Rostropovitch, Mstislav

Rostropovitch, Mstislav (mĭs`tĭsläv' rŏs'trəpô`vyĭch), 1927–, Russian cellist, pianist, and conductor. He made his cello debut in 1940, toured with the Moscow Philharmonic, and taught at the Moscow Conservatory until his friendship with Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and his support for Soviet dissidents brought him into official disfavor in the early 1970s. Banned from many musical outlets, Rostropovitch, his wife, the soprano Galina Vishnevskaya, and their children left the Soviet Union in 1974 and settled in the United States the following year. From 1977 to 1994 he served as the musical director of the National Symphony Orchestra, Washington, D.C.