The State Jazz Orchestra of the USSR

The USSR State Jazz Band (or The State Jazz Orchestra of the USSR,[1] Russian: Государственный джаз-оркестр СССР) was a Soviet jazz band that existed in 1930s–1940s.

After it was auditioned by Joseph Stalin in 1938, a number of similar state-sponsored musical ensembles were created across the country.[2]

Critical analysis

S. Frederick Starr comments in his book on the Soviet jazz that the band "played with a polish and precision any Western pop orchestra might have envied". But then he adds:

For all its precision, the State Jazz Orchestra was a dismal failure. Tsfasman's Americanism and his unpopularity with the bureaucrats had disqualified him for the position of conductor, which went instead to Victor Knushevitsky, a capable musician with absolutely no feeling for jazz. Miffed, Tsfasman then declined the post of second pianist that was offered him, leaving no true jazz player except [drummer Ivan] Bacheev in a position of importance in the State Jazz Orchestra. Knushevitsky's classical background and ignorance of jazz predisposed him to turn the band into a kind of chamber orchestra with saxophones. The results were disastrous. What began as a small group rapidly snowballed into a forty-three piece ensemble, quite enough to stifle any jazz feeling or spontaneity that individual musicians might have spirited into the group.

— S. Frederick Starr. Red and Hot: The Fate of Jazz in the Soviet Union 1917–1991[3]

Boris Schwarz's book Music and Musical Life in Soviet Russia, 1917–1970 describes The State Jazz Orchestra of the USSR as "essentially" a "'light' music" (easy listening) orchestra.[4]

Selected discography

References
  1. "Review: Back in the USSR". JSTOR 129489. grandiosely named "The State Jazz Orchestra of the USSR." When it played, even Stalin approved, as Dr. Starr vividly narrates in one of the most amusing ...
  2. "SOVIET JAZZ HAS SURVIVED POLITICS". The New York Times.
  3. S. Frederick Starr (1994). Red and Hot: The Fate of Jazz in the Soviet Union 1917–1991. Hal Leonard Corporation. pp. 176–. ISBN 978-0-87910-180-0.
  4. Boris Schwarz (1972). Music and Musical Life in Soviet Russia, 1917–1970. Barrie and Jenkins. p. 361. ISBN 978-0-214-65264-6. In 1938, an official State Jazz Band of the U.S.S.R. was formed which absorbed some of the best players from Tsfasman's band and other organizations. In essence, it was an estradnaya orchestra—an ensemble playing "light" music—and the ...


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