Pyotr Naumovich Volkov (1877-1933)

Pyotr Naumovich Volkov, who was Professor of trombone at the first conservatoire in Russia—then St. Petersburg, now Leningrad—was both an ordinary and an extraordinary figure. In order to understand more clearly the significance of this distinguished teacher's work we must consider it in its historical context in the musical life of Russia.

The trombone first appeared in Russia during the reign of Tsar Peter I (Peter the Great). As Yakob Shtelin writes in his book Music and the Ballet in 18th-century Russia, Peter was very fond of the solemn sound of trombones and the now obsolete cornetti which he had probably heard on his first trip to Holland and Germany. He sent for such a group from Riga and this was kept for playing at banquets.

Later trombones became established in military music. Lukashov, from the orchestra of Prince Yusupov, and Kegel from Moscow are two of the gifted Russian military trombone players from those days whose names we know. In 1876–77 Rimsky-Korsakov wrote his concerto for trombone and wind band. It was played for the first time in Kronstadt on 16th March 1878 by an NCO, Leonov, with the composer conducting, and again by a private, Aksyonov, in Nikolaev on 21st June 1882.

Trombones did not appear in opera orchestras in Russia until the first quarter of the 19th century, nor in symphony orchestras until even later. The trombonists in the professional orchestras of the imperial theatres at that time were foreigners.

The second half of the 19th century is notable for the rapid development of musical life in Russia. In 1859 was founded in St. Petersburg the Russian Musical Society whose principal task was to set up an organisation of wide-ranging concert activity and to make music popular amongst the general public. This raised the question of creating a body of Russian musicians and the need for instituting some kind of musical education and so the first Russian conservatoire was opened in St. Petersburg in 1862 on the initiative of Anton Rubinstein.

Since at that time there were no Russian musicians to fill the teaching posts, these were taken by foreigners. The first trombone teacher at the St. Petersburg Conservatoire was Franz Josef Türner (1831–1909), Austrian by birth and musical education. He became a teacher there in 1870 and professor in 1879, while also working as an artist in the orchestras of the St. Petersburg Imperial Theatres and also as director of the wind band of the Life Guards' Regiment.

Pyotr Volkov was one of Türner's pupils. This distinguished trombonist, founder of the Leningrad branch of the Russian school of trombone playing, thus received his training in the old St. Petersburg Conservatoire. He was born on 12th January 1877 in the village of Golovchino in the government of Kursk, son of Naum Volkov, a former military musician and a well known horn player in Russia.