7 Sergey Prokofiev 7In 1927 Prokofiev toured the Soviet Union and was
rapturously received by the Soviet public as a world-
renowned Russian musician-revolutionary. During the
1920s and the early ’30s, Prokofiev also toured with
immense success as a pianist in the great musical centres
of western Europe and the United States. His U.S. tours
were attended with tumultuous success and brought him
new commissions, such as the Symphony No. 4 in C Major
(1930), for the 50th anniversary of the Boston Symphony,
and the String Quartet No. 1, commissioned by the Library
of Congress. His new piano concerti—No. 4 (1931), for the
left hand, and No. 5 in G Major (1932)—demonstrated anew
his bent for virtuoso brilliance.
Soviet Period
Although he enjoyed many aspects of life in the West,
Prokofiev increasingly missed his homeland. Visits to the
Soviet Union in 1927, 1929, and 1932 led him to return to
Moscow permanently. From 1933 to 1935 the composer
became a leading figure of Soviet culture. In the two
decades constituting the Soviet period of Prokofiev’s
work—1933 to 1953—the realistic and epic traits of his art
became more clearly defined. The synthesis of traditional
tonal and melodic means with the stylistic innovations of
20th-century music was more fully realized.
In the years preceding World War II, Prokofiev created
a number of classical masterpieces, including his Violin
Concerto No. 2 in G Minor (1935) and the ballet Romeo and
Juliet (1935–36). His work in theatre and the cinema gave
rise to a number of programmatic suites, such as the
Lieutenant Kije suite (1934), the Egyptian Nights suite (1934),
and the symphonic children’s tale Peter and the Wolf (1936).
Turning to opera, he cast in the form of a contemporary
drama of folk life his Semyon Kotko, depicting events of the