Horowitz Back in Soviet Union After 61 Years

Pianist Vladimir Horowitz, who left the Soviet Union 61 years ago vowing never to return, came home for the first time today as an “ambassador of peace.”

Horowitz, 81, accompanied by his wife, Wanda, told reporters at Moscow airport that he is happy to be back, adding, “I have no enemies here, only friends.”

Horowitz will give two concerts, already sold out, in Moscow and Leningrad during his three-week visit and will try to visit his native city of Kiev, capital of the Soviet Ukraine. He entered the Soviet Union on a six-month visa.

After he emigrated, Horowitz was quoted in one biography as saying: “I have no desire to return. I don’t like the Russian approach to music, to art, to anything. I lost all my family there. I never want to go back and never will.”

‘Much Has Changed’

Asked about this today, he replied: “It was wartime then. Much has changed.” He added, “I had many friends here but I don’t know if they are still alive.”

Horowitz said: “I will greet the Soviet people with my music. . . . I am an ambassador of peace. I am very glad to be home here, and in Leningrad especially, which I love.”

He was embraced today by his niece, Lena Dolberg, who had not seen him since he left Leningrad as a 21-year-old in 1925.

Dolberg told reporters before greeting her uncle that she was apprehensive about meeting him. “I last saw him in 1925. He was young and beautiful and happy. I am sad that it has been so long.”

Disillusioned by Restrictions

Horowitz, born Oct. 1, 1904, left his country disillusioned by growing cultural restrictions which followed a comparatively open period immediately after the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917.

His father, Simeon, lied about his age to Soviet authorities when he was due to do national service and obtained for his son a six-month temporary visa for Germany, from where he sailed to the United States.