Toʻxtasin Jalilov

Toʻxtasin Jalilov was born in 1896 (some sources give 1895) in the Soyguzar quarter of Andijan, into a poor family. He never attended a music school: he had his first dutar lessons from the master Yusufjon changchi, taught himself the gijjak and tanbur, and also took lessons from Orif Toshmatov, Mahmudjon Usmonov and Moʻminjon Jabborov. From his youth he was known in the Fergana Valley as a fine singer and skilled instrumentalist.

In 1918–1920 he performed as a singer and gijjak player in agitation brigades, took part in the “Eastern Evenings” that Hamza organised in 1919, and later worked in Hamza’s dramatic troupe. In 1923 he played at the agricultural exhibition in Moscow. From 1925 to 1927 he was a member of the Uzbek concert-ethnographic ensemble, touring Paris, Moscow, Leningrad, Kazan and Ufa.

His theatre career began in Andijan: in the 1920s he chose the melodies for plays by Komil Yashin and Sobir Abdulla staged by amateur troupes, and from the late 1920s until 1934 he was artistic director of the Andijan Music Theatre. In 1934 he was invited to Tashkent as music director of the musical theatre there, and in 1935 he took part in an international dance festival in London. In 1937, ahead of the decade of Uzbek literature and art in Moscow, he founded and led a song and dance ensemble at the Uzbek State Philharmonic; that year he was named People’s Artist of the Uzbek SSR.

From 1940 Jalilov was artistic director of the Muqimiy Uzbek State Theatre of Musical Drama and Comedy. His music for “Tohir and Zuhra” (after Sobir Abdulla’s play) and “Nurkhan” by Komil Yashin became the core of the theatre’s repertoire. He took part in creating more than forty Uzbek musical dramas and, with Boris Brovtsyn, wrote an opera of the same name from “Tohir and Zuhra” (1949, second version 1955). In 1942 he led the Uzbek group of a concert brigade that toured Iran.

He was the author of more than 200 songs and melodies. Best known are his settings of poems by Hamza, Sobir Abdulla, Chustiy, Furqat and Muqimiy, and the melodies “Otmagay tong”, “Ey quyosh” and “Toʻylar muborak”. He played the tanbur, dutar, gijjak and chang, giving folk tunes a fresh sound and meaning; his pupils included Ganijon Toshmatov and Komiljon Jabborov.

Toʻxtasin Jalilov died in Tashkent in May 1966. He held the Order of Lenin, two Orders of the Red Banner of Labour and the Order of the Badge of Honour, and in 2002 was posthumously given the Order “For Outstanding Merit”. The folk instruments orchestra of the Uzbek State Philharmonic bears his name; his daughter Etibor Jalilova became a People’s Artist of Uzbekistan, and his sons Dehqon Jalilov and Salohiddin Toʻxtasinov also worked in the arts.