Career
He composed well over two hundred musical pieces imbued with romantic, sentimental moods and subtle lyricism which enjoyed great success in Russia. His numerous morceaux in his dramatic declamatory style, pre-date the creative works of Dargomyzhsky, Mussorgsky and Tchaikovsky. The young Aleksander was raised in the rich musical environment of Count Vladimir Orlov"s country estate Otrada, near Moscow.
He was taught violin by his father, Lev Gurilyov, a serf musician and kapellmeister in the orchestra of the Orlovs.
In 1831 he was freed after the death of his father"s owner and moved to Moscow, where he soon became known as a composer of folk music, pianist and teacher. Having become acquainted with the representatives of the Moscow intelligentsia - artists and writers, Gurilyov wrote songs based on poems by Grekov, Aleksey Koltsov, Makarova, and rapidly acquired popularity.
Some of his compositinons were published by well-known publishers in music magazines. In his last years he was paralyzed and suffered from mental illness, which eventually became the cause of his death in Moscow in 1858.