RUCHEVSKAYA, Ekaterina Alexandrovna

E.A. Ruchievskaya (1922–2009) was an outstanding Russian musicologist, Doctor of Arts, professor at the Leningrad-St. Petersburg Conservatory, Honored Artist of Russia, and member of the Union of Composers of Russia. E.A. Ruchievskaya was born in Tsarskoye Selo (now Pushkin) in 1922. She studied at the special music school affiliated with the Leningrad Conservatory. Beginning in 1944, she studied at the Leningrad Conservatory simultaneously in two departments—composition (under M.O. Steinberg and Y.V. Kochurov) and music history and theory—graduating from both in 1949; she then completed her postgraduate studies in 1952. In 1963, she defended her candidate’s dissertation, and in 1979, her doctoral dissertation. E.A. Ruchievskaya is the author of over 100 scholarly works (including monographs) in the fields of musical analysis and opera studies. She founded her own school of analysis (with over 70 students). E.A. Ruchievskaya was one of the first in the USSR to turn her attention to the analysis of vocal music, becoming a recognized authority in this field of musicology. A separate area of E.A. Ruchievskaya’s scholarly work focuses on the works of contemporary composers: Y.V. Kochurov, L.A. Prigozhin, Y.A. Falik, G.V. Sviridov, B.I. Tishchenko, and S.M. Slonimsky. Among E.A. Ruchievskaya’s major scholarly achievements are the theory of musical theme functions, the theory of musical syntax, the theory of “counter-rhythm,” and the introduction into musicology of a number of concepts (terms) related to the analysis of librettos and the musical dramaturgy of opera.