Radio Symphony Orchestra (1941–1946); the then chief conductor of this last orchestra, also known as the Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra, was the fiery Nikolai Golovanov. In 1946 Ivanov took up the position for which he is principally remembered today, that of chief conductor of the USSR State Symphony Orchestra, remaining with this orchestra for nineteen years until Evgeny Svetlanov took over from him in 1965.

Under Ivanov the USSR State Symphony Orchestra not only survived the hardships of the postwar years but also developed the Soviet Union’s reputation for cultural achievement through its numerous international tours. These took it not only to countries then allied to the Soviet Union, such as Czechoslovakia, Poland, Romania and China, but also from 1956 further afield to Austria, France, Germany, Japan and the USA. Its American tour of 1960 was extensive: a product of the American–Soviet cultural exchange programme, it lasted for two months and one of its highlights was a concert in the Madison Square Garden in New York with an audience of sixteen thousand people. Between 1960 and 1962, Ivanov guest-conducted with orchestras in both East and West Europe and North and South America. A contemporary review (Le Soir) for a concert that he gave in Belgium provides a vivid portrait of his conducting style: ‘When at the conductor’s stand, Konstantin Ivanov is an artist possessing great artistic impact and high technical skill. He is gifted with a fervent temper, he conducts passionately and expressively… He is able to breathe life into the work, accurately distributing sound effects and conveying both subtle nuances and deep contrasts.’ In 1963 he conducted the first performance of Shostakovich’s Overture on Russian and Khirghiz Folk Themes for Orchestra Op. 113, composed to celebrate the one hundredth anniversary of the incorporation of Kirghizia into the Russian State. Konstantin Ivanov himself composed several works for orchestra including a symphony, a symphonic poem entitled Fiery Years, and a concerto for double-bass and orchestra; he also wrote vocal miniatures.

Ivanov’s recorded legacy is not extensive: evidently he was not completely at ease with the recording process, believing that the presence of an audience was essential for orchestra and conductor to give of their collective best. Certainly in the live recordings of his conducting that have been issued, for example from the final of the 1962 International Tchaikovsky Piano Competition in Moscow when he accompanied one of the prizewinners, Vladimir Ashkenazy, in Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1, his direction is remarkably intense. His accounts of the first five symphonies of Tchaikovsky are extremely full-blooded, as are his recordings of shorter works by the same composer, notably Romeo and Juliet, Francesca da Rimini, The Voyevoda and the Capriccio Italien. Other recordings of note are powerful accounts of Glazunov’s Symphonies Nos 1, 5 and 6, Myaskovsky’s Symphony No. 16, Rimsky-Korsakov’s Symphony No. 2 ‘Antar’, and Scriabin’s Symphony No. 3 ‘The Divine Poem’. Ivanov also recorded a small amount of contemporary music, including the Symphony No. 1 by Andrey Eshpai, and some of his own compositions.

© Naxos Rights International Ltd. — David Patmore (A–Z of Conductors, Naxos 8.558087–90).