Mikhail Bronner is a Russian composer, born on 25 February 1952 in Moscow. He studied at the Moscow State Conservatory, graduating in 1977 in composition under Tikhon Khrennikov and orchestration under Yuri Fortunatov, and completed postgraduate studies there in 1981.
He has been active in Russian musical institutions as a member of the board of the Moscow Composers' Organization, chairman of the admissions commission of the Union of Moscow Composers, and a member of the organizing committee of the international festival of contemporary music Moscow Autumn. Since 2001 he has taught composition at the M. M. Ippolitov-Ivanov State Musical Pedagogical Institute.
Bronner is the author of more than 400 works in various genres. His stage works include the operas The Ugly Duckling (2015), Edible Tales (2013), The Golden Island (1993), and The Cold Heart (1981), as well as the ballets An Optimistic Tragedy (1985) and The Taming of the Shrew (1996). Several of these works were staged in major Moscow musical theaters, including the Moscow Children's Music Theater named after Natalia Sats and the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Academic Music Theatre.
A large part of his catalogue consists of concert works, including 74 instrumental concertos. Among them are Three Sad Messages for violin and chamber orchestra (2016), Kein Heldenleben for chamber orchestra (2016), I Float in the Waves of Love for bayan and chamber orchestra (2016), Zugzwang for symphony orchestra with solo piano, violin, and clarinet (2015), In The Middle of Nowhere for violin, viola, and chamber orchestra (2015), Belarusian Concerto for cymbals and chamber orchestra (2012), TSAVT TANEM for cello and chamber orchestra (2011), Illusion of Life for violin, percussion, and chamber orchestra (2011), and Gates of Heaven for violin and chamber orchestra (2000).
He has also written major choral and vocal works, including Stabat Mater, Jewish Requiem, The Shadow of Trees, Peasant Songs, From Russian Poetry, Humana Mass, and various vocal cycles on poems by John Keats, Anna Akhmatova, Marina Tsvetaeva, Osip Mandelstam, and Joseph Brodsky. Bronner considers Jewish Requiem, composed in 1992, to be his principal work; its world premiere took place in six cities in Germany in 1994.
Bronner's music has been performed in concert halls and at festivals across Russia and internationally, and his works have been issued on records and compact discs in Russia and abroad. He also composed for screen, including the television series Poirot's Failure directed by Sergei Ursulyak. Among his honors are the Dmitri Shostakovich Prize of the Union of Composers of Russia, the 2017 international audience award Theatregoer's Star for best production for children and youth for the opera The Ugly Duckling, a Silver Disc from the Gnessin Russian Academy of Music for merits in bayan art, and the titles Composer of the Year in 2002 and Person of the Year in 2013 from the newspaper Muzykalnoye obozrenie.