Alexandrov Ensemble choir

The Alexandrov Ensemble choir (established Moscow 1926) is the choir of the Alexandrov Ensemble.

It has for most of its history been a male-voice choir of tenors and basses, based in Moscow and directed and conducted by Alexander V. Alexandrov from 1926 to 1946, by his son Boris A. Alexandrov from 1946 to 1987, and by various directors up to the present. It has always consisted of Soviet and then Russian Red Army personnel, and has been held to represent that army at home and abroad. Since the 1990s, female army personnel have occasionally been included in the choir as sopranos. Since 2007 boy sopranos and altos from the associated choir school have joined the choir for some of the time.

On December 25, 2016, a plane containing 92 people, including over 60 members of the choir, crashed while en route to Latakia, Syria.

Before he died in 1946, Alexander Alexandrov made it clear to his son Boris that the choir was central to the Alexandrov Ensemble, and that without the choir there would be no Ensemble. There are several possible reasons for this:

In an ideal world any composer, considering arrangements on such a grand scale as many of those recorded by the Alexandrov Ensemble, might reasonably demand the full set of basses, tenors, altos and sopranos, to allow the full range of tonal effects. Alexander Alexandrov, its first director, began his training at Kazan Cathedral, St. Petersburg, which no doubt had a choir with the full vocal range.

However, for most of its history, the choir has consisted only of basses and tenors. Alexander Alexandrov several times applied to his superiors for permission to include boy singers, but was refused. There are several possible reasons for this refusal:

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