Talk:Georgy Vinogradov

Expansion of article, and Infobox
For those who may be interested: I am about to expand this article, and have added an infobox to help me get started. However if you do not agree with any contents of the infobox, or if you do not agree with having this type of infobox, you are welcome to edit the article, and please feel free to discuss major changes here. I'm happy to co-operate with you on this.

NB: I do not intend to cut or change the original article. I do intend to merge other material with it. Thanks. --Storye book (talk) 17:30, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Who is M. Matveyev?
I have an album of songs and arias from Vinogradov's repertoire (pub. Moscow 1980). I've identified all the composers except one: M. Matveyev, who wrote a song called "Glyadel ya, stoya nad Nyevoi", to words by Tyutchev. The internet has not come up with any information on this Matveyev. Can anyone here help me out? (All transliterations are mine; please forgivre any errors.) -- ♬  Jack of Oz  ♬  [your turn]  12:32, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

External links modified
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What really ended Vinogradov's career as a radio singer and Ensemble soloist
Some things were never written down (at least not in a manner accessible to us), and can never have citations. Before he died, Leonid Kharitonov told me what really happened. Vinogradov was a tearaway radio singer star, and he and his friends behaved rather like Frank Sinatra's notorious Rat Pack, having noisy fun in restaurants and night clubs, and sometimes upsetting people who felt that their behaviour was outrageous. Vinogradov was a very successful radio singer besides being a soloist of the Ensemble, but he really wanted to develop his lieder singing, and needed to concentrate only on that. On many occasions he would quarrel loudly with Ensemble director Boris Alexandrov on stage during rehearsals, demanding that Boris set him free from his contract with the Ensemble. Stalin loved the Ensemble and its soloists. He had favourites, and took a close interest in Boris's work. Whatever Boris's opinion, he could not let Vinogradov go, no matter how badly he behaved. Things came to a head at an official reception dinner for Soviet and Polish ambassadors in Moscow in 1951. It was part of a stratagem for peace, the Katyn Massacre being the ginormous elephant in the room. Vinogradov and some of his friends were invited as prized entertainers. Everyone was sitting at tables, and waitresses brought food and drink. A waitress carrying a large tray of crockery passed close to Vinogradov. He goosed her, and she dropped the tray. Everybody noticed, and Vinogradov was removed from the scene. ("Goosed" means he put his hand up her skirt and pinched her - or worse).

Due to his previous enviable success, Vinogradov could have expected the shot in the back of the neck. However, Stalin loved his soloists, and protected him, as he had protected the Alexandrovs who were practising Russian Orthodox members, and protected A.V. Alexandrov who had a son by one of the dancers of the Ensemble, and who died in his mistress's bed, with plans for the Ensemble's peace concert scattered around him. So Vinogradov was happy to be sacked from the Ensemble for his misdemeanour, although he was also banned from ever recording again. One of his last recordings was the song cycle Dichterliebe, which he sang in Russian (instead of German) and turned its love story into an allegory of his own love story with the Revolution - including the Terrors and making peace with himself at the end. Whether Vinogradov intended it or not, the last song in his Dichterliebe recording does sound like a goodbye to his recording career. Thereafter he toured, giving private concerts, and perhaps taught a little.

I have written this here, now, because Kharitonov is now dead, and I don't know how much longer I can expect to be around to tell the tale. So here it is. Maybe one day a document will come out of Russia to confirm what Kharitonov told me. Storye book (talk) 09:08, 20 June 2023 (UTC)