Anatoly Konstantinovich Lyadov, a Russian composer, was born on May 11, 1855, in Saint Petersburg. He grew up without a mother but showed early musical talent. His father, a conductor at the Mariinsky Theatre in Saint Petersburg, gave him his first lessons. After his father's death, when Lyadov was thirteen, he began attending the Saint Petersburg Conservatory in 1870. Despite initial difficulties, he later became a teacher of elementary music theory there.
Although Lyadov undoubtedly possessed great talent, a certain laziness and lack of discipline characterized him throughout his life. These traits deterred him from larger, more labor-intensive projects. He worked on one opera for decades without making any significant progress. When the choreographer Sergei Diaghilev commissioned him to compose the ballet "The Firebird" in 1909, Lyadov had, after some time, only purchased the music paper, whereupon Diaghilev passed the commission on to the young Igor Stravinsky.
Lyadov's compositions consist mainly of piano miniatures and short orchestral pieces. They are characterized by a masterful command of compositional technique and a nuanced use of color, sometimes even bordering on the grotesque. In his later years, his music showed harmonic influences from other composers. Despite his unfinished projects, he left behind works that remain in the repertoire to this day. Lyadov died on August 28, 1914, at his estate, Polinovka, in the Novgorod Governorate, leaving behind a fascinating, if incomplete, chapter in the history of Russian music.