Nadezhda Simonyan

Nadezhda Simonyan (February 26, 1922 - June 7, 1997) was a Russian composer who wrote over 40 film scores for movies, radio, and television, as well as chamber and orchestral works, and music for circus performances. Simonyan was born in Rostov-on-the-Don. She studied composition and piano at Leningrad Conservatory, where she received a diploma in 1950 and earned a medal. Her teachers included Oles Chishko and Venedikt Pushkov. In 1956, Simonyan wrote her first film soundtrack for Old Man Khottabych, a children’s film by Gennadii Kazanskii. Peter Rollberg described Simonyan’s strength as a composer as a “ . . . warm melodiousness that equally energizes cheerful, dramatic, and tragic episodes with a pragmatic, flexible approach to instrumentation.” In 1960, Italian film maker Federico Fellini praised her soundtrack for the movie Lady with the Dog. She often used smaller chamber orchestras...