Yuri Iosifovich Vizbor Юрий Иосифович Визбор
Background information
Born	(1934-06-20)20 June 1934 Moscow, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union(present-day Russia)
Died	17 September 1984(1984-09-17) (aged 50) Moscow, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union(present-day Russia)
Occupation(s)	Bard, poet, actor

Yuri Iosifovich Vizbor^[a] (June 20, 1934 – September 17, 1984) was aSovietbard and poet as well as a theatre and film actor.^[1]

Vizbor was born inMoscow where he lived for most of his life. He worked as a teacher, a soldier, a sailor, a radio and press correspondent, a ski instructor, and an actor in many Russian films and plays.^[2] He participated in and documented expeditions to remote areas of the Soviet Union. His compositions included songs, poetic prose, plays, screenplays and short stories.^[3]

Vizbor's father, a commander in theRed Army, was of Lithuanian descent. His family name was originally Vizbaras. His mother was an ethnicUkrainian fromKrasnodar.^[4] In 1937, his father fell victim toStalin's purges. In 1941, Yuri and his mother moved toSiberia. This period influenced the artist's distaste for politics and his fascination with the wilderness.^[3]

In 1951, he graduated from high school and after several failed attempts to start studies in several high-ranking universities (he was denied the place as the "son of the enemy of the People") was accepted as a student of theMoscow State Pedagogical Institute. It was here that he wrote his first song, entitled "Madagascar".

After graduating with a degree in Russian language and literature in 1955, Vizbor worked as a teacher inArkhangelsk. In 1957 he was conscripted to the army where he worked as a radio operator. He married in 1958. In the late 1950s and early 1960s Vizbor began to acquire fame as a songwriter by circulating homemade tapes.

Vizbor is often compared with his contemporaries,Vladimir Vysotsky andBulat Okudzhava. The topics of Vizbor's songs were observational, focusing on his love of nature and of travel. By using his extremely varied professions as a template, Vizbor attempted to document various aspects of "normal life" at the height ofBrezhnev'sera of stagnation. His trademark was a relaxed singing style that often sounded on the verge of laughter. Vizbor recorded songs with a traditionalRussian seven-string guitar that was often slightly out of tune.

While most Russian bards relied on a rhythmic strumming pattern as the basis for their musical accompaniment, Vizbor was fond of a slow plucking style epitomized by songs such as "Fanskie Gory". His best-known tune was a romanticballad called "Milaya Moya" or "My Dear." On a more somber note, his song "Seryoga Sanin" told the story of a free spirited friend who dies tragically.

In March 1984, Vizbor wrote his last song, having written over 250 of them during the past thirty-three years. His poetry had also been set to music by numerous musicians. His last writings were letters to his daughter from his sickbed while he lay dying of liver cancer from April to September 1984.

Aminor planet3260 Vizbor discovered by Soviet astronomerLyudmila Zhuravlyova in 1974 is named after him.^[5]

• My Little Sun of Forest, 1998

• Yuri Vizbor atIMDb

• 1934 births
• 1984 deaths
• Burials at Kuntsevo Cemetery
• Moscow State Pedagogical University alumni
• Russian bards
• Soviet songwriters
• Soviet musicians
• Russian people of Lithuanian descent
• Soviet people of Lithuanian descent
• Seven-string guitarists
• Soviet male actors
• Soviet poets
• Russian male poets
• Soviet male writers
• 20th-century Russian male writers
• Soviet male singer-songwriters
• Soviet singer-songwriters
• Soviet guitarists
• 20th-century Russian male singers
• Deaths from liver cancer
• Deaths from cancer in the Soviet Union
• Singers from Moscow
• Male actors from Moscow

• Articles containing Russian-language text
• CS1 Russian-language sources (ru)
• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Articles with hCards