Views: 256

|

Zelina Iskanderova writes:

Every two years, at the end of August - beginning of September, Toronto hosts the largest Ashkenaz Festival in North America and the world - a festival of Jewish culture from around the world! For those who will not attend the screening (September 4) of a Russian film about the outstanding singer Mikhail Alexandrovich and the coverage of a new book about him, organized by me at the ongoing Ashkenaz Festival 2016, on September 22 at 7 pm I will do a repeat in my “Evenings of Jewish Culture” Program "in the northern Russian-speaking part of Toronto, in the Bernard Bethel Center. A new Russian film “Like a Nightingale about a Rose...” and a presentation of Leonid Makhlis’ book “Six Careers of Mikhail Alexandrovich”, recently published in Moscow, will be shown. Life of a Tenor”, ​​which served as the basis for the film, along with unique video and audio materials, as well as archival documents.

Mikhail Alexandrovich

Mikhail Davidovich Alexandrovich was born on July 23, 1914 in the village of Berspils (Latvia).
M. Aleksandrovich’s parents worked at a rural inn, servicing a tavern and a trading store. The father, a self-taught musician, instilled in his children a love of music, taught them to sing and play the violin. He began to pay special attention to four-year-old Misha, who discovered a clear and strong voice, excellent musical memory and excellent hearing.
And in 1921, the Alexandrovich family, which already had five children, moved to the capital of Latvia, Riga, where Misha began to study at the People's Jewish Conservatory.
On October 19, 1923, the first public concert of nine-year-old Mikhail Alexandrovich took place in Riga, and was a great success. In 1924-1926. the young singer performed with great success in Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, and Germany.
During the period of voice failure (1927-1933), M. Aleksandrovich studied at the gymnasium and played the violin at the Riga Conservatory. He gave a solo concert again in Riga on January 1, 1933, and in the same year he began working as a cantor in the Riga synagogue. In August 1934 he moved to Manchester (England), where he became the chief cantor of the local synagogue. While living and working in England, M. Aleksandrovich periodically traveled to Italy, where he improved his singing with the famous tenor Benjamino Gigli.
In 1937, Aleksandrovich moved to Lithuania, where he became the cantor of the Oel Yaakov choral synagogue in Kaunas, sang in opera and gave concerts.
In 1940, M. Aleksandrovich received an invitation from the Belarusian State Stage to work in Minsk and in the spring of 1941 he began performing concerts in Minsk and other cities of Belarus.
During the Great Patriotic War, M. Aleksandrovich sang a lot for soldiers and toured in Baku, Tbilisi, and Yerevan.
On July 5, 1943, M. Alexandrovich gave his first concert in Moscow. The singer's enchanting velvety voice and his virtuoso performance of difficult opera arias delighted the Moscow public. Beginning in 1945, he toured the Soviet Union extensively and with constant success.
In 1947, Mikhail Alexandrovich received the title Honored Artist of the RSFSR. In 1948, he was awarded the Stalin Prize for his concert activities. In the Soviet Union, 70 records with his recordings were released - the total circulation of the records was 2 million copies. At the same time, during all the years of his life in the USSR, the singer was never given the opportunity to tour in the West.
In October 1971, M. Aleksandrovich and his family left for permanent residence in Israel, and in 1973 he moved to the USA. He has successfully given concerts in Tel Aviv, New York, Toronto, Rio de Janeiro, Sydney, Buenos Aires, and performed cantorial singing in synagogues. In 1985, M. Aleksandrovich’s memoirs “I Remember...” were published in Munich (published in Moscow in 1992). In 1989, Mikhail Alexandrovich spent a month on a tour of the Soviet Union and in May 1991 again performed concerts in Moscow.
The singer died in July 2002 in Munich.

Ave, Maria (F. Schubert)
Barcarolle (E.Tellaferi - B.Roginsky and A.Manuilova)
Ballad
Amapola (Spanish folk)
Bella Donna (G. Winkler - E. Agranovich)
The sail turns white (A. Varlamov - M. Lermontov)
Will there be happiness or not (Romanian people - S. Bolotin, T. Sikorskaya)
Return to Sorrento (E. Curtis - D. Curtis)
Spring (E. Tagliaferi)
Here are the soldiers coming (K. Molchanov - M. Lvovsky)
Come out
Ivushka (Slovak folk)
Give me peace (E. Tagliaferi)
Like a nightingale about a rose (T. Khrennikov - P. Antokolsky)
Carmela (E. Curtis)
Carmen (Spanish folk)
Ring (F. Chopin - A. Mickiewicz)
Lullaby (M. Blanter - M. Isakovsky)
Lullaby (Z. Kompaneets - I. Fefer / A. Gayamov)
Our native land (E. Mario - A. Manuilova, B. Ranginsky)
Mandolinata (E. Toliferi - B. Ranginsky)
My friend (N. Kirkulescu - T. Brudnu/S. Bolotini and T. Sikorskaya)
Sea (E. Nutel - A. Khudozhnikov)
My chosen one (E. Nardell - A. Manuilova, B. Ranginsky)
My Tresita
We went out into the garden (M. Tolstoy - A. Tolstaya)
At the dawn of foggy youth (A. Gurilev - A. Koltsov)
Don’t wake her up at dawn (A. Varlamov - A. Fet)
Above the Blue River (Pokrass Brothers - V. Karpov)
Pouting your lips to threaten (P. Bulakhov - N. Pavlov)
Don't believe it, child (N. Petrov -?)
Don't hurt me (A. Hill - G. Registan)
Neapolitan romance (A. Pecchia - A. Manuilova, B. Ranginsky)
No, it’s not you that I love so passionately (N. Titov - M. Lermontov)
No, you fell out of love (E. Curtis)
Night tango (V. Matteo - E. Agranovich)
Oh Marie (E. Capua - V. Rousseau)
Oh my sun (E. Capua - D. Capurro)
Oh, don't forget me (E. Curtis)
Oh, don't kiss me (A. Varlamov - ?)
Oh, forget your past hobbies (T. Kotlyarevskaya)
With a sharp ax (A. Grechaninov - A.K. Tolstoy)
Song of Unity (M. Blanter - E. Dolmatovsky)
Song of the Sailor (Labrioma - A. Manuilova, B. Ronginsky)
Song about happiness (M. Blanter - S. Alymov)

A country

Russian empire Russian Empire →
Latvia Latvia →
USSR USSR
Israel Israel
USA USA
Germany Germany

Mikhail Davidovich (Davydovich) Alexandrovich( - ) - Latvian and Soviet singer (tenor). Laureate of the Stalin Prize, second degree ().

Biography

M. D. Aleksandrovich was born on July 10 (23), 1914 in the village of Birzhi (now Berzpils, Balvi region of Latvia) into a Jewish family of small traders. In the 1920s, he gained popularity as a child prodigy; at the age of nine he toured the cities of Eastern Europe and Germany performing Jewish folk songs in Yiddish, romances and arias in Russian and German and other works of non-children’s repertoire, accompanied by composer and pianist O. D. String. He graduated from the Latvian Conservatory and trained in Italy with B. Gigli. In the 1930s he was cantor of synagogues in Manchester, Riga and Kaunas.

The singer's voice is not very strong, but beautiful, with a surprisingly pure and soft timbre and a wide range of high lyric tenor. He possessed a well-developed vocal technique and exceptional diction.

Awards and prizes

• Stalin Prize of the second degree (1948) - for concert and performing activities

Write a review of the article "Alexandrovich, Mikhail Davidovich"

Links

Literature

• Makhlis L. S. Six careers of Mikhail Alexandrovich. The life of a tenor. - M.: Ves Mir, 2014. - 656 p. - 1,500 copies. - ISBN 978-5-77770-563-1.

Notes

Excerpt characterizing Alexandrovich, Mikhail Davidovich

“I know everything,” Napoleon interrupted him, “I know everything, and I know the number of your battalions as accurately as mine.” You don’t have two hundred thousand troops, but I have three times that much. “I give you my word of honor,” said Napoleon, forgetting that his word of honor could not have any meaning, “I give you ma parole d"honneur que j"ai cinq cent trente mille hommes de ce cote de la Vistule. [on my word of honor that I have five hundred and thirty thousand people on this side of the Vistula.] The Turks are no help to you: they are no good and have proven this by making peace with you. The Swedes are destined to be ruled by crazy kings. Their king was mad; they changed him and took another - Bernadotte, who immediately went crazy, because a crazy person only being a Swede can enter into alliances with Russia. - Napoleon grinned viciously and again brought the snuffbox to his nose.
To each of Napoleon’s phrases, Balashev wanted and had something to object to; He constantly made the movement of a man who wanted to say something, but Napoleon interrupted him. For example, about the madness of the Swedes, Balashev wanted to say that Sweden is an island when Russia is for it; but Napoleon shouted angrily to drown out his voice. Napoleon was in that state of irritation in which you need to talk, talk and talk, only in order to prove to yourself that you are right. It became difficult for Balashev: he, as an ambassador, was afraid of losing his dignity and felt the need to object; but, as a person, he shrank morally before forgetting the causeless anger in which Napoleon, obviously, was. He knew that all the words now spoken by Napoleon did not matter, that he himself, when he came to his senses, would be ashamed of them. Balashev stood with his eyes downcast, looking at Napoleon’s moving thick legs, and tried to avoid his gaze.
- What do these allies of yours mean to me? - said Napoleon. – My allies are the Poles: there are eighty thousand of them, they fight like lions. And there will be two hundred thousand of them.
And, probably even more indignant that, having said this, he told an obvious lie and that Balashev stood silently in front of him in the same pose submissive to his fate, he turned sharply back, walked up to Balashev’s very face and, making energetic and quick gestures with his white hands, he almost shouted:
“Know that if you shake Prussia against me, know that I will erase it from the map of Europe,” he said with a pale face distorted with anger, striking the other with an energetic gesture of one small hand. - Yes, I will throw you beyond the Dvina, beyond the Dnieper and will restore against you that barrier that Europe was criminal and blind in allowing to be destroyed. Yes, that’s what will happen to you, that’s what you won by moving away from me,” he said and silently walked around the room several times, trembling his thick shoulders. He put a snuff box in his vest pocket, took it out again, put it to his nose several times and stopped in front of Balashev. He paused, looked mockingly straight into Balashev’s eyes and said in a quiet voice: “Et cependant quel beau regne aurait pu avoir votre maitre!”
Balashev, feeling the need to object, said that from the Russian side things were not presented in such a gloomy way. Napoleon was silent, continuing to look at him mockingly and, obviously, not listening to him. Balashev said that in Russia they expect all the best from the war. Napoleon condescendingly nodded his head, as if saying: “I know, it’s your duty to say so, but you yourself don’t believe in it, you’re convinced by me.”

Mikhail Davidovich Alexandrovich

Mikhail Alexandrovich was born on July 23, 19 14 into a poor Jewish family in the small Latvian village of Berspils near Riga.

In 1934, Aleksandrovich graduated from the Jewish People's Conservatory in Riga and, having passed the competition, went to England for three years to become the chief cantor of the Manchester Synagogue. Cantorial singing - hazanut - has a short history, and only at the beginning of the twentieth century did singers with professional vocal training appear, which, of course, enriched and ennobled this type of musical art, which was almost completely unknown in Russia. In 1937, Alexandrovich moved to Kaunas, closer to his family. During this period, he even managed to travel to Italy and take vocal lessons from the great Benjamino Gigli. For some time, the artist successfully managed to combine religious services with secular concert activities.

However, the stage still prevailed. And the annexation of the Baltic states to the USSR in 1940 seemed to put an end to his cantorship altogether. Aleksandrovich became a Soviet artist and was enrolled in the staff of the VGKO (All-Union Touring and Concert Association).

In the spring of 1941, a completely different, Soviet artistic life began for the young singer, who immediately became a favorite among the new public.

But the war turned everything upside down... A difficult military life began, with tours around the country, giving concerts in hospitals and front-line artistic brigades. During the war years, Misha found his only love, Raechka Levinson (they lived together for more than 60 years). On July 5, 1943, his first Moscow concert was held with great success at the House of Unions.

In the post-war years, the artistic fate of M. Alexandrovich developed very happily. He became popularly known, gave exceptionally successful concerts throughout the great country, sang in philharmonic societies, factory clubs and construction sites, in workshops and on collective farms, in the open air. The singer's repertoire was enriched with songs of the peoples of the USSR in their languages, songs of Soviet composers. But the core of almost all his concerts remained beautiful lyrical Neapolitan songs in Russian, which aroused great delight among listeners: the singer was their best performer. In addition, in each of his programs, Mikhail Davidovich included a variety of songs from the peoples of the world, Russian romances, popular opera arias, works by Western European authors, and Jewish folk songs.

In 1947 he was already an Honored Artist of the RSFSR. Several times he had to perform in front of the “father of all nations”; for such occasions he had such songs as, for example, A. Novikov’s panegyric “Beloved Stalin”, and even an entire program - “The Struggle for Peace in the Works of Soviet Composers”.

In 1948 he received the Stalin Prize. The fame of the people's favorite haunted his envious colleagues and senior officials from the Ministry of Culture and the Mosconcert; he was put on an indefinite "tour diet", i.e. due to his Jewish origin, he simply became “not allowed to travel abroad.”

At the end of the 60s, television broadcasts of performances stopped, the number of concerts was sharply reduced (under the pretext of fighting “fabulous fees”), Aleksandrovich’s voice was heard less and less on the radio, and records stopped being released. In relation to the legendary singer, it got to the point that the head of the Mosconcert decided to give only him a humiliating audition at the Ministry of Culture commission for the right to give solo concerts. This was already an unheard of insult.

The obstruction arranged for him actually tore the singer away from the public, interest in him fell, and he began to lose his artistic face here. In 1970, M. Aleksandrovich received a call from Israel and was immediately blacklisted. His concert activities were completely suppressed, his name was completely crossed out from the lists of “permitted” performers, all official recordings of his singing on radio and television were demagnetized (only archival ones and in collectors’ collections were preserved), and gramophone records, which had previously been produced in millions of copies, were confiscated out of sale and destroyed. On October 29, 1971, M.D. Aleksandrovich and his family left the USSR. A golden page from the history of Soviet art has been torn out.

Mikhail Davidovich lived in Israel, the USA, Canada, and Germany. Everywhere he continued his inexhaustible creative activity as a chamber singer and a magnificent, unsurpassed synagogue cantor, causing the constant admiration of his listeners.

He has traveled all over the world with concert programs. During the period of perestroika and after the collapse of the USSR, Mikhail Davidovich was able to meet again with his admirers in our country - in 1989 - 1992 he made three large tours of Russia and Ukraine with four dozen concerts, already as a foreign guest performer, who, despite his advanced age, retained , excellent artistic form and voice. On May 26, 1997, his last farewell concert took place in the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory.

In April 2000, in honor of the 85th anniversary of M.D. Aleksandrovich, two creative evenings were held in Moscow at the F.I. Chaliapin House-Museum and at the Russian Cultural Foundation (this evening had the iconic name “Return of the Legend”). Unfortunately, the singer, who was ill at that time, was unable to attend them.

In the last years of his life, cruel fate, along with many ailments, dealt the singer a severe blow - he almost lost his sight and hearing. Mikhail Davidovich spoke with sadness about this: “The Jewish God is a great master of balancing everything: for my happy youth I received from him such a terrible old age”...

NET,_RAZLUBILA_TY
IA_TOSKUU_BEZ_TEBIA
MOIA_TEREZITA
VESNA
ARIIA_KANIO_IZ_1_DEYSTVIIA_OPERY_PAIACY
SIBONEY
NA_ZARE_TY_EE_NE_BUDI
O,_NE_ZABUD_MENIA
MANDOLINATA
FRANCUZSKAIA_SERENADA
O,_POZABUD_BYLYE_UVLECHENIA
O,_MOE_SOLNCE
MOIA_IZBRANNICA
CHERNOGLAZAIA_LASTOCHKA
PROSCHAY,_KRASIVYY_SON
NE_VER,_DITIA
VYYDI
SAD_MOY_LUBIMYY
AVE_MARIIA
KRAY_NASH_RODNOY
NOCHNOE_TANGO
SOLNECHNYY_GOROD
DAY_MNE_POKOY
KOLYBELNAIA
KARMEN
NEAPOLITANSKIY_ROMANS

M. Aleksandrovich’s parents worked at a rural inn, servicing a tavern and a trading store.

The father, a self-taught musician, instilled in his children a love of music, taught them to sing and play the violin. He began to pay special attention to four-year-old Misha, who discovered a clear and strong voice, excellent musical memory and excellent hearing.

The parents understood that in rural conditions their son’s talent would wither and that it was necessary to settle in a big city, where experienced teachers would be able to develop little Misha’s musical abilities.

And in 1921, the Alexandrovich family, which already had five children, moved to the capital of Latvia - Riga.

In the same 1921, Mikhail Alexandrovich began to study at the People's Jewish Conservatory.

During the first year of classes, teachers prepared a varied and extensive program with Misha. It contained songs by Schubert, Schumann, romances by Grieg, Rimsky-Korsakov, Grechaninov, Gounod, Jewish folk songs and songs by Jewish composers - Milner, Shklyar, Yampolsky. M. Aleksandrovich prepared some of his works in German (for example, Schubert’s songs), but he sang most of his works in Russian and Yiddish.

On October 19, 1923, the first public concert of nine-year-old Mikhail Alexandrovich took place in Riga, and was a great success. So that the audience sitting in the back rows could see the little artist, he sang while standing on a chair.

After the first concerts in Riga in the fall of 1923, the Rigashe Nahrichten newspaper wrote: “As for the nine-year-old singer Misha Aleksandrovich, about whose phenomenal talent a lot needs to be written, he has no equal among child prodigies. His first appearance on stage caused - otherwise and it couldn’t be - there was universal amazement and delight. A person who was not present at the concert simply cannot imagine all the soulfulness of his performance, which sounded equally powerful both in pianissimo and in forte, and the immense range of his voice, which manifested itself in the most impressive way.. "

M. Aleksandrovich’s family was in dire financial need, and in order to help the family, little Misha in 1924-1926. performed with great success in Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, and Germany. During these years, he sang not only in Russian, German and Yiddish, but also performed many opera arias, romances and songs in Latvian, Hebrew, and Italian. During the period of voice breaking (1927-1933), young M. Aleksandrovich studied at the gymnasium and played the violin at the Riga Conservatory. After a six-year break, M. Aleksandrovich gave his first solo concert in Riga on January 1, 1933, and in the same year he began working as a cantor in the Riga synagogue. In August 1934, he moved to Manchester, England, where he became the chief cantor of the local synagogue. While living and working in England, M. Alexandrovich periodically traveled to Italy, where he improved his singing with the famous tenor Benjamino Gigli.

M. Aleksandrovich worked as a cantor in England for 3 years. In 1937 he moved to Lithuania, where he became cantor of the Oel Yaakov Choral Synagogue in Kaunas. Along with serving in the synagogue, M. Aleksandrovich sang in the opera and gave concerts. In the theater, he performed the roles of Lensky in Eugene Onegin and Almaviva in The Barber of Seville, but the singer’s greatest satisfaction and greatest success came from performing on the concert stage.

In 1940, Lithuania was annexed to the Soviet Union, and difficulties began with cantorial activities. M. Aleksandrovich received an invitation from the Belarusian State Stage to work in Minsk and in the spring of 1941 he began performing concerts in Minsk and other cities of Belarus.

During the Great Patriotic War, M. Aleksandrovich sang a lot for the soldiers of the Transcaucasian Front (in 1942-1943), and between trips to the front he successfully toured in Baku, Tbilisi, and Yerevan.

On July 5, 1943, M. Alexandrovich gave his first concert in Moscow. The singer's enchanting velvety voice and his virtuoso performance of difficult opera arias delighted the Moscow public. Beginning in 1945, M. Aleksandrovich toured the Soviet Union extensively and with constant success.

In 1947, Mikhail Alexandrovich received the title Honored Artist of the RSFSR.

In 1948, he was awarded the Stalin Prize for his concert activities. In the Soviet Union, 70 records with his recordings were released - the total circulation of the records was 2 million copies. At the same time, during all the years of his life in the USSR, the singer was never given the opportunity to tour in the West.

In October 1971, M. Aleksandrovich and his family left for permanent residence in Israel, and in 1973 he moved to the USA.

After leaving the USSR, he successfully gave concerts in Tel Aviv, New York, Toronto, Rio de Janeiro, Sydney and Buenos Aires, and performed cantorial singing in synagogues. In the West, the singer released 7 long-playing records with recordings of opera arias, Russian romances, Jewish traditional songs, and complex cantorial psalms and hymns.

In 1985, M. Aleksandrovich’s memoirs “I Remember...” were published in Munich (published in Moscow in 1992).

In 1989, Mikhail Alexandrovich spent a month on a tour of the Soviet Union and in May 1991 again performed concerts in Moscow.

At the beginning of July 2002, at the age of 87, Mikhail Davidovich Alexandrovich died in Munich (Germany).

Photos sent by Vladimir Terentyev

Music Privateer
Sl. B. Ronginsky and A. Mainulova
Ans. p/u A.M. Kovaleva
17066 - 1949

The recording was made in MP3 format (1,133 MB)

Mexican folk song
Russian text by V. Krylov
Instr. ensemble directed by V.V. Meshcherina
26286 - 1956

The recording was made in MP3 format (1,436 MB)

Mikhail Davidovich (Davydovich) Alexandrovich(1914 - 2002) - Latvian and Soviet singer (tenor). Winner of the Stalin Prize, second degree (1948).

Biography

M. D. Aleksandrovich was born on July 10 (23), 1914 in the village of Birzhi (now Berzpils, Balvi region of Latvia) into a Jewish family of small traders. In the 1920s, he gained popularity as a child prodigy; at the age of nine, he toured the cities of Eastern Europe and Germany performing Jewish folk songs in Yiddish, romances and arias in Russian and German, and other works of non-children’s repertoire, accompanied by composer and pianist O. D. String. He graduated from the Latvian Conservatory and trained in Italy with B. Gigli. In the 1930s he was cantor of synagogues in Manchester, Riga and Kaunas.

Since 1940 - in the USSR, chamber and pop singer. Seventy records were released in the USSR with a circulation of twenty-two million copies.

Since 1971 he lived in Israel, since 1974 - in the USA, since 1990 - in Germany. Until the end of his life he worked as a cantor, performed solo concerts on five continents, and recorded records and CDs. Published a book of memoirs “I Remember...” (“Machlis Publications”, Munich, 1985; “Progress”, Moscow, 1992).

Aleksandrovich performed with constant success among the public and critics for 75 years. Died on July 3, 2002 in Munich.

The singer's voice is not very strong, but beautiful, with a surprisingly pure and soft timbre and a wide range of high lyric tenor. He had a well-developed vocal technique and exceptional diction.

Awards and prizes

• Stalin Prize of the second degree (1948) - for concert and performing activities
• Honored Artist of the RSFSR (1947)

Links

• Biography in the Jewish Journal
• Program for “Echo of Moscow” “NON-PAST TIME” MIKHAIL ALEXANDROVICH: THREE-QUARTERS OF A CENTURY ON STAGE. 07/27/2014
• Vladimir Sharonov's film "Like a Nightingale about a Rose..." dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the birth of the world famous tenor. Cantor Mikhail Davidovich Alexandrovich.

Literature

• Makhlis L. S. Six quarries of Mikhail Alexandrovich. The life of a tenor. - M.: Ves Mir, 2014. - 656 p. - 1,500 copies. - ISBN 978-5-77770-563-1.