Alexander Vertinsky Александр Вертинский | |
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| Background information | |
| Also known as | Aleksander Wertyński |
| Born | Alexander Nikolayevich Vertinsky March 20 [O.S. March 8] 1889 |
| Died | May 21, 1957(1957-05-21) (aged 68) |
| Genres | Russian romance,cabaret,tango |
| Occupation(s) | singer, poet, actor, composer |
| Years active | 1916–1957 |
Alexander Nikolayevich Vertinsky (Russian:Александр Николаевич Вертинский; March 20 [O.S. March 8] 1889 – May 21, 1957) was a Russian[1] and Soviet artist, poet, singer, composer,cabaret artist and actor who exerted seminal influence on theRussian tradition of artistic singing.
Alexander Vertinsky and his elder sister Nadezhda were born in Kiev (now Kyiv,Ukraine) out ofwedlock: their parents couldn't marry since his father's first wife ("Varvara, an elderly, evil and unattractive woman") refused a divorce, so he had to adopt his own children. Both parents belonged to theRussian Orthodox Church.[2] His father Nikolai Petrovich Vertinsky (1845—1894) came from a railwayman's family.[3] He was a well-known lawyer – according to Alexander, especially popular among poor people, because he defended them for free and even helped financially, — and an occasional journalist (he publishedfeuilletons under a pen name Graf Niver).
While Alexander considered himself Russian in general, he assumed he had somePolish blood too: "I never met people with my surname in Russia, but in Poland it is met more or less often... one of my great-grandfathers was probably a Pole".[2][4][5] He also recognised that he had some Ukrainian ancestry and Ukrainian as one of his native languages. In his letters Vertinsky recalled a time when he was working atDovzhenko Film Studios and Ukrainian actress Natalia Uzhviy was surprised to hear his Ukrainian accent.[6][7][8][9]
Alexander's mother Eugenia Stepanovna Skolatskaya came from anoble family, but the parents rejected her after she had given birth to illegitimate children. She died when Alexander was only three years old fromsepsis after an unsuccessful surgery, and in two years his father also died fromtuberculosis. As Alexander described it, Nikolai Vertinsky couldn't accept his wife's death, spent a lot of time at the cemetery, and at one point was found unconscious near her tomb, which led to his illness and quick death.[2][10]
Vertinsky was brought up by his mother's sister Maria Stepanovna, while Nadezhda was raised by her other sister, Lidia Stepanovna. They didn't want siblings to meet, to the point that Alexander was told that his sister had died, and vice versa; only years later did he see her name in a theatrical magazine and contact her. In 1898, he entered the First Kiev Gymnasium meant for children of the aristocracy. He was expelled from the second grade and moved to the less prestigious 4th Kiev Gymnasium. In 1905, he was expelled once again, this time from the fifth grade. Vertinsky didn't enjoy studying, blaming his aunt who "knew nothing about raising children".[2]
He tried various jobs before earning his living by contributing short stories to the Kievan periodicals. In 1912 Vertinsky and his sister moved to Moscow, where he failed in his ambition to joinKonstantin Stanislavski'sMoscow Art Theatre. During that time, he became addicted tococaine, a habit that would claim the life of his sister. From 1914 to 1916 he took part inWorld War I by serving aboard ahospital train organized by theMorozovs. He treated only heavily wounded soldiers and dressed a total of 35000 wounds.[2]
By 1916, Vertinsky started to employ a scenic figure ofPierrot, with powdered face, singing miniature novellas-in-song known asariettas, or "Pierrot's doleful ditties". Each song contained a prologue, exposition, culmination, and atragic finale. The novice performer was christened the "Russian Pierrot", gained renown, became an object of imitation, admiration, vilified in the press and lionized by the audiences.
Simultaneously with his booming singing career, he played screen bit parts inAleksandr Khanzhonkov's silent movies. From that time stems a lifelong friendship withIvan Mozzhukhin. His famous piece "Vashi paltsy pakhnut ladanom" ("Your Fingers Smell of Frankincense") was dedicated to another film star,Vera Kholodnaya. Shortly before theOctober Revolution Vertinsky devised a stage persona of Black Pierrot and started to tour Russia and Ukraine performing decadent elegies with a touch of cosmopolitan chic, such as "Kokainetka" and Tango "Magnolia" ("V bananovo-limonnom Singapure"). In the words of the American historianRichard Stites, "Vertinsky bathed his verses in images of palm trees, tropical birds, foreign ports, plush lobbies, ceiling fans, and "daybreak on the pink-tinted sea"[11] — precisely those things which the war-time audience craved for.
By November 1920, Vertinsky decided to leave Russia with the bulk of his clientele. He performed inConstantinople and toured RomanianBessarabia, where he was declared a Soviet agent. In 1923, he performed inPoland and Germany, then moved to Paris, where he would perform before the Russian émigré clientele at Montmartre cabarets for nine years.
In 1926, Vertinsky made one of the earliest recordings of the song "Dorogoi dlinnoyu" ("Дорогой длинною" or "Endless Road"), written byBoris Fomin (1900–1948) with words by the poetKonstantin Podrevskii,[12] which, with English lyrics byGene Raskin, was a major hit forMary Hopkin in 1968 as "Those Were the Days".
After several successful tours in the Middle East, Vertinsky followed the majority of well-to-do Russians to the United States, where he debuted before the audience which includedRachmaninoff,Chaliapin, andMarlene Dietrich. TheGreat Depression forced him to join the community ofShanghai Russians. It was in China that he met his wife and the oldest daughter, Marianna, was born.
In 1943, the Soviet government allowed Vertinsky to return to Russia. Despite lack of media coverage, he performed about two thousand concerts in the USSR, touring fromSakhalin toKaliningrad. To feed his family, he also appeared in Soviet films, often playing pre-revolutionary aristocrats, as in the screen version ofChekhov's "Anna on the Neck" (1955). His role of an anti-Communistcardinal in "The Doomed Conspiracy" even won him theStalin Prize for 1951.
The artist died on 21 May 1957 of heart failure at theHotel Astoria inLeningrad after giving his last performance. He was buried at theNovodevichy Cemetery in Moscow.[13]
Between 1923 and 1941 Vertinsky was married to Irina Vladimirovna Vertidis. While he doesn't mention her in his memoirs, her name could be found in the divorce certificate.[14] From 1942 and till his death Vertinsky was married to the actress and artistLidiya Vertinskaya (née Tsirgvava, 1923—2013). They had two daughters:Marianna Vertinskaya (born 1943) andAnastasiya Vertinskaya (born 1944), both successful actresses.
Marianna was married three times; she has a daughter Alexandra from her first marriage to the Soviet architect Ilya Bylinkin and a daughter Daria from her second marriage to the actorBoris Khmelnitsky. Anastasiya was married to the film directorNikita Mikhalkov from 1966 to 1969 and gave birth to their sonStepan Mikhalkov, also an actor and restaurateur. According to the singer-composerAlexander Gradsky, he was married to Vertinskaya from 1976 to 1978, yet she denied they were ever officially married. She also had a long-lasting relationship (around 20 years) with the theatre directorOleg Yefremov.[15][16]
Vertinsky is still influential in Russian musical culture, and has been covered by the likes ofVladimir Vysotsky andBoris Grebenshchikov. There is even an album of electronic lounge covers, by the Cosmos Sound Club.
In 2021, an eight-episode television series about the singer, titled simplyVertinsky [ru], was premiered, first online and then on the RussianFirst Channel. Vertinsky was played byAleksey Filimonov, who himself performed all the featured songs.[17][18][19][20]
Aminor planet3669 Vertinskij, discovered by Soviet astronomerLyudmila Georgievna Karachkina in 1982 is named after him.[21]
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