Alexander Siloti and Arnold Schoenberg: on performance “Pelleas et Melisande” in Saint Petersburg

The article reveals the main aspects of organizing the tour of the Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg to St. Petersburg in 1912. The well-known musician-educator Alexander Ilyich Siloti was the initiator of Schönberg's visit to Russia. He invited the composer to perform his new work, the symphonic poem “Pelleas et Melisande” (Op. 5), written in Berlin on the subject of the symbolist playwright M. Maeterlinck. The author of the article bases upon published and unpublished sources, highlights the historical, social and psychological background of the composer's arrival in St. Petersburg. The scientific research base of the article is the materials of archives, first introduced into scientific circulation, including reviews of the “Russian Musical Newspaper” and other periodicals of the pre-revolutionary period. The purpose of this article is to analyze and highlight the historical event, which is the arrival of Arnold Schoenberg in St. Petersburg in the context of the cultural life of the capital, which became a noticeable phenomenon and continued in subsequent years.