Eugen Doga


Eugen Doga was a Moldovan composer. He made significant contributions to various forms of music during his career.
Doga created ballets, Luceafărul, Venancia, and Queen Margot, the opera Dialogues of Love, more than 100 instrumental and choral works, symphonies, 6 quartets, Requiem and other church music. He also wrote incidental music for 13 plays, radio shows, more than 200 film scores, more than 260 songs and romances, more than 70 waltzes. He also composed works for children and the music for the opening and closing ceremonies of the 1980 Summer Olympic Games in Moscow.
The World Intellectual Property Organization, in recognition of his outstanding achievements in music, awarded him a special certificate in 2007.

Life and career

Early life and education

Doga was born on 1 March 1937 in the village of Mocra in the Rîbniţa District, in a Romanian family.
The childhood of the composer coincided with a period of historical cataclysms – the war, repressions, hunger, poverty, and exhausting hard work.
After finishing seven years at school, Doga with his friends went to Chișinău to enrol in the School of Music which he learned about when listening to a homemade radio. He was admitted to the music school, despite having no prior training. Thanks to his natural talent and hard work, Doga managed to quickly catch up, mastered musical notation, and learned to play cello. He always had the fondest memories of his cello teacher Pablo Giovanni Baccini, with whom his personal example greatly influenced the future destiny of the composer.
"My second teacher, an old man by the name of Pavel Ivanovich Bachinin, became my salvation. I always think of him with joy. He scheduled my first lesson at 6 o'clock in the morning. I came in – he was already sitting there playing the piano. I liked him a lot – intelligent, very musical, and tactful. He worked with me every morning from 6:00 to 8:30, before lectures, for two and a half years. He taught me not only to play the cello, but simply to be a decent human being. He never said the word 'must', never used the imperative mood. However, through his own example, his attitude, he had taught me a lot,"- said Doga.
In 1951–1955 he studied at the Music School in Chișinău, specializing in cello, and then at the Conservatory where one of his classmates was a future opera star Maria Bieșu. She made her debut with his song "White flower garden" on the Moldovan television. Paralysis of the left hand prevented a career of a musician – this was due to the fact that he used to live in a basement. Doga studied for another 5 years at the Art Institute "Gavriil Musicescu", in the class of Professor S. Lobel specializing in composition. 1 January 1957 for the first time in his work, "New Year song" was performed on the Moldovan radio children's choir and orchestra under the baton of Shiko Aranova. In 1963, he wrote his first string quartet.
After graduating from the Conservatory in Chişinău, he performed as cellist in the Orchestra of the State Committee of the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic for television and radio, taught at the Music College "Stefan Neaga" from Chișinău, and worked from 1967 to 1972 at the repertory-editorial Board of the Ministry of Culture of Moldova.
He made his compositional debut in 1963, with a string quartet.

Concert activity

From 1972 Doga om concert tours, travelled all over the territory of the former Soviet Union, as well to some foreign countries.
"The image of the person is defined by his deeds that ultimately benefit people and society. And the concerts that I give in Chișinău, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kursk or Bucharest, are aimed at precisely this idea of bringing people together, preserving the ideals that make people kinder, more tolerant, that make flowers bloom, and the sun shine brighter,"- said Eugen Doga.
Doga's concerts took place in the biggest concert halls. They "gathered huge audiences", and they still do today. "...There were so many offenses because of Eugen Doga's concerts; people just did not want to talk to me. They told me: "I have been asking you for three years, and you can't arrange Eugen Doga's concert." And I really couldn't, because he was very busy. In Leningrad there was a concert orchestra conducted by Anatoly Badhen, a wonderful orchestra, unequalled in the Soviet Union, which played high-quality music. This orchestra for many years gave a lot of concerts with Eugen Doga's music everywhere, throughout the Soviet Union" – Mikhail Murzak. Philharmonic Director of Chișinău.
His music was performed by the Choir of TV and radio Moldova, the Russian state Symphony orchestra of cinematography, Academic Choir "Doina", The George Enescu Philharmonic Orchestra, the Moscow chamber orchestra "The seasons", Leningrad Concert Orchestra, Academic Grand choir "Masters of choral singing", Orchestra of the Moldavian Philharmonic "Sergei Lonkevich", Moscow city Symphony orchestra "Russian Philharmonic", The national Symphony orchestra of the public company "Teleradio-Moldova", the Presidential orchestra of the Republic of Moldova, Children's choir "Liya Ciocarlia", Large children's choir of the USSR Gosteleradio, Orchestra of the Romanian National Opera Iași, and other groups.

Public activities

Equally important for Doga during his whole life was his public work. From 1987 to 1991 he was a member of the Committee on Lenin and State Prizes of the USSR. For two convocations he was in the Supreme Soviet of Moldavia, for two more – in the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. As of 2001 he was the permanent chairman of the jury of the All-Russian Movement "Gifted Children of Russia", chairman of the jury of the contest of family Theatre. From 1997 to 2002 he worked with preschool children in a house where he lived. Member of the International Academy of the Arts, Member of the academy of film art "NIKA", Full member of the Russian Academy of science and culture; Member of the International Academy of Arts and culture. Throughout the creative activities of Doga he conducted awareness-raising concerts, charity concerts, and lectured to students.
He was on numerous juries of various music and cinematic competitions and festivals across Russia and abroad: Festival "Spirit of fire", Kremlin Cadet ball, Berdyanskiy International Film Festival, Education International Festival in Iași, International Film Forum "Gold Knight", The all-Russian children's charity ball books heroes", and so on.
Doga declared that he supported the Unification of Moldova and Romania.
He was an Orthodox Christian, belonging to the Metropolis of Bessarabia.
Doga opposed the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine and called it a war, not a "special military operation".
He participated in the European Moldova National Assembly on 21 May 2023.

Family

"Family is the home port, which any ship is seeking for, wherever it is. Even despite long distances. Our, artists', distances are incommensurable, but I am glad to have my wife, daughter and grandson waiting for me". Eugen Doga
In 1962 Eugen Doga was married to a graduate of the Moscow technological Institute of Natalia. They had a daughter, Viorica and grandson, Dominic.
  • Father – Dmitry Fedorovich Doga.
  • Mother – Elizabeth Nikiforovna Doga.
  • Wife – Natalia Pavlovna Doga, engineer.
  • Daughter – Viorica Doga.
  • Grandson – Dominique Doga

    Later life

Eugen Doga lived with his family in Chișinău, as well as in Moscow. He continued to perform live, participating in various festivals.
In 2012, the anniversary concert in the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, Concert Hall Ateneul Roman in Bucharest, at the National Palace in Chișinău, in 2013 – in Kazakhstan, 2014 – performances in Tomsk, Stavropol, in Iași, in the park Arts Titan in Bucharest and others. In 2014, his waltz "Gramophone" was performed in the hall Ateneum Roman at the annual awarding of the Romanian Academy for outstanding achievements in the field of culture, science and education, along with works by Mozart, Enescu, Strauss, and Borodin.
He continued with social activities – spent with like-minded charity concerts at Children's Hospital and the hospital, in Tiraspol, participated in festivals.
In 2012 Doga established the International Fund "Dominanta". The Fund is designed to facilitate the implementation of the composer's creative and spiritual principles – cooperation in the field of musical art, cinema.
On 18 January 2014, the salon "Eugen Doga" opened its doors. This is the implementation of long – standing ambition to create a Music room, which will bring together like-minded people. The main aim of the Salon is the convergence of the society in a fragmented world today with the help of art and communication.
The documentary film "Eugen Doga" took the big prize at the International Festival of Independent Film "HERCULES.ro" in Romania.
Doga died on 3 June 2025, at the age of 88.

Creation

Film music

In 1967, Eugen Doga began writing music for cinema and it became a regular engagement for many years. "The first movie with my music came out in 1968, the last – in 2011. Cinema is a whole separate life, my most important and favorite genre. In cinema music I was able to express all of my stylistic aspirations; I got to work with great orchestras, musicians, and movie directors from around the world" – said Eugen Doga.
Eugen Doga's debut as a movie composer was in 1967 in the movie directed by George Voda "We need a gatekeeper for anime" based on the fairy-tale "Ivan Turbinca" by Ion Creanga – a fantastic story about amazing adventures of a soldier from the royal army, who was invited to serve as a guard of the gates to paradise.
He continued to write music for movies. From 1960s to 1970s he wrote music for almost half of the movies produced by the studio "Moldova-Film." There was a running joke in the studio that it should be renamed into "MolDoga Film".