Русские песни were recorded in 1976—1979 and released on LP in 1980. I can’t find more precise date, so why not 5 October.
I remember how it appeared in our house. One of my mum’s former students worked at the Aprelevka record factory and was procuring the vinyls before they hit the stores. As for Русские песни, I never saw it in the stores. Some of those vinyls came in faceless paper sleeves or just in plastic “inner” bags, but this one came in a proper cardboard sleeve, with the title and song names in both Russian and English. Wow.
Till then, I only knew Gradsky thanks to Как молоды мы были and his work in the animated film Голубой щенок. (Mind you, “only” this would be enough to secure him a place in the music pantheon.) I never imagined him to be a rock musician. The title, Russian songs, was not particularly promising. I was not a big fan of Russian folk songs because what we heard on the radio or TV back then were of the official (castrated) variety — Alexandrov Ensemble, Lyudmila Zykina, Pyatnitsky Choir. Surely Gradsky wouldn’t sing any of those, I thought. So, when nobody was home, I gave it a listen. And then another one. And another one.
This album was a revelation. Of course, now I can’t think of any other version of any of these songs, nor any other sequence. And it is recommended (by me) to make a pause between “side A” and “side B” even if you listen to the CD. They were recorded three years apart (side A in 1976, side B in 1979) and each has its own beginning and end.
One detail that I haven’t known until now is that it was Yuri Fokin (Skomorokhi, Tsvety, Mashina Vremeni) who played drums on 1976 sessions. As he emigrated to the USA in 1978, his name didn’t appear in the album credits — typical in the Soviet times, but this omission was not corrected on the 1995 CD either.
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Русские песни / Russian Songs
Сюита на темы народных песен / Folk song suite |
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Юрий Иванов: бас-гитара, гармоника Сергей Зенько: флейта, дудка, саксофон Юрий Фокин: барабаны (1, 2, 5) Владимир Васильков: барабаны (7)
Yuri Ivanov: bass guitar, accordion Sergey Zenko: flute, pipe, saxophone Yuri Fokin: drums (1, 2, 5) Vladimir Vasilkov: drums (7) |
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