“Formalism is music that people don’t understand at first hearing.”

— Sergei Prokofiev

Quoted in Boris Schwarz Music and Musical Life in Soviet Russia, 1917-1970 (1972) p. 115.

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Sergei Prokofiev 7

Ukrainian & Russian Soviet pianist and composer 1891–1953

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“Formalism is music that people don’t understand at first hearing.”

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