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Evgeny Belyaev

Evgeny Mikhailovich Belyaev
Belyaev1970s.jpg
Evgeny Belyaev
Background information
Born (1926-09-11)11 September 1926
Klintsy, Bryansk Oblast, Soviet Union
Origin Klintsy, Bryansk Oblast, Soviet Union
Died 21 February 1994(1994-02-21) (aged 67)
Moscow, Russia
Genres Opera, Romantic music, military music, ethnic Russian music, easy listening, middle of the road, folk music.
Occupation(s) Alexandrov Ensemble soloist
Years active 1955–1992
Labels Kultur, BMG, EMI, Melodiya, Silva, Teldec, Victor, Columbia. Supraphon,
Associated acts Alexandrov Ensemble

Evgeny Mikhailovich Belyaev, also written as Yevgeny Belyayev (Russian: Евгений Михайлович Беляев) (Klintsy, 11 September 1926 – 21/22 February 1994), was a Russian tenor soloist of the Alexandrov Ensemble under Boris Alexandrov. He is remembered in the Soviet Union as the Russian Nightingale and in the West as one of the definitive singers of Kalinka.

On 11 September 1926, he was born in Klintsy in the Bryansk Oblast. As a child, he was known by the diminutive, Zhenia (the soft "g" of Bryansk). As a schoolboy he won a singing competition at the Artek (camp) (Young Pioneer camp) near the Black Sea.

During World War II he served in the subdivision of zenith troops and gained the Army Olympiad Prize. He fought in Czechoslovakia and served as a Lance Corporal in the first Red Orders of Suvorov and Kutuzov division of the Carpathian Military District of the 4th Ukrainian Front under the command of General-Colonel Andrei Yeremenko. He is also said to have been in an anti-aircraft warfare unit and to have finished the war as a sergeant. He is said to have sung in the lulls between the fighting. (NB: The Suvorov and Kutuzov division later became the 93rd Mechanized Brigade (Ukraine)).

He then graduated from Gnessin State Musical College. He married and had two sons, one of whom was a professional pianist.


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