Dear Gentlemen,

In this blog I have tried to assemble a list of prominent Soviet tenors – tenors behind the Iron Curtain – singers the careers of which went largely obscure from the Western public because of the political realities of the era they were part of – realities which dictated the detachment of the Soviet opera from its Western counterpart.
It just so happened that these times were the Golden Era of the Russian Opera, and the voices that were hidden behind the Iron Curtain were of a remarkable quality.
In addition to that, the revival of these voices in the West is also of much interest because of the unique character and the idiosyncratic nature of the Soviet school of operatic singing, which was different from the Western in many aspects.
By “voices behind the Iron Curtain” I mean those artists whose entire career or a significant part of it developed during the most ideologically radical years of the Soviet rule and the Soviet Union’s disconnection from the West, and not those who had already established a name for themselves in an earlier period, or those who have only started their way in Soviet Union’s very last days or are singing well into the present – both are more familiar to the Western public.
In cases of some of the singers the information and the recordings presented here is all that is left of them, and in some cases appears for the first time in the internet, or in English and for the Western public.

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Anatoliy Zhukov (1921)





Lyrical tenor. Acclaimed artist of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialistic Republic. People’s artist of the Russian Federation.
Fought bravely in the Second World War at Stalingrad and the Kursk Salient, among other battles. Finished the war in Prague. Received medals. After the war was a soloist of the ensemble of the 7-th army.
Graduated from Lvov city conservatory, and after that accepted to the Bolshoi Theater young singers' training group.
From 1953 – soloist of the Novosibirsk city Theater. His debut there was in the role of Alfred in Verdi's "Traviata".
Had more than 500 compositions in his concert and chamber repertoire.
Was a guest singer in the Bolshoi Theater, in Saint-Petersburg Kirov Theater and other major theaters.
Also sang abroad.
From 1959 – taught in Novosibirsk Glinka city conservatorium, where he was a professor.