Anatoly Ivanovich Orfenov |

Anatoly Orfenov

Russian tenor Anatoly Ivanovich Orfenov was born in 1908 in the family of a priest in the village of Sushki, Ryazan province, not far from the town of Kasimov, the ancient estate of the Tatar princes. The family had eight children. Everyone sang. But Anatoly was the only one, despite all the difficulties, who became a professional singer. “We lived with kerosene lamps,” the singer recalled, “we didn’t have any entertainment, only once a year, at Christmas time, amateur performances were given. We had a gramophone that we started on holidays, and I listened to Sobinov’s records, Sobinov was my favorite artist, I wanted to learn from him, I wanted to imitate him. Could the young man have imagined that in just a few years he would be lucky to see Sobinov, to work with him on his first opera parts.

The father of the family died in 1920, and under the new regime, the children of a clergyman could not count on higher education.

In 1928, Orfenov arrived in Moscow, and by some providence of God he managed to enter two technical schools at once – pedagogical and evening music (now the Ippolitov-Ivanov Academy). He studied vocals in the class of the talented teacher Alexander Akimovich Pogorelsky, a follower of the Italian bel canto school (Pogorelsky was a student of Camillo Everardi), and Anatoly Orfenov had enough of this stock of professional knowledge for the rest of his life. The formation of the young singer took place during a period of intensive renewal of the opera stage, when the studio movement became widespread, opposing itself to the semi-official academic direction of state theaters. However, in the bowels of the same Bolshoi and Mariinsky there was an implicit remelting of old traditions. The innovative revelations of the first generation of Soviet tenors, led by Kozlovsky and Lemeshev, radically changed the content of the “lyric tenor” role, while in St. Petersburg, Pechkovsky made us perceive the phrase “dramatic tenor” in a new way. Orfenov, who entered his creative life, from the very first steps managed not to get lost among such names, because our hero had an independent personal complex, an individual palette of expressive means, thus “a person with a non-general expression”.

First, in 1933, he managed to get into the choir of the Opera Theater-Studio under the direction of K.S. Stanislavsky (the studio was located in Stanislavsky’s house in Leontievsky Lane, later moved to Bolshaya Dmitrovka to the former premises of the operetta). The family was very religious, my grandmother objected to any secular life, and Anatoly hid from his mother for a long time that he worked in the theater. When he reported this, she was surprised: “Why in the choir?” The great reformer of the Russian stage Stanislavsky and the great tenor of the Russian land Sobinov, who no longer sang and was a vocal consultant at the Studio, noticed a tall and handsome young man from the choir, paid attention not only to this voice, but also to the diligence and modesty of its owner. So Orfenov became Lensky in the famous performance of Stanislavsky; in April 1935, the master himself introduced him to the performance, among other new performers. (The most stellar moments of artistic destiny will continue to be connected with the image of Lensky – the debut at the Branch of the Bolshoi Theater, and then on the main stage of the Bolshoi). Leonid Vitalievich wrote to Konstantin Sergeevich: “I ordered Orfenov, who has a lovely voice, to urgently prepare Lensky, except for Ernesto from Don Pasquale. And later: “He gave me Orfen Lensky here, and very well.” Stanislavsky devoted a lot of time and attention to the debutant, as evidenced by the transcripts of the rehearsals and the memoirs of the artist himself: “Konstantin Sergeevich talked to me for hours. About what? About my first steps on the stage, about my well-being in this or that role, about the tasks and physical actions that he certainly brought into the score of the role, about the release of muscles, about the ethics of the actor in life and on stage. It was a great educational work, and I am grateful to my teacher for it with all my heart.”

Working with the largest masters of Russian art finally formed the artist’s artistic personality. Orfenov quickly took a leading position in the troupe of the Stanislavsky Opera House. The audience was captivated by the naturalness, sincerity and simplicity of his behavior on stage. He was never a “sweet sound-coder”, the sound never served as an end in itself for the singer. Orfenov always came from music and the word betrothed to it, in this union he looked for the dramatic knots of his roles. For many years, Stanislavsky nurtured the idea of ​​staging Verdi’s Rigoletto, and in 1937-38. they had eight rehearsals. However, for a number of reasons (including, probably, those that Bulgakov writes about in a grotesquely allegorical form in The Theater Novel), work on the production was suspended, and the performance was released after the death of Stanislavsky under the direction of Meyerhold, the main director of the theater at that time. How exciting the work on “Rigoletto” was can be judged from the memoirs of Anatoly Orfenov “First Steps”, which were published in the journal “Soviet Music” (1963, No. 1).

strove to show on the stage the “life of the human spirit” … It was much more important for him to show the struggle of the “humiliated and insulted” – Gilda and Rigoletto, than to surprise the audience with a dozen beautiful top notes of the singers and the splendor of the scenery … He offered two options for the image of the Duke. Odin is a voluptuous lecher who outwardly resembles Francis I, portrayed by V. Hugo in the drama The King Amuses himself. The other is a handsome, charming young man, equally passionate about the Countess Ceprano, the simple Gilda, and Maddalena.

In the first picture, when the curtain is raised, the Duke is sitting on the upper veranda of the castle at the table, in the figurative expression of Konstantin Sergeevich, “lined” with ladies … What could be more difficult for a young singer who does not have stage experience, how to stand in the middle of the stage and sing the so-called “aria with gloves,” that is, the ballad of the Duke? At Stanislavsky’s, the Duke sang a ballad like a drinking song. Konstantin Sergeevich gave me a whole series of physical tasks, or, perhaps, it would be better to say, physical actions: walking around the table, clinking glasses with the ladies. He demanded that I have time to exchange glances with each of them during the ballad. By this, he protected the artist from “voids” in the role. There was no time to think about the “sound”, about the public.

Another innovation of Stanislavsky in the first act was the scene of Duke Rigoletto flogging with a whip, after he “insults” Count Ceprano … This scene did not go well for me, the flogging turned out to be “opera”, that is, it was hard to believe in it, and at rehearsals I many more fell for her.

In the second act during the duet, Gilda hides behind the window of her father’s house, and the task set by Stanislavsky for the Duke was to lure her out of there, or at least make her look out the window. The Duke has a bouquet of flowers hidden under his cloak. One flower at a time, he gives them to Gilda through the window. (The famous photograph by the window was included in all opera annals – A.Kh.). In the third act, Stanislavsky wanted to show the Duke as a man of the moment and mood. When the courtiers tell the Duke that “the girl is in your palace” (the production was in a Russian translation that differs from the generally accepted one – A.Kh.), he is completely transformed, he sings another aria, almost never performed in theaters. This aria is very difficult, and although there are no notes higher than the second octave in it, it is very tense in tessitura.

With Stanislavsky, who tirelessly fought against operatic vampuca, Orfenov also performed the parts of Lykov in The Tsar’s Bride, the Holy Fool in Boris Godunov, Almaviva in The Barber of Seville, and Bakhshi in Lev Stepanov’s Darvaz Gorge. And he would never have left the theater if Stanislavsky had not died. After the death of Konstantin Sergeevich, a merger with the Nemirovich-Danchenko Theater began (these were two completely different theaters, and the irony of fate was that they were connected). In this “troubled” time, Orfenov, already a merited artist of the RSFSR, took part in some of the epoch-making productions of Nemirovich, sang Paris in “Beautiful Elena” (this performance, fortunately, was recorded on the radio in 1948), but still in spirit he was a true Stanislav. Therefore, his transition in 1942 from the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theater to the Bolshoi was predetermined by fate itself. Although Sergei Yakovlevich Lemeshev in his book “The Way to Art” expresses the point of view that outstanding singers (such as Pechkovsky and himself) left Stanislavsky because of a feeling of tightness and in the hope of improving vocal skills in wider spaces. In the case of Orfenov, apparently, this is not entirely true.

Creative dissatisfaction in the early 40s forced him to “quench his hunger” “on the side”, and in the 1940/41 season Orfenov enthusiastically collaborated with the State Opera Ensemble of the USSR under the direction of I.S. Kozlovsky. The most “European” in spirit tenor of the Soviet era was then obsessed with the ideas of an opera performance in a concert performance (today these ideas have found a very effective embodiment in the West in the form of the so-called semi-staged, “semi-performances” without scenery and costumes, but with acting interaction) and as a director, he staged productions of Werther, Orpheus, Pagliatsev, Mozart and Salieri, Arkas’ Katerina and Lysenko’s Natalka-Poltavka. “We dreamed of finding a new form of opera performance, the basis of which would be sound, and not spectacle,” Ivan Semenovich recalled much later. At the premieres, Kozlovsky himself sang the main parts, but in the future he needed help. So Anatoly Orfenov sang the charismatic part of Werther seven times, as well as Mozart and Beppo in Pagliacci (Harlequin’s serenade had to be encore 2-3 times). Performances were staged in the Great Hall of the Conservatory, the House of Scientists, the Central House of Artists and the Campus. Alas, the existence of the ensemble was very short-lived.

Military 1942. The Germans are coming. Bombing. Anxiety. The main staff of the Bolshoi Theater was evacuated to Kuibyshev. And in Moscow today they are playing the first act, tomorrow they are playing the opera to the end. In such an anxious time, Orfenov began to be invited to the Bolshoi: first for one-time, a little later, as part of the troupe. Modest, demanding of himself, from the time of Stanislavsky he was able to perceive all the best from his comrades on the stage. And there was someone to perceive it – the entire golden arsenal of Russian vocals was then in working order, led by Obukhova, Barsova, Maksakova, Reizen, Pirogov and Khanaev. During his 13 years of service at the Bolshoi, Orfenov had the opportunity to work with four chief conductors: Samuil Samosud, Ariy Pazovsky, Nikolai Golovanov and Alexander Melik-Pashaev. Sadly, but today’s era cannot boast of such grandeur and magnificence.

Together with his two closest colleagues, lyric tenors Solomon Khromchenko and Pavel Chekin, Orfenov took the “second echelon” line in the theatrical table of ranks immediately after Kozlovsky and Lemeshev. These two rival tenors enjoyed a truly all-encompassing fanatical popular love, bordering on idolatry. It suffices to recall the fierce theatrical battles between the armies of the “Kazlovites” and “Lemeshists” to imagine how difficult it was not to get lost and, moreover, to take a worthy place in this tenor context for any new singer of a similar role. And the fact that the artistic nature of Orfenov was close in spirit to the sincere, “Yesenin” beginning of Lemeshev’s art did not require special evidence, as well as the fact that he with honor passed the test of the inevitable comparison with idol tenors. Yes, premieres were rarely given, and performances with the presence of Stalin were staged even less often. But you are always welcome to sing by replacement (the artist’s diary is replete with notes “Instead of Kozlovsky”, “Instead of Lemeshev. Reported at 4 o’clock in the afternoon”; it was Lemeshev Orfenov who most often insured). Orfenov’s diaries, in which the artist wrote comments about each of his performances, may not be of great literary value, but they are an invaluable document of the era – we have the opportunity not only to feel what it means to be in the “second row” and at the same time receive a happy satisfaction from his work, but, most importantly, to present the life of the Bolshoi Theater from 1942 to 1955, not in a parade-official perspective, but from the point of view of ordinary working days. They wrote about the premieres in Pravda and gave Stalin Prizes for them, but it was the second or third casts that supported the normal functioning of the performances in the post-premier period. It was just such a reliable and tireless worker of the Bolshoi that Anatoly Ivanovich Orfenov was.

True, he also received his Stalin Prize – for Vasek in Smetana’s The Bartered Bride. It was a legendary performance by Boris Pokrovsky and Kirill Kondrashin in Russian translation by Sergei Mikhalkov. The production was made in 1948 in honor of the 30th anniversary of the Czechoslovak Republic, but became one of the most beloved comedies by the public and lingered in the repertoire for many years. Many eyewitnesses consider the grotesque image of Vashek to be the pinnacle in the artist’s creative biography. “Vashek had that volume of character that betrays the true creative wisdom of the author of the stage image – the actor. Vashek Orfenova is a subtly and cleverly made image. The very physiological shortcomings of the character (stuttering, stupidity) were dressed on stage in the clothes of human love, humor and charm ”(B.A. Pokrovsky).

Orfenov was considered a specialist in the Western European repertoire, which was mostly performed at the Branch, so he most often had to sing there, in the building of the Solodovnikovsky Theater on Bolshaya Dmitrovka (where the Mamontov Opera and the Zimin Opera were located at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries, and now works “Moscow Operetta”). Graceful and charming, despite the depravity of his temper, was his Duke in Rigoletto. The gallant Count Almaviva shone with refinement and wit in The Barber of Seville (in this opera, difficult for any tenor, Orfenov set a kind of personal record – he sang it 107 times). The role of Alfred in La Traviata was built on contrasts: a timid young man in love turned into a jealous man blinded by irritation and anger, and at the end of the opera he appeared as a deeply loving and repentant person. The French repertoire was represented by Faust and Aubert’s comic opera Fra Diavolo (the title part in this performance was the last work in the theater for Lemeshev, just as for Orfenov – the lyrical role of the amorous carabinieri Lorenzo). He sang Mozart’s Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni and Beethoven’s Jacquino in the famous production of Fidelio with Galina Vishnevskaya.

The gallery of Russian images of Orfenov is rightfully opened by Lensky. The singer’s voice, which had a gentle, transparent timbre, softness and elasticity of sound, ideally matched the image of a young lyrical hero. His Lensky was distinguished by a special complex of fragility, insecurity from worldly storms. Another milestone was the image of the holy fool in “Boris Godunov”. In this landmark performance by Baratov-Golovanov-Fyodorovsky, Anatoly Ivanovich sang in front of Stalin for the first time in his life in 1947. One of the “incredible” events of artistic life is also connected with this production – one day, during Rigoletto, Orfenov was informed that at the end of the opera he should arrive from the branch on the main stage (5 minutes walk) and sing the Holy Fool. It was with this performance that on October 9, 1968, the Bolshoi Theater team celebrated the 60th anniversary of the artist and the 35th anniversary of his creative activity. Gennady Rozhdestvensky, who conducted that evening, wrote in the “duty book”: “Long live professionalism!” And the performer of the role of Boris, Alexander Vedernikov, noted: Orfenov has the most precious property for an artist – a sense of proportion. His Holy Fool is a symbol of the people’s conscience, such as the composer conceived it.”

Orfenov appeared 70 times in the image of Sinodal in The Demon, an opera that has now become a rarity, and at that time one of the most repertory. A serious victory for the artist was also such parties as the Indian Guest in Sadko and Tsar Berendey in Snegurochka. And vice versa, according to the singer himself, Bayan in “Ruslan and Lyudmila”, Vladimir Igorevich in “Prince Igor” and Gritsko in “Sorochinsky Fair” did not leave a bright trace (the artist considered the role of the boy in Mussorgsky’s opera initially “injured”, since during the first performance in this performance, a hemorrhage occurred in the ligament). The only Russian character who left the singer indifferent was Lykov in The Tsar’s Bride – he writes in his diary: “I don’t like Lykov.” Apparently, participation in Soviet operas did not arouse the artist’s enthusiasm either, however, he almost did not participate in them at the Bolshoi, with the exception of Kabalevsky’s one-day opera “Under Moscow” (young Muscovite Vasily), Krasev’s children’s opera “Morozko” (Grandfather) and Muradeli’s opera “The Great Friendship”.

Together with the people and the country, our hero did not escape the whirlpools of history. On November 7, 1947, a grand performance of Vano Muradeli’s opera The Great Friendship took place at the Bolshoi Theater, in which Anatoly Orfenov performed the melodic part of the shepherd Dzhemal. What happened next, everyone knows – the infamous decree of the Central Committee of the CPSU. Why exactly this completely harmless “song” opera served as a signal for the beginning of new persecution of the “formalists” Shostakovich and Prokofiev is another riddle of dialectics. The dialectic of Orfenov’s fate is no less surprising: he was a great social activist, a deputy of the Regional Council of People’s Deputies, and at the same time, all his life he sacredly kept faith in God, openly went to church and refused to join the Communist Party. It is surprising that he was not planted.

After Stalin’s death, a good purge was arranged in the theater – an artificial generational change began. And Anatoly Orfenov was one of the first who was given to understand that it was time for a seniority pension, although in 1955 the artist was only 47. He immediately applied for resignation. Such was his vital property – to immediately leave from where he was not welcome.

Fruitful cooperation with Radio began with Orfenov back in the 40s – his voice turned out to be surprisingly “radiogenic” and fit well on the recording. At that not the brightest time for the country, when totalitarian propaganda was in full swing, when the air was filled with the cannibalistic speeches of the chief accuser at fabricated trials, musical broadcasting was by no means limited to marches of enthusiasts and songs about Stalin, but promoted high classics. It sounded for many hours a day, both on recording and broadcast from studios and concert halls. The 50s entered the history of Radio as the heyday of opera – it was during these years that the golden opera stock of the radio fund was recorded. In addition to well-known scores, many forgotten and rarely performed operatic works have been reborn, such as Rimsky-Korsakov’s Pan Voyevoda, Tchaikovsky’s Voyevoda and Oprichnik. In terms of artistic significance, the vocal group of Radio, if inferior to the Bolshoi Theater, was only a little. The names of Zara Dolukhanova, Natalia Rozhdestvenskaya, Deborah Pantofel-Nechetskaya, Nadezhda Kazantseva, Georgy Vinogradov, Vladimir Bunchikov were on everyone’s lips. The creative and human atmosphere on the Radio of those years was exceptional. The highest level of professionalism, impeccable taste, repertoire competence, efficiency and intelligence of employees, a sense of guild community and mutual assistance continue to delight many years later, when all this is gone. Activities on the Radio, where Orfenov was not only a soloist, but also the artistic director of a vocal group, turned out to be extremely fruitful. In addition to numerous stock recordings, in which Anatoly Ivanovich demonstrated the best qualities of his voice, he introduced into practice public concert performances of operas by Radio in the Hall of Columns of the House of the Unions. Unfortunately, today this richest collection of recorded music has turned out to be out of place and lies dead weight – the era of consumption has put forward completely different musical priorities to the fore.

Anatoly Orfenov was also widely known as a chamber performer. He was especially successful in Russian vocal lyrics. Recordings of different years reflect the singer’s inherent watercolor style and, at the same time, the ability to convey the hidden drama of subtext. Orfenov’s work in the chamber genre is distinguished by culture and exquisite taste. The artist’s palette of expressive means is rich – from almost ethereal mezza voce and transparent cantilena to expressive culminations. In the records of 1947-1952. The stylistic originality of each composer is very accurately conveyed. The elegiac refinement of Glinka’s romances coexists with the sincere simplicity of Gurilev’s romances (the famous Bell, presented on this disc, can serve as a standard for the performance of chamber music of the pre-Glinka era). At Dargomyzhsky, Orfenov especially liked the romances “What is in my name to you” and “I died of happiness”, which he interpreted as subtle psychological sketches. In the romances of Rimsky-Korsakov, the singer set off the emotional beginning with intellectual depth. Rachmaninov’s monologue “At night in my garden” sounds expressive and dramatic. Of great interest are the recordings of romances by Taneyev and Tcherepnin, whose music is rarely heard in concerts.

Taneyev’s romance lyrics are characterized by impressionistic moods and colors. The composer was able to capture in his miniatures subtle changes in shades in the mood of the lyrical hero. Thoughts and feelings are complemented by the sound of spring night air or a slightly monotonous whirlwind of the ball (as in the well-known romance based on poems by Y. Polonsky “Mask”). Reflecting on the chamber art of Tcherepnin, Academician Boris Asafiev drew attention to the influence of the Rimsky-Korsakov school and French impressionism (“gravitation towards capturing the impressions of nature, towards air, towards colorfulness, towards the nuances of light and shadow”). In the romances based on Tyutchev’s poems, these features are discerned in the exquisite coloring of harmony and texture, in fine details, especially in the piano part. The recordings of Russian romances made by Orfenov together with the pianist David Gaklin are an excellent example of chamber ensemble music-making.

In 1950, Anatoly Orfenov began teaching at the Gnessin Institute. He was a very caring and understanding teacher. He never imposed, did not force to imitate, but every time he proceeded from the individuality and capabilities of each student. Even though none of them became a great singer and did not make a world career, but how many associate professor Orfenov was able to correct voices – he was often given hopeless ones or those who were not taken into their classes by other, more ambitious teachers. Among his students were not only tenors, but also basses (tenor Yuri Speransky, who worked in various theaters of the USSR, now heads the department of opera training at the Gnessin Academy). There were few female voices, and among them was the eldest daughter Lyudmila, who later became a soloist of the Bolshoi Theater Choir. The authority of Orfenov as a teacher eventually became international. His long-term (nearly ten years) foreign teaching activity began in China and continued at the Cairo and Bratislava conservatories.

In 1963, the first return to the Bolshoi Theater took place, where Anatoly Ivanovich was in charge of the opera troupe for 6 years – these were the years when La Scala first came, and the Bolshoi toured in Milan, when future stars (Obraztsova, Atlantov , Nesterenko, Mazurok, Kasrashvili, Sinyavskaya, Piavko). According to the recollections of many artists, there was no such wonderful troupe. Orfenov always knew how to take the position of the “golden mean” between the management and the soloists, fatherly supported the singers, especially the youth, with good advice. At the turn of the 60s and 70s, the power in the Bolshoi Theater changed again, and the entire directorate, headed by Chulaki and Anastasiev, left. In 1980, when Anatoly Ivanovich returned from Czechoslovakia, he was immediately called Bolshoi. In 1985, he retired due to illness. Died in 1987. He was buried at the Vagankovsky cemetery.

We have his voice. There were diaries, articles and books (among which are “Sobinov’s creative path”, as well as a collection of creative portraits of young soloists of the Bolshoi “Youth, hopes, accomplishments”). Warm memories of contemporaries and friends remain, testifying that Anatoly Orfenov was a man with God in his soul.

Andrey Khripin