Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich was a Russian composer and pianist. He is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century, with a unique harmonic language and a historic importance due to his years of work under Stalin. Shostakovich achieved fame in the Soviet Union under the patronage of Soviet chief of staff Mikhail Tukhachevsky, but had a complex and difficult relationship with the government, he received accolades and state awards and served in the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR and the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. A polystylist, Shostakovich developed a hybrid voice, combining a variety of different musical techniques into his works, his music is characterized by sharp contrasts, elements of the grotesque, ambivalent tonality. Shostakovich's orchestral works include six concerti, his chamber output includes 15 string quartets, a piano quintet, two piano trios, two pieces for string octet. His solo piano works include two sonatas, an early set of preludes, a set of 24 preludes and fugues.

Other works include three operas, several song cycles, a substantial quantity of film music. Born at Podolskaya Street in Saint Petersburg, Shostakovich was the second of three children of Dmitri Boleslavovich Shostakovich and Sofiya Vasilievna Kokoulina. Shostakovich's paternal grandfather surnamed Szostakowicz, was of Polish Roman Catholic descent, but his immediate forebears came from Siberia. A Polish revolutionary in the January Uprising of 1863–4, Bolesław Szostakowicz was exiled to Narym in 1866 in the crackdown that followed Dmitri Karakozov's assassination attempt on Tsar Alexander II; when his term of exile ended, Szostakowicz decided to remain in Siberia. He became a successful banker in Irkutsk and raised a large family, his son Dmitri Boleslavovich Shostakovich, the composer's father, was born in exile in Narim in 1875 and studied physics and mathematics at Saint Petersburg University, graduating in 1899. He went to work as an engineer under Dmitri Mendeleev at the Bureau of Weights and Measures in Saint Petersburg.

In 1903 he married another Siberian transplant to the capital, Sofiya Vasilievna Kokoulina, one of six children born to a Russian Siberian native. Their son, Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich, displayed significant musical talent after he began piano lessons with his mother at the age of nine. On several occasions he displayed a remarkable ability to remember what his mother had played at the previous lesson, would get "caught in the act" of playing the previous lesson's music while pretending to read different music placed in front of him. In 1918 he wrote a funeral march in memory of two leaders of the Kadet party murdered by Bolshevik sailors. In 1919, at age 13, Shostakovich was admitted to the Petrograd Conservatory headed by Alexander Glazunov, who monitored his progress and promoted him. Shostakovich studied piano with Leonid Nikolayev after a year in the class of Elena Rozanova, composition with Maximilian Steinberg, counterpoint and fugue with Nikolay Sokolov, with whom he became friends.

He attended Alexander Ossovsky's music history classes. Steinberg tried to guide Shostakovich on the path of the great Russian composers, but was disappointed to see him'wasting' his talent and imitating Igor Stravinsky and Sergei Prokofiev. Shostakovich suffered for his perceived lack of political zeal, failed his exam in Marxist methodology in 1926, his first major musical achievement was the First Symphony, written as his graduation piece at the age of 19. This work brought him to the attention of Mikhail Tukhachevsky, who helped Shostakovich find accommodation and work in Moscow, sent a driver around in "a stylish automobile" to take him to a concert. After graduation, Shostakovich embarked on a dual career as concert pianist and composer, but his dry playing style was unappreciated, he won an "honorable mention" at the First International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw in 1927 and attributed the disappointing result to suffering from appendicitis and the jury being all Polish. He had his appendix removed in April 1927.

After the competition Shostakovich met the conductor Bruno Walter, so impressed by the composer's First Symphony that he conducted it at its Berlin premiere that year. Leopold Stokowski was impressed and gave the work its U. S. premiere the following year in Philadelphia. Stokowski made the work's first recording. Shostakovich concentrated on composition thereafter and soon limited his performances to his own works. In 1927 he wrote a patriotic piece with a pro-Soviet choral finale. Owing to its experimental nature, as with the subsequent Third Symphony, it was not critically acclaimed with the enthusiasm given to the First.1927 marked the beginning of Shostakovich's relationship with Ivan Sollertinsky, who remained his closest friend until the latter's death in 1944. Sollertinsky introduced the composer to Mahler's music, which had a str

Bắc Ninh is a city in the northern part of Vietnam and is the capital of Bắc Ninh Province. The city is the cultural and commercial center of the province; the city area is 82.60 square km, with a population of 501,199 in November 2017. In January 2006, the town of Bắc Ninh was upgraded to city. In March 1884, Bắc Ninh was the site of a decisive campaign in the wars between France and assorted Black Flag Army forces, the town fell to the French. Thereafter under French protectorate, the town was confirmed as the center of all political, cultural offices of colonial administration in the province; the land of the Bắc Ninh Citadel, within Niem and Do Villages, was occupied by French troops. At this time Bắc Ninh became known in Europe for its lacquer work and mother-of-pearl inlaid black-wood screens, cabinets and boxes. Bắc Ninh Railway Station opened after 1904. An ambush of French troops by the Việt Minh occurred at Bắc Ninh while the 1946 Fontainebleau Conference was ongoing; the city's name means "northern serenity".

The city is home to the Banking Academy of Vietnam, Bắc Ninh campus, the Kinh Bắc International School, the Military Academy of Politics main campus, Bắc Ninh Railway Station. There is a shrine to Bà Chúa Kho; the city is administratively divided into 19 units, including 16 urban wards - Đáp Cầu, Hạp Lĩnh, Khắc Niệm, Phong Khê, Khúc Xuyên, Thị Cầu, Vũ Ninh, Suối Hoa, Tiền An, Ninh Xá, Vân Dương, Vạn An, Vệ An, Kinh Bắc, Đại Phúc, Võ Cường - and 3 rural communes - Hoà Long, Kim Chân and Nam Sơn

Part of a series of articles upon Archaeology of Kosovo An archaeological site at Poslište was discovered during the construction of the highway segment between Prizren and Vrmica in 2010 one kilometre south of the multilayer archaeological site at Vlašnja, on the left side of this road segment 150 m from the road that leads toward the Poslište village. Rescue excavations were carried out at this location in an earlier known unidentified site of Roman era. Based on the discovered archaeological material, the archaeological excavations proved existence of the remains of a Roman road station, set along the ancient road Via Lissus-Naissus. Aside from the discovered movable archaeological material, within this archaeological complex, a Mansio with several secondary rooms with a conspicuous Thermae were recorded. Most as part of the Roman road station a building known as Mutatio or horse exchange station was part of this complex. While, it is known that along the important Roman roads, there were station stables that served to offer fresh horses a service, offered at each road station along the Roman roads during Roman period.

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