Composers on the March, 1941-45

This chapter examines the Composers' Union during the Great Patriotic War. The war was an important moment in the development of the Soviet music profession. During a chaotic and traumatic evacuation, the Composers' Union expanded contacts and implicit commitments between the central body and local chapters, clarified the institutional relationship between its professional and resource distribution functions, and drew a solid boundary on membership by permanently excluding performers. At the same time, an influx of new members, mainly songwriters, changed the face of Composers' Union membership. Most importantly, the leadership of the Composers' Union helped to stimulate and support composers' and musicologists' response to the call to professional arms. The Composers' Union as a whole and its members individually produced just the sort of music that the war effort required. For this service, the members of the Composers' Union gained lasting juridical access to a comparatively privileged strata of Soviet society.