Red Square and Mstislav Rostropovich

After I graduated from Miami University in 1993, like every other graduate, it was time to get a job. Having two majors - Russian Langauge & Diplomacy and Foreign Affairs - it seemed appropriate that I looked to do something in connection with Russia.

In mid May of that year, I called the US Department of Commerce and requested a list of every American company doing business in Russia. After receiving the list, I sent my resume to every company with an office in the USA (over 120 companies). Over the next few weeks, I received only two responses - one from a company in Stamford, Connecticut, and one from a New York businessman who had an import warehouse in Moscow, Russia. So for the first time in my life, I left the USA and went to work in the former Soviet Union.

I arrived in July of 1993, but I was so busy working, I never had time to visit the sights. Eventhough I lived in downtown Moscow and only minutes from Red Square, I did not walk across Red Square until Septmeber 25, 1993, and that was by accident! I was out that evening with a few friends (including my roommate Paul Moser) and we turned left and bang, there I was, standing on the most iconic symbol of the former Soviet Union.

Being on Red Square was a strange feeling for me. The only time that I had seen Red Square was on television as the tanks and missiles were paraded across the square during the annual Soviet May Day parades. Now, I was standing there, looking at the Kremlin and Lenin's Mausoleum. I knew that at that time not a whole lot of Americans had been to Red Square, as the Cold War had only ended a few years before. I had the wonderful feeling that it was a new world with a new beginning. The early 90's was a very interesting time to be in Russia.

That evening, a stage was being erected on Red Square for a concert to be held the following day. On September 26, 1993, Mstislav Rostropovich was going to conduct a concert - the 1812 Overture by Tchaikovasky - on Red Square. For most of his life, Rostropovich fought the Soviets for freedom of speech and democratic values and was punished by the Soviets for such views. Rostropovich left the Soviet Union in 1974 and settled in the United States. In 1978 and because of his public opposition to the Soviet Union's restriction of cultural freedom, his Soviet citizenship was revoked. Rostropovich did not return to the Soviet Union until 1990, and his return was a symbol of the new beginning for Russia and for the post-Cold War world.

A contemporary background video about Rostropovich's 1993 concert is below.


The following day, Paul and I happily returned to Red Square in order to watch Rostropovich's concert and enjoy a beautiful, cool fall day in Moscow.