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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Nikolay Pechkovsky (1896)






Born on January 25th in Moscow. People's Artist of Russian Soviet Federative Socialistic Republic (1939).
Together with his two older brothers made his first steps in theatrical art during his studies in college, with him even writing an opera called "The Force of Love".
From the age of 14 started appearing in minor roles in different venues.
Was drafted and fought in the First World War, returning home shell-shocked.
Studied vocal with the former Bolshoi singer L.D.Donskoy.
Performed and studied in Opera Theater Studio under the direction of Stanislavski for two years, where he had built himself as a singer.
From 1924 to 1941 Pechkovsky was the leading soloist of the St-Petersburg Kirov Opera Theater.
His biggest successes were the roles of Lensky, Othello, Werther. His favorite, prominent and most memorable role was German in "Pique Dame".
Also performed chamber repertoire of Russian compositors, songs of soviet mass-song composers, folk songs and romances.
In 1939 he was given the job of the head of a branch of St-Petersburg Kirov Opera Theater.
When World War II began, he found himself on a german occupied territory, and was forced to perform for the germans. During this time he was passing important information to the soviet authorities, saving soviet citizens from death, helping partisans. Even so, after the war he was sentenced to a prison time and was sent to the Gulag. During his time in the camps of the Gulag he organized prisoners' amateur troupes and even staged opera plays such as "Pagliacci", "Pique Dame" and "Carmen". He emerged from the Gulag only in 1954, but was not acquitted, and only allowed to appear in provincial opera theaters and minor venues. 
Received the Lenin Award (1939).
From 1994 on an annual international competition for young singers is held in Saint-Petersburg in his memory.
Died on November 24th 1966 in Saint-Petersburg.