For one graduate student here at BGSU, moving to the United States was more than just a change of scenery — it was a step closer to following her dream.
At the age of 17, Svetlana Smolina packed her bags, left her home in Gorky, Russia and headed for the United States for greater opportunities to study piano. In Russia, playing concerts and teaching music simply does not pay enough money for basic living, and both Svetlana and her mother felt the United States would offer her more chances at building a career through playing the piano, she said.
“You come here and you can do so many things. It is difficult to find [such opportunities] in the rest of the world,” she said. “When you come to this country you can do anything.”
Smolina’s chance to study in the United States came after attending a recital by Alexander Toradze in Saint Petersburg Russia in 1995. After meeting with Toradze after the show, and later performing for him, Toradze invited Smolina to study with him at Indiana University South Bend, with a full tuition waiver plus scholarship.
“I was thinking about entering the Moscow Conservatory, but instead this opportunity of studying in the U.S. came and I decided to try,” she said. “It all happened so fast.”
Smolina’s invitation to the United States came in June, and she left Russia in September of the same year. Smolina did not realize just how quick this move would be. Because she was an only child, she knew it would be hard on her mother, who she had been living with at the time.
“I am so thankful to her though that she let me go,” Smolina said.
Although she is now thousands of miles from home, Smolina carries on a family tradition of playing the piano. Her mother graduated with a music education/music theory degree from the Moscow Conservatory and teaches piano and theory in Gorky, as well as working for a Laser Design Firm.
This musical background is what first interested Smolina in playing the piano. She took her first piano lesson at the age of seven, and after her first public performance, she knew she had found something she loved, she said.
“After my first concert I played for the public, the communication with the audience that I was able to see, and the warm reaction [made me] love the music even more,” Smolina said.
This positive interaction Smolina had with the audience and performing something she loved was a major driving force for her continuing to play, even when practices seemed long and discouraging.
“I love everything about piano, but it takes a certain amount of time to get to where you want to be,” she said.
Now, at 27 years old, Smolina’s practice has paid off. She has competed in piano competitions around the world, and performed recitals in Italy, Greece, Japan and here in the U.S.
Her first international win came in Senigallia, Italy at the International Piano Competition.
Smolina also won the grand prize at a 2001 International Two Piano Competition in Miami, Florida alongside husband Maxam Mogilevsky. The two met in Russia when Mogilevsky was an assistant to her future teacher, Toradze.
After studying in Indiana, Smolina moved to Brussels for three years, then returned to the United States to complete her bachelor’s degree at Oberlin Conservatory.
The two were then married, and her husband took a job as an assistant professor of music performance studies here at the University in 2003.
After moving to Bowling Green, Smolina decided to further her studies, and complete her master’s degree in music performance after finding a great piano teacher, she said. She now studies under Virginia Marks, a professor in the College of Musical Arts.
After graduating this May, Smolina plans on continuing her education and earning her doctorate possibly at the University of Michigan.
Throughout her career in piano, there have been numerous conductors and performers that Smolina has looked up to and admired for their work, such as piano players Emil Gilels, Martha Argerich and Sviatoslav Richter.
“I love these performers for their incredible talent, ability, skills of making different colors, characters, clarity, quality of the sound, [and ability to] put listeners literally into their world of music,” she said.
Her favorite conductor however is Valery Gergiev, for the way he relates to the audience and Smolina in particular.
“There are some performances that when you listen to them or watch people perform, you just don’t want them to stop,” she said.
“You see them and your jaw drops, and you’re like, ‘wow.'”
Smolina will continue performing throughout the year at venues in Italy, Austria, Greece and at the Rurh Klavier Festival in Germany where performers come by invite only.
