Rodion Shchedrin is an outstanding Russian Soviet composer. He was born into the family of professional musicians in Moscow on December 16, 1932. In 1941 he was admitted to the Central Music School and after finishing it became a student of the Moscow Sveshnikov Choral School in 1944. In the fourth year of studies already he joined the Union of Composers. Later on Rodion Shchedrin headed this Union of Composers (from 1973 to 1993). In 1955 he graduated from the Moscow Conservatory majoring in composition and the piano. In 1964-1969 Rodion Shchedrin taught composition in the Moscow Conservatory.
The composer often performed his own works, including the piano play. Rodion Shchedrin gained popularity very early in his life, and first of all in theatrical genres: his ballets Konek-Gorbunok (1960) and Carmen Suite (1967), and the opera Not Only Love (1961) were staged in the Bolshoi Theater. Subsequently his ballets Anna Karenina (1972), The Seagull (1980), The Lady with a Dog (1986), and the opera Dead Souls (1977) saw the light on the same stage.
In the 1960s Rodion Shchedrin's style that initially focused on quite traditional folklore came to blend the elements of folk art and avant-garde techniques (elements of dodecaphony, sonorities, etc.).
The composer works in an array of genres and personally defines his style as post-avant-garde.
The main parties in a number of Rodion Schedrin’s ballets were composed for his wife, the prima ballerina Maya Plisetskaya. Rodion Shchedrin is the author of choral, chamber, piano, and symphonic compositions, as well as film music. Rodion Shchedrin personally authored librettos to lots of his compositions.
The list of his awards and ranks is very long: the State and Lenin Awards of the Soviet Union, the State Award of Russia, the Award of Shostakovich, Crystal Award of the World Economy Forum, and the Order For Services to the Fatherland, to name just a few.
Since 1991 Rodion Shchedrin has been living in Munich, but keeping the Russian citizenship.