Mikhail Fabianovich Gnesin

Mikhail Gnesin or Gnessin (2 February {O.S. 21 January} 1883, Roston-on-Don, Russian Empire — 5 May 1957, Moscow, USSR), was a Russian-Jewish composer, musicologist, and music pedagogue, one of the founders of the Society for Jewish Folk Music. He studied at the St. Petersburg Conservatory with Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Alexander Glazunov, and Anatoly Liadov. Mikhail's elder sisters Elena (1874—1967), Mariya Gnesina (1874/76—1918), and Evgeniya Savina-Gnesina (1871—1940) established the renowned Gnessin State Musical College in 1895. Gnessin's works The Maccabeans and The Youth of Abraham earned him the "Jewish Glinka" nickname. Some of his prominent students include Aram Khatchaturian, Niyazi, Evgeni Svetlanov, Tikhon Khrennikov, Alexander Varlamov, Vadim Salmanov, Sergei Axyuk, Samuil Senderei, and Pavel Aedonitsky.