Goldin Max Davidovich (1917)

Goldin Max (Moisei) Davidovich (10 August 1917, Riga) — composer, educator, and musicologist.

Max Goldin graduated from the Latvian State Conservatory in 1939, having studied composition under Jāzeps Vītols. During the Second World War, he served on the front and was seriously wounded. Following his recovery, he joined the Latvian SSR Artistic Ensemble stationed in Ivanovo, composing choral works during 1941–44.

From 1944 to 1947, he pursued postgraduate studies at the Moscow State Conservatory under Professor Alexander Alexandrov. In 1948, he returned to the Latvian State Conservatory, where he became a senior lecturer and, from 1977, a full professor. He earned his Candidate degree in musicology in 1952 and was awarded a Doctorate in 1970.

Goldin's compositions are distinguished by their formal clarity, polished technical craftsmanship, richly coloured harmony, and deft polyphonic texture. He made significant contributions to the preservation and study of Jewish folk music, arranging over eighty Jewish folk songs for voice and piano and more than forty for choir. He incorporated Jewish folk melodies into his own works, using them both as quotations and as the basis for improvisational exploration. In 1994, he compiled an anthology of Jewish folk song.

His compositional oeuvre includes vocal, choral, and instrumental music, as well as the dramatic mystery play “Esther and Artaxerxes” (1988).

Selected works: Latviešu tautas deju melodijas. R., Liesma, 1967; Latviešu un cittautu mūzikas sakari. R., Liesma, 1972; Internacionalas tendences Emīļa Melngaiļa darbībā. R., Liesma, 1983

About: SKV. Lpp. 37–39; Padomju Latvijas mūzikas darbinieki. R.,1965. Lpp.173–174; Карклинь Л. Композиторы и музыковеды советской Латвии. Рига, 1974. С. 71–73; Latviesu komponisti un muzikoloģi. Sast. L. Furmane. R.,1989. Lpp. 44–45.

М. Михайлец

Г. Смирин