David Toradze

David Toradze was a Soviet Georgian composer, film composer, and music teacher. He was born on April 14, 1922, in Tiflis, now Tbilisi, Georgia. He was named People's Artist of the Georgian SSR in 1961.

From 1937 to 1939 he studied at the Tbilisi Conservatory with Professors S. V. Barkhudaryan in composition and A. D. Virsaladze in piano. From 1939 to 1941 he continued his studies at the Moscow Conservatory named after Pyotr Tchaikovsky, where he studied composition with Professor Reinhold Gliere.

Toradze later became closely associated with the Tbilisi Conservatory as a teacher. In 1954 he began teaching composition and instrumentation there, and from 1973 he held the rank of professor. Between 1962 and 1968 he also served as deputy chairman of the board of the Union of Composers of the Georgian SSR.

His output included songs and romances on verses by Georgian poets, as well as music for theater and cinema. He wrote stage works in several genres, including the opera The Call of the Mountains (1947), the operettas Natela (1948) and The Avenger (1952), and the ballets Gorda (1949) and For Peace (1953), later revised as The Unconquered in 1970. He also composed the opera The Bride of the North (1958).

Among his orchestral and choral works are the festive overture Festival (1944), Symphony No. 1 (1946), African Sketches for soloists, choir, and variety-symphony orchestra (1962), Symphony No. 2 Praise to Nikortsminda (1968), a piano concerto with orchestra (1979), the symphonic pieces Morning and Joke, and the choral symphony Georgian Folk Melodies, as well as Seven Poems for choir, oboe, and double bass (1972) on verses by Galaktion Tabidze.

Toradze also wrote music for the theater, including productions of Comedy of One Night by K. R. Kaladze (1943), Sunken Stones by I. O. Mosashvili (1948), Spring in Saken by G. D. Gulia (1950), Modern Tragedy by R. S. Ebralidze (1960), and Teresa's Birthday by G. D. Mdivani (1962). His work received major official recognition, including the Order of Lenin, the Order of the Badge of Honor, the Stalin Prize of the second degree for the ballet Gorda, the title Honored Artist of the Georgian SSR, and the title People's Artist of the Georgian SSR. In 1977 he received the Grand Prix and gold medal at the 7th International Festival of Ballet Television Films in New York for the film-ballet Mtsyri.

He died on November 8, 1983, in Tbilisi, Georgian SSR, USSR, and was buried in the Didube Pantheon in Tbilisi.