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MIKHAIL ALEXANDROVICH (23 JULY 1914, BĒRZPILS, VITEBSK GOVERNORATE - 3 JULY 2002, MUNICH)
Mikhail Alexandrovich
was born on the 23 of July 1914, in the village of Bērzpils, Vitebsk Governorate
(now part of Balvi Municipality, Latvia), in the family of Jewish peasants. His
father, an amateur musician, taught his young children to sing, and at the age
of five, Mischa was able to sing folk melodies with the seriousness of an
adult. At the age of seven, Mischa made his first studies of the theory of
music and piano at the Riga Conservatory and started learning a concert
repertoire based on folk tunes and the works of composers like Schubert,
Gounod, Grieg, Schumann and Rimsky-Korsakov. with which, at the age of nine, he
made a three-year tour of European cities. He prided himself on being the first
child singer to be accepted as a serious artist on the concert stage. In his
teens, when his voice changed to that of a lyric tenor, he studied at the St.
Petersburg Conservatory. To finance further studies in Italy (1934-36) he
accepted a position as cantor in Manchester, England. He spent several years
singing in England, and made concert tours in France, Austria and Poland.
Although basically a concert singer, he did sing the roles of Nemorino in
L'Elisir d'Amore, the Duke in Rigoletto, and Alfred in La Traviata on several
opera stages, but recognizing that his voice was fragile, he refused to compete
with louder-voiced, operatically trained singers and limited such appearances.
Returning to Latvia, in 1936, Alexandrovitch sang as a cantor in Riga, but also
continued to give concerts and to sing in a few operatic performances. After
Latvia was annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940, Mischa was sent to entertain the
military forces, and even sang aboard warships of the Baltic fleet during the
seige of Leningrad. In July 1943, Mischa gave his first concert in Moscow and
became an immediate success. Besides singing a serious repertoire, he
introduced many Neapolitan songs he learned in Italy into his recitals and
became known as the Russian Tito Schipa. He sang in every corner of the Soviet
Union, and his recordings were ea gerly awaited by the Russian public. However,
Alexandrovich was never happy under the Soviet regime, and made numerous
attempts to get out of Russia. He finally succeeded in 1971, thanks in part to
the efforts of Cantor Louis Danto, then cantor at the Park Synagogue in
Cleveland. Alexandrovitch first went to Israel, but stayed there only a short
time before coming to the United States. In 1972, out of gratitude to Cantor
Danto, he gave a recital in Cleveland, four selections from which are found on
this disc. When Danto moved on to Toronto, Canada, he found a postion there for
the already elderly singer as a cantor at the Beth David Synagogue.
Alexandrovitch remained in Toronto for several years, and finally moved to
Germany, where he is living in Munich at the present time. At the age of 80,
Alexandrovitch was still giving concerts and singing on the radio.
TRACKLIST
1. Mamma Mia Che Vo'
Sapè (Nutile)
2. Torna a Surriento
(De Curtis)
3. Tiritomba (Italian
Folk Song)
4. Amapola (Lacalle)
5. Carme (De Curtis)
6. Mandulinata a
Napule (Tagliaferri)
7. Piscatore 'e
Pusilleco (Tagliaferri)
8. Mal d'Amore (Buzzi-Peccia)
9. Der Gefangene im
Kaukasus (Cui) Aria
10. La Juive (Halevy)
Rachel, quand du Seigneur
11. Werther
(Massenet) Pourquoi me reveiller
12. L'elisir d'amore
(Donizetti) Una furtiva lagrima
13. Pagliacci
(Leoncavallo) Vesti la giubba
14. Don Juan Serenade
(Napravnik)
15. Ave Maria
(Bach-Gounod)
16. O sole mio (De
Curtis)
17. Sérénade
française ("Au clair de la lune, mon gentil Pierrot") (Leoncavallo)
18. Sei miei sospiri
(Fetis)
19. Ein Augenblick
ist mein gewesen (Glinka)
20. Glaub nicht, mein Kind (Petrov)
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