Zurab Sotkilava - Georgian opera singer: biography, family, creativity

Sotkilava Zurab Lavrentievich - an outstanding contemporary opera soloist and teacher. His life is an example of purposefulness and incredible willpower.

Youth. Rising star of USSR football

Zurab Sotkilava was born in March 1937 in the city of Sukhumi (now Sukhum), which was then part of the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic.

The singer remembers that his mother and grandmother sang very well and played the guitar. Sometimes they would sit around the house and start singing old songs and Georgian romances, and the future soloist of the opera would sing along with them.

Zurab Sotkilava, whose sport in life has also played an important role, did not think about the musical path in his childhood and youth. He was fond of football and was able to show himself well. The young man got into the team of the city of Sukhumi Dynamo. Zurab Sotkilava played in it as an extreme defender, but often supported attacks on the opponent's gate. In 1956 a young athlete became captain of the junior team of the Georgian SSR. In the same year, Georgian footballers won the national championship. And in 1958 Zurab was invited to play in the Dynamo team from Tbilisi.

Parents did not share the enthusiasm of his son with football and tried to direct him to the path of music. Once the family Sotkilava gave a violin, and the parents found a teacher for the child. Zurab tried to learn the game on this instrument for a month. Then the piano appeared in the house, but it was too late to learn how to play it at 12 years old. Parents wanted to identify Zurab in a music school in the cello class, but he again refused. He was accepted into the singing class, but the teenager did not study very diligently and liked to run away from school to the stadium.

The most memorable meeting for Zurab was his last match for Dynamo, in which his team mated with Dynamo from Moscow. In that match, the gates of Muscovites were guarded by the legendary Lev Yashin, and Valery Urin was one of the attackers. This match the Tbilisi team lost with a score of 1: 3. With Lev Yashin Zurab Sotkilava really got to know later, when he became an opera soloist. A young football player was injured while playing in Yugoslavia, and in 1959 another injury ended his career in sports.

The beginning of the way in the theater

In 1958, footballer of the Tbilisi team "Dynamo" Zurab Sotkilava briefly came to visit relatives in Sukhumi. At this time a pianist Valery Razumovskaya came to visit them, always believing that a young man could become a talented singer. She persuaded him to go to the audition for a professor at the Tbilisi Conservatory, who was in Sukhumi.

At first, Zurab's voice did not impress the professor. But the incident intervened. The professor loved football, and it was difficult to get tickets for Dynamo matches, and Zurab began to get them for him. As a fee, the musician agreed to give him lessons. After just a few lessons, the professor told Zurab that he has a future in opera. At first the young man did not take it seriously, but after the second injury he thought about music.

In 1960, Zurab Sotkilava graduated from the Tbilisi Polytechnic Institute, the mining department, and the day after the defense of the diploma passed the entrance exams to the conservatory of the capital of Georgia.

Georgian Opera and Ballet Theater

Sotkilava recalled that one day before the music lessons he heard on the radio the broadcast of the performance of the Italian singer Mario del Monaco in the opera "Carmen", which shocked him. In the conservatory Zurab Sotkilava began to sing baritone. But Professor David Iasonovich Andzuladze corrected this mistake. The young man became a tenor. In 1965, singer Zurab Sotkilava made his debut on the stage of the largest theater of his republic - the Georgian Opera and Ballet Theater. In the work "Tosca" by Giacomo Puccini, he sang the part of Cavaradossi. The singer was part of the troupe of this theater until 1974.

Dinaro Barra

A year after his debut, he went on an internship at the Milan Theater La Scala, which took two years. At that time many outstanding artists sang on the Milan stage, among them Pavarotti was already beginning his creative career. The teacher of the Georgian singer was maestro Dinaro Barra.

After training, Zurab triumphed and took first place at the Bulgarian contest of young singers "Golden Orpheus". In 1970 he became the second at the Moscow Tchaikovsky Competition and the winner in Spain. The singer got recognition at home - in 1970 he was awarded the title of Honored Artist of the Georgian SSR, and three years later - People's Artist.

World Recognition

For the first time in 1972, Zurab Lavrentievich appeared on the stage of the Bolshoi Theater at a concert dedicated to the centenary of the outstanding soloist of the opera Leonid Sabinov. In late 1973, Zurab Sotkilava again appeared on the stage of the Bolshoi Theater, where he sang the role of José in the opera Carmen. After the performance, the director of the theater Kirill Molchanov approached the artist and offered to enter the permanent composition.

The following year, Zurab became a permanent artist of the Bolshoi Theater. He recalls that in this he helped the support of colleagues from Moscow. In 1974, the premiere of Giuseppe Verdi's opera Othello took place in Moscow, where the singer performed the main role. Next to her - "Rural honor" Pietro Mascagni, where Zurab Sotkilava sang the party Turiddu.

Europe and the USA

In the 1970s, the Georgian opera singer became a figure that the opera lovers around the world recognized. He sang in theaters in Paris, Milan, USA cities. Enthusiastic reviews were written about him in the press of the United States. In 1979, the singer Zurab Sotkilava received the title of People's Artist of the USSR. During these years the maestro sang the parties of Radames from "Aida" Verdi, Jose from "Carmen", Manrico from "Troubadour", Vodemona from "Iolanta", Pretender from "Boris Godunov". He also does not forget about his roots: on the stage of the theater in Tbilisi, he sang in operas "Abessalom and Eteri" Zakhariy Paliashvili and "Rape of the Moon" Otar Taktakishvili.

Teacher

In the mid-1970s Zurab Sotkilava began teaching. From 1976 to 1988 he read opera singing at the Moscow Conservatory and became a professor in 1987. In 2002, he returned to teaching at the Conservatory. Among the pupils of the maestro is tenor Vladimir Bogachev, who collaborates with the Vienna State Opera, La Scala and other world-class theaters. Another student, baritone Vladimir Redkin, has been performing for thirty years on the stage of the Bolshoi Theater. Among the younger students of Zurab Lavrentievich is the tenor of the Bolshoi Theater Alexei Dolgov.

Disease and coping

Zurab Sotkilava, whose biography includes many difficult pages, in early 2015 learned of a terrible diagnosis - pancreatic cancer. A little earlier the maestro noticed that he began to lose weight sharply. On January 19, he was forced to cancel the concert, and the 20th diagnosis was confirmed. The singer was operated on in Germany on January 30, and then he underwent chemotherapy in Moscow. The singer and members of his family (with Eliso Turmanidze they were married in 1965 and gave birth to two daughters - Tayu and Keti) for a long time did not want to talk about the disease, and it became public this spring.

Zurab Sotkilava coached the voice to return the previous vocal data. Resumed studies with students at the Conservatory. In 2015, he again came on the scene. In late October, Zurab Lavrentievich spoke at a concert dedicated to him, which was held at the Moscow International House of Music. In early 2016, Zurab Lavrentievich performed at a concert dedicated to the memory of Elena Obraztsova, a singer with whom he was associated for many years of friendship and joint performances.

Our hero says about himself that he has fulfilled all his dreams. At the same time, he continues to speak and notes that when he sings, the happier person in the whole world can not be found. His second home is the scene of the Bolshoi Theater.