Name Mikhail Matinsky Died 1820 | Role Scientist Education Moscow State University | |
Similar People Vasily Pashkevich, Yevstigney Fomin, Dmitry Bortniansky | ||
Mikhail Alexeyevich Matinsky (Russian: Mihail alekseevich Matinskii, 1750 – c. 1820) was a Russian scientist, dramatist, librettist and opera composer.
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Biography
Matinsky originated from the serfs of Count S. P. Yaguzhinsky and was born in Pavlovskoe. He studied in the gymnasium for the "raznochintsy" (people not belonging to the gentry) at Moscow University and also in Italy. Later he taught mathematics at the Smolny Institute in St Petersburg. He published the following books: The Description of Measures and Weights of Different Countries (St Petersburg 1779), The Fundamentals of Geometry (St Petersburg 1798), and The Concise Universal Geography (St Petersburg 1800). He also translated the comedy The Churchwoman by Christian Furchtegott Gellert, and the same author's Fables and Tales, as well as The Republic of the Scientists by S. Fayard. He died in St Petersburg.
Operas
His creative output also included comedies, opera librettos, and even music set to them. His operas Regeneration (Pererozhdenie, 1777), and Saint-Petersburg's Trade Stalls (Sankt Peterburgskii Gostnii Dvor) had considerable success. The second one, a scathing satire to the government officials and their thievish behaviour, is one of the first examples of Russian comic opera. It was staged on December 26, 1779 at the Knipper Theatre in St Petersburg and was repeated 16 times. Later the music was rewritten by a composer Vasily Pashkevich in 1882 and 1792. In a new version the opera was also staged at the Court Theatre.