A peasant girl (middle) wearing a brocade sarafan in 1909. A simple black sarafan

A Sarafan (Russian: сарафан, from Persian sеrāрā^{[citation needed]}) is a traditional Russian long, trapeze-shaped jumper dress (pinafore) worn as Russian folk costume by women and girls.

Chronicles first mention it under the year 1376, and since that time it was worn well until the 20th century. It is now worn as folk costume for performing Russian folk songs and folk dancing. Plain sarafans are still designed and worn today as a summer-time light dress.^[1][2]

It was the dress worn by peasant girls and women in the central and northern part of Russia until the 20th century. Russian women from the upper and middle classes stopped wearing traditional Russian costume in the 18th century, during Peter the Great's modernization of Russia, apart from the kokoshniks as part a court dress (although the clothing style of Russian aristocrats differed greatly from those of commoners). It is now worn as folk costume for performing Russian folk songs and folk dancing.

Sarafans could be of single piece construction with thin shoulder straps over which a sleeveless vest, called a "dushegreya" is sometimes worn, giving the shape of the body of a smaller triangle over a larger one. It comes in different styles such as the simpler black, flower- or check-patterned versions formerly used for everyday wear, or the elaborate brocade versions formerly reserved for special occasions. The head-dress usually worn with the sarafan today in folk performances is the kokoshnik, although in the past a head scarf tied under the chin or at the back of the head was part of everyday dress.

Plain sarafans are still designed and worn today as a summer-time light dress without the traditional Russian blouse. They can be worn during folk music and dance performances and are produced as souvenirs.^{[citation needed]}

References[link]

External links[link]

• Sarafan photos

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James Last in 2006

James Last (also known as "Hansi") (born Hans Last, 17 April 1929, Bremen, Germany) is a German composer and big band leader. His "happy music" made his numerous albums best-sellers in Germany and the United Kingdom. His composition, "Happy Heart", became an international success in interpretations by Andy Williams and Petula Clark. According to the British Hit Singles & Albums book, he has reportedly sold in excess of seventy million albums worldwide.^[1]

Early life[link]

Last's father was an official at the public works department of the city of Bremen and he grew up in the suburb of Sebaldsbrück. He learned to play the piano from the age of 12, then switched to double bass as a teenager. His home city was heavily bombed in World War II and he ran messages to air defence command posts during raids. At 14 he was entered in the Bückeburg Military Music School of the German Wehrmacht.^[2]

After the fall of the Nazis, he joined Hans-Gunther Österreich's Radio Bremen Dance Orchestra in 1946. In 1948, he became the leader of the Last-Becker Ensemble, which performed for seven years. During that time, he was voted as the best bassist in the country by a German jazz poll for three consecutive years, from 1950–1952. After the Last-Becker Ensemble disbanded, he became the in-house arranger for Polydor Records, as well as for a number of European radio stations. For the next decade, he helped arrange hits for artists like Helmut Zacharias, Freddy Quinn, Lolita, Alfred Hause and Caterina Valente.

Work[link]

Last first released albums in the U.S. under the titles The American Patrol on Warner Brothers around 1964. He also released a series of nine albums in a series called Classics Up To Date vols. 1–9 which served up arrangements of classical melodies with strings, rhythm and wordless chorus from the mid 1960s through the early 1970s. Last released an album, Non-Stop Dancing, in 1965, a recording of brief renditions of popular songs, all tied together by an insistent dance beat and crowd noises. It was a hit and helped make him a major European star. Over the next four decades, Last released over 190 records, including several more volumes of Non-Stop Dancing. On these records, he varies his formula by adding different songs from different countries and genres, as well as guest performers like Richard Clayderman and Astrud Gilberto. He also had his own successful television series in the 1970s with guests ABBA and Lynsey de Paul.

Though his concerts and albums are consistently successful, especially in the UK, where he had 52 hit albums between 1967 and 1986, which made him second only to Elvis Presley in charting records,^{[citation needed]} he has had relatively few hit singles. In the UK, his only chart singles were "The Seduction", the theme from American Gigolo (1980) composed by Giorgio Moroder, and "Biscaya" from the album Biscaya. In the US, where "The Seduction" became a Top 40 hit, peaking at No. 28 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 22 on the Adult Contemporary chart in May 1980, Last was somewhat more successful on the singles charts. In 2003, his song "The Lonely Shepherd" which features the pan flute of Gheorghe Zamfir appeared on the soundtrack of the Quentin Tarantino movie Kill Bill: Vol. 1.^[3]

He has won numerous popular and professional awards, including Billboard magazine's Star of the Year trophy in 1976, and has been honoured for lifetime achievement with the German ECHO prize in 1994. His song "Music from Across the Way" (recorded by Andy Williams in 1972) is a melody with a classical feeling and was a worldwide hit; it is the only other Last single apart from "The Seduction" to reach the U.S. Hot 100, where it peaked at No. 84 (and No. 18 on the Adult Contemporary chart) in late 1971. (His only other U.S. chart single was a double-sided entry featuring remakes of The Village Stompers' "Washington Square" and Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Proud Mary", which reached No. 22 on the Adult Contemporary chart in early 1971.)

Last has a large fan base in Europe and elsewhere. His trademark is big band arrangements of pop music hits; his series of party albums is equally well known. Over the course of his career, he has sold well over 100 million albums.^[4] In the United States, Last's music was a staple of the mainly instrumental-based Beautiful Music radio format for years.

European concert dates for April 2011 have been advertised.^[5]

Personal life[link]

Last divides his time between Florida and Germany. He gives much credit to his wife and son, who help with his music.

Discography[link]

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See also[link]

• James Last Orchestra
• List of best-selling music artists

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: James Last

• Official website

For the Kyrgyz politician, see Ivan Rebrov.

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (November 2009)

Ivan Rebroff
Background information
Birth name	Hans-Rolf Rippert
Born	(1931-07-31)July 31, 1931 Berlin, Germany
Died	February 27, 2008(2008-02-27) (aged 76) Frankfurt, Germany
Genres	International music
Occupations	Singer
Instruments	Vocals

Ivan Rebroff

Ivan Rebroff

Ivan Rebroff (31 July 1931 – 27 February 2008) was a German singer, allegedly of Russian ancestry, with an extraordinary vocal range of four and a half octaves, ranging from the soprano to bass registers.^[1]

Rebroff was born in Berlin as Hans-Rolf Rippert. He was famous for singing Russian folk songs, but also performed opera, light classics and folk songs from many other countries. He was known on stage for his gusto. He performed over 6,000 concerts in his career, including a two-year seven-day-a-week stint at the French opera, singing, among other greats, Fiddler on the Roof. Rebroff still performed 12 shows in 14 days when he was well into his seventies, such as on an Australian tour.

Ivan Rebroff described himself as international, the "connection between East and West". He became a citizen of Greece and lived on the Greek island of Skopelos in the Sporades.

He died in Frankfurt after a long illness. Four days after his death, his brother Horst Rippert, who is nine years his senior (and by his own accounts shot down Antoine de Saint Exupéry), claimed part of Ivan's vast fortune.^[2]

LP Discography[link]

Unknown Year[link]

• Favourites from Mother Russia
• Ivan Rebroff (Includes Lara's Theme and other Popular Melodies)

1968[link]

• Folk Songs from Old Russia (Volksweisen aus dem alten Russland)
• Folk Songs from Old Russia Volume II (Volksweisen aus dem alten Russland 2)
• Original russische Liebeslieder
• Na Sdarowje (Ivan sings about Vodka and Wine)
• Slawische Seele (Compilation album shared with Tatjana Ivanow & Dunja Rajter)

1969[link]

• Beim Klang der Balalaika, Au son des Balalaikas (French version of Beim Klang der Balalaika)
• Abendglocken (Compilation)
• Russische Weihnacht mit Ivan Rebroff
• A Russian Christmas (English version of Russische Weihnacht?)
• Un Violon sur le toit (Soundtrack of French production of Fiddler on the Roof)
• Russische Party ("Live" album)
• Festliche Weihnacht (with Regensburger Domspatzen - Boys' Choir)
• A Festive Christmas (Festliche Weihnacht re-issue)

1970[link]

• Somewhere My Love (English language versions)
• Kosaken müssen reiten (German language versions)
• Ivan Rebroff (Compilation?)

1971[link]

• The Best of Ivan Rebroff (Compilation)
• Ivan Rebroff Sing vir Ons (South African Album-Gold Disk Award)
• Vir Jou Suid-Afrika (South African album)
• Ivan Rebroff (Opera)
• Kalinka (Soundtrack from L'Homme qui vient de la Nuit)
• Mein Russland, Du bist schön (German language versions)
• Starportrait (Compilation)
• Zwischen Donau und Don (with Dunja Rajter)

1972[link]

• Erinnerungen an Russland (Russian language versions)
• The Best of Ivan Rebroff Volume II (Compilation)

1973[link]

• Lieder der Welt (Folk songs from around the world)
• Mein Altes Russland (lushly arranged Russian folk songs)
• 25 Greatest Russian Melodies (Compilation with Tatiana Ivanov (2 duets))
• 20 Greatest Hits (Compilation)

1974[link]

• Russische Party 2 ("Live" album)
• Memories of Russia

1975[link]

• Ivan Rebroff at Carnegie Hall (Live at Carnegie Hall)
• Reich Mir Die Hand
• Russische Lieder Von Liebe und Tod

1977[link]

• Midnight in Moscow (Russian language versions)
• Komm mit nach Hellas (German language versions of Greek songs)

1978[link]

• Mitternacht in Moskau (German version of Midnight in Moscow)

1979[link]

• Ave Maria
• Die Ivan Rebroff Versameling (Compilation of South African tracks)

1980[link]

• Zauber einer großen Stimme — 20 unvergängliche Welterfolge
• Zauber einer großen Stimme — Seine größten Welterfolge
• Die schönsten Lieder dieser Welt (Ivan Rebroff singt 20 unvergängliche Melodien)
• Katharina und Potemkin (TV Musical/Operetta)

CD Discography[link]

2002[link]

• Meine Reise um die Welt
• The Great Ivan Rebroff

2003[link]

• Seine Größten Welterfolge
• Best of Ivan Rebroff
• Golden Stars

Compilation albums[link]

• Festliche Weihnachten
• The Art of Ivan Rebroff
• The Best of Russian Folk Songs Vol. 1
• The Best of Russian Folk Songs Vol. 2
• Erinnerungen an das letzte Jahrhundert (Memories of the Last Century)
• Der Zarewitsch
• Die Fledermaus (As Prince Orlofsky, with Carlos Kleiber & Bavarian State Orchestra)
• Weihnachten mit Ivan Rebroff
• Die schönste Stimme Rußlands
• Kosakenträume

Notes[link]

1. ^ The Guinness book of records, 1993
2. ^ "Heimlicher Bruder will Millionen-Vermögen" (29/2/09) in Aktuelle Nachrichten - Bild.de

External links[link]

• Official web site
• Ivan Rebroff Fan Page

Nicolai Gedda (left), in Finland, debating about musical interpretation with Caj Ehrstedt (on the right), during the Korsholm Music Festival,^[1] in 1987.

Nicolai Gedda (born 11 July 1925) is a Swedish operatic tenor. Having made some two hundred recordings, Gedda is said to be the most widely recorded tenor in history. Gedda's singing is best known for his beauty of tone, vocal control, and musical perception.^[2]

Biography[link]

Nicolai Harry Gustav Gedda (gedda [written as 'gädda'] means 'pike' in Swedish) was born in Stockholm to a Swedish mother and a half-Russian father. Gedda was raised by his aunt Olga Gedda and his adoptive father Mihail Ustinov (a distant relative of Peter Ustinov), who sang bass in Serge Jaroff's Don Cossack Choir and was cantor in a Russian Orthodox church.^[3] Gedda grew up bilingual in Swedish and Russian. From 1929 to 1934 they lived in Leipzig, Germany, where young Nicolai learned German. They returned to Sweden after Hitler came to power. In school he later learned English, French and Latin. After leaving school he learned Italian by himself.

Gedda began his professional career as a bank teller in a local bank in Stockholm. One day he told a client that he was searching for a good singing teacher, and the client recommended Carl Martin Öhman, a well known Wagnerian tenor from the 1920s, who is also credited with discovering Jussi Björling. Later he also taught the Finnish bass Martti Talvela. Öhman was enthusiastic about Gedda and took him as a pupil, at the beginning without payment, because Gedda had to support his parents with his pay. After a few months he obtained a scholarship and was later able to pay for Öhman's lectures.

Opera career[link]

An early appraisal of Gedda's singing was offered by Walter Legge, after first hearing Gedda sing for the role of Dmitry in a planned recording of Boris Godunov.

"On my arrival at the airport I was asked by a swarm of journalists if I were not interested in hearing their excellent young Swedish voices. Naturally I was interested, but I did not expect either the front page stories that appeared next morning or the mass of letters and almost incessant telephone calls asking to be heard. I had to ask the Director of the Opera for a room for a couple of days to hear about 100 young aspirants. The first to sing to me (at 9.30 in the morning) was Gedda who had I believe sung only once in public. He sang the Carmen Flower Song so tenderly yet passionately that I was moved almost to tears. He delivered the difficult rising scale ending with a clear and brilliant B flat. Almost apologetically I asked him to try to sing it as written -- pianissimo, rallentando and diminuendo. Without turning a hair he achieved the near-miracle, incredibly beautifully and without effort. I asked him to come back at 8 that evening and sent word to my wife that a great singer had fallen into my lap and to Dobrowen that, believe it or not, this 23-year-old Gedda was the heaven-sent Dmitry for our Boris."^[4]

He was understudy to Giuseppe Di Stefano at a performance of L'elisir d'amore at the Edinburgh Festival circa 1951.

In April 1952, at the age of 26, Gedda made his debut at the Royal Swedish Opera, performing the role of Chapelou in Adolphe Adam's Le postillon de Lonjumeau. One of the arias in this opera, "Mes amis, écoutez l'histoire", is considered one of the most difficult tenor arias in all of opera, as it calls for a demanding high D from the soloist. In this same year Gedda also performed the role of Hoffmann in Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann and the tenor role in Der Rosenkavalier.

After an audition in Stockholm, Gedda gained the attention of conductor Herbert von Karajan, who took him to Italy. In 1953, he made his début at La Scala as Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni.

In 1954, he made his Paris Opéra debut in the tenor role in Weber's Oberon, and was given a permanent contract for several years. In 1957, Gedda made his Metropolitan Opera début in the title role of Gounod's Faust, and went on to sing 28 roles there over the next 26 years, including the world premieres of Barber's Vanessa and Menotti's The Last Savage. Gedda made his Royal Opera House Covent Garden début in 1954 as the Duke of Mantua in Verdi's Rigoletto and has since returned to sing Benvenuto Cellini, Alfredo, Gustavus III, Nemorino and Lensky.

Gedda's recordings span a wide variety of styles and several of the roles may be considered amongst the most challenging in the entire operatic repertoire, notably Arnold in Rossini's Guillaume Tell and Arturo in I puritani, both requiring stratospheric high notes and an easy legato line.

A singer of unusual longevity, Gedda has been active well into his late 70s; in May 2001 he recorded the role of the Emperor Altoum in Puccini's Turandot and the role of the High Priest in Mozart's Idomeneo in June 2003.

Art song[link]

In addition to his opera performances, Gedda cultivated an active parallel career as a recitalist, with a large repertoire of French, German, Scandinavian, and Russian art songs. As an interpreter of Lieder he often performed with the pianist Sebastian Peschko. Gedda's language skills, intellectualism and intense musicality, as well as his extensive recordings, have rendered him particularly indispensable in this genre.^[5] Gedda has also taught and former students include Daryl Simpson of the Celtic Tenors^[6]

Honours[link]

In 1965 he became Swedish Court Singer, and in 1966 a member of the Swedish Academy of Music. Also in 1966 he received K.u.K ( Kaiser und König) award for singing.In 1968 he was decorated with the Swedish medal "Litteris et artibus." In 1976 he got the golden Nobel medal and in 2007 he received Caruso prize.

In 2010 he received from the French president Nicolas Sarkozy the Legion of Honor, or Légion d'honneur, the highest French decoration.

Nicolai Gedda was a visiting professor at the Royal Academy of Music in London and in 1994 he was made an Honorary Member of the Royal Academy.^[7]

Biographies[link]

He published his first memoirs, "Gåvan är inte gratis" (A gift is not free of charge) in 1977, with the help of his future wife, Aino Sellermark. Later the two wrote another biography: "Nicolai Gedda: My Life and Art", which was published by Amadeus Press in 1999.

Notes[link]

External links[link]

• Nicolai Gedda Fanpage - Un-official Nicolai Gedda fan website (in English and German).
• Free download links - Nicolai Gedda in Operas and Recitals
• YouTube - Lorengar & Gedda in Love duet Act 1 M. Butterfly 1/2 - Pilar Lorengar and Nicolai Gedda sing Puccini's "Vogliatemi Bene" from Madama Butterfly. Part 1 of 2.
• YouTube - Lorengar & Gedda in Love duet Act 1 M. Butterfly 2/2 - Part 2 of 2.
• J'ai revu nos amis from Fra Diavolo by Aubert
• YouTube - Pour Berthe moi je soupire from Le prophète by Meyerbeer
• YouTube - Magische Töne From Die Königin von Saba by Karl Goldmark
• YouTube - Kuda, kuda vy udalilis (Evgenij Onjegin)
• YouTube - Postillon de Lonjumeau (Adam)