14.12.2018
“In the last hour of December…”
On 28 December, the Mikhailovsky Theatre at the Hermitage project will present its annual New Year concert. As is now traditional, the concert will feature popular songs from the past.
„This will be our third New Year concert in the Hermitage,“ says Natalia Dudik, who will be leading the orchestra and has compiled the programme. "I’m thrilled that our project, which grew out of a chamber concert of songs from films, is so popular with the public and has become such a lovely tradition. This year’s concert at the Hermitage will include not only Soviet hits but also retro Western hits.
The title of the concert is ‘In the last hour of December...’. Everyone knows that song by Secret, the Soviet ‘beat quartet’, written by Maxim Leonidov and Nikolay Fomenko. The song will be featuring in our concert, of course, in an arrangement which Igor Gribkov did specially for us. He even told the composer about it — he was interested and asked to be sent a recording afterwards. Secret recorded the song with an Estonian string quintet, but that was in the mid-1980s, when recording conditions were very different. For our concert in the Hermitage, it’s been scored for a large symphony orchestra. The song celebrates New Year, a bit like Abba’s Happy New Year.
Our concert will be similar in format to the TV show Song of the Year, only we will be showcasing songs not from the past year, but from a past era. We have settled on the period between the 1950s and the 1980s. The concert will open with the song Five Minutes from Carnival Night in the original orchestration, which everyone knows from the 1956 film. Then we’ll be taking a time machine across the decades. We’ve decided that 90% of the programme will be songs by outstanding Soviet popular singers: Lyudmila Senchina, Lidia Klement, Maya Kristalinskaya, Valery Obodzinsky, Eduard Khil, and Muslim Magomaev. We have specially invited Natalya Mironova to perform Lyudmila Senchina’s Cinderella. This will be the first time Natalya has taken part in one of our concerts. Other musicians joining us for the first time this year will be Alexander Kuznetsov and Damir Zakirov.
One the foreign hits we’re performing is the Mexican song Cielito Lindo, which will actually be the oldest song in the concert: it was written back in the 19th century. We here in Russia know the version by Klavdiya Shulzhenko, Chelita. Guarde che luna is a 60s hit from the baritone repertoire. It was brought to the Soviet Union by Muslim Magomaev. And for one night only, in our concert, we’ll be performing Cancao Do Mar, a Portuguese fado song from the 50s. It’s the favourite song of Richard Gere, who insisted that it be included in the soundtrack of the film Primal Fear, which he acted in. It’s a song that sits between two cultures: you can pick out both Mauretanian and Portuguese themes in it. It’s a Mediterranean song, basically, and will add a wonderfully exotic flavour to the concert. It has to be performed in a folk style, and we’ll have Irina Mikhailova with us to sing it. We’ll also be welcoming Boris Pinkhasovich, who will sing Frank Sinatra’s My Way.
Another unusual and exclusive item on the programme will be Andrey Petrov’s song Stars in the Conductor’s Bag, which the famous Leningrad singer Lidia Klement performed. I happened to hear the piece on the radio when they were playing retro songs. I really liked it, and found it with an Internet search. Our arranger Igor Gribkov helped to find the music. The score was actually written out by Andrey Petrov himself. I think it’s fair to say the song is a product of its time: it features outer space, water, and the Western musical traditions of the 60s. But at the same time, it’s very much a Leningrad song."
„This will be our third New Year concert in the Hermitage,“ says Natalia Dudik, who will be leading the orchestra and has compiled the programme. "I’m thrilled that our project, which grew out of a chamber concert of songs from films, is so popular with the public and has become such a lovely tradition. This year’s concert at the Hermitage will include not only Soviet hits but also retro Western hits.
The title of the concert is ‘In the last hour of December...’. Everyone knows that song by Secret, the Soviet ‘beat quartet’, written by Maxim Leonidov and Nikolay Fomenko. The song will be featuring in our concert, of course, in an arrangement which Igor Gribkov did specially for us. He even told the composer about it — he was interested and asked to be sent a recording afterwards. Secret recorded the song with an Estonian string quintet, but that was in the mid-1980s, when recording conditions were very different. For our concert in the Hermitage, it’s been scored for a large symphony orchestra. The song celebrates New Year, a bit like Abba’s Happy New Year.
Our concert will be similar in format to the TV show Song of the Year, only we will be showcasing songs not from the past year, but from a past era. We have settled on the period between the 1950s and the 1980s. The concert will open with the song Five Minutes from Carnival Night in the original orchestration, which everyone knows from the 1956 film. Then we’ll be taking a time machine across the decades. We’ve decided that 90% of the programme will be songs by outstanding Soviet popular singers: Lyudmila Senchina, Lidia Klement, Maya Kristalinskaya, Valery Obodzinsky, Eduard Khil, and Muslim Magomaev. We have specially invited Natalya Mironova to perform Lyudmila Senchina’s Cinderella. This will be the first time Natalya has taken part in one of our concerts. Other musicians joining us for the first time this year will be Alexander Kuznetsov and Damir Zakirov.
One the foreign hits we’re performing is the Mexican song Cielito Lindo, which will actually be the oldest song in the concert: it was written back in the 19th century. We here in Russia know the version by Klavdiya Shulzhenko, Chelita. Guarde che luna is a 60s hit from the baritone repertoire. It was brought to the Soviet Union by Muslim Magomaev. And for one night only, in our concert, we’ll be performing Cancao Do Mar, a Portuguese fado song from the 50s. It’s the favourite song of Richard Gere, who insisted that it be included in the soundtrack of the film Primal Fear, which he acted in. It’s a song that sits between two cultures: you can pick out both Mauretanian and Portuguese themes in it. It’s a Mediterranean song, basically, and will add a wonderfully exotic flavour to the concert. It has to be performed in a folk style, and we’ll have Irina Mikhailova with us to sing it. We’ll also be welcoming Boris Pinkhasovich, who will sing Frank Sinatra’s My Way.
Another unusual and exclusive item on the programme will be Andrey Petrov’s song Stars in the Conductor’s Bag, which the famous Leningrad singer Lidia Klement performed. I happened to hear the piece on the radio when they were playing retro songs. I really liked it, and found it with an Internet search. Our arranger Igor Gribkov helped to find the music. The score was actually written out by Andrey Petrov himself. I think it’s fair to say the song is a product of its time: it features outer space, water, and the Western musical traditions of the 60s. But at the same time, it’s very much a Leningrad song."
