Stalin came to hear a performance of "Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District". However, he did not like it, and he left during the performance. A few days later an article was written in the newspaper "Pravda" about the opera. The article heading was: “Chaos instead of music”. It said that the opera was full of horrible music and noisy chords. The opera was not allowed to be performed again in the Soviet Union for almost thirty years.