Sergei Prokofiev was one of seven Soviet composers (among the others: Khachaturian and Shostakovich) denounced in 1948 "for formalistic and anti-democratic tendencies in music which are alien to the Soviet people." Confessing his "guilt," the great Russian composer promised to mend his Western ways in his next opera, which proved to be his last. Ten months later. The Story of a Real Man was submitted to the Composers' Union, was promptly banned as "anti-melodious" and still reeking with "the decay of bourgeois culture." Now, long after his official post-Stalin rehabilitation and seven years...
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