MAESTRO ALEXANDER ZATSEPIN
Is it possible to imagine the 20th century without the songs of the great Alexander Zatsepin. Favorite millions of hits and songs from the comedies of Leonid Gaidai made his work immortal. Already from the first chords “Songs about bears”, “But we don’t care”, “Love to meet”, “Where childhood goes” or “Wizard-dropouts” I want to sing along. And the life of an outstanding composer was not as cloudless and fun as his compositions.
Talented siberian
Alexander Zatsepin hails from Novosibirsk. He was born March 10, 1926. The parents of the future composer had nothing to do with creativity, but a little grown-up son was hired by a music teacher. Later he was sent to a music school, where the boy enjoyed studying and even started composing small melodies at a very young age.
In addition to music, Alexander was fond of gymnastics and acrobatics, worked in the radio circle, until World War II struck. Composer Alexander Zatsepin
Alexander’s father was a surgeon and at the very beginning of the war he was put in prison for counter-revolutionary activities. In the hospital of Novosibirsk, where his father worked, there were already many wounded. For being late for work for 15 minutes, they were put on trial. Sergei Dmitrievich then told a friend that at last the Soviet government had taken on the slobs and quitters. The word “finally” was decisive in his fate. One of his friends reported him to the NKVD, for which Zatsepin’s father was imprisoned. He was released only in 1956.
Alexander Zatsepin in search of himself
During the war, Alexander Zatsepin, like many boys-peers, plowed the fields on the tractor, helped the collective farmers to harvest. At one time he even wanted to go to work in a circus, but his mother was absolutely the composer Alexander Zatsepin, against this, and his son continued his studies at school. There he organized a small orchestra that played Glenn Miller’s jazz compositions from The Serenade of the Sun Valley.
Next was the Institute of Transport Engineers, but there did not work out with mathematics and the student Zatsepin was expelled for academic failure in this subject.
In the army, Alexander was called in 1945. He ended up at an infantry school in Tyumen, where he ended up in a platoon under the command of Yevgeny Matveyev – a famous actor and director. In the army, Alexander mastered the accordion and clarinet, played the piano, took part in amateur performances, and played dances in the foyer of cinemas.
First popularity
The experience gained in the Song and Dance Ensemble of the Novosibirsk District was useful for Zatsepin. After demobilization, he was invited to work at the philharmonic. All year he traveled with the tour team in Siberia. Alexander realized that he lacked a musical education and went to study at the composer Alexander Zatsepinalma-Ata musical school. They listened to him and advised him to immediately submit documents to the conservatory. He entered the piano department, and then began to combine his studies with classes at the composer.
Then he wrote his first serious work, which successfully went on the stage of the local theater for fifteen years. It was the ballet “Old Man Hottabych”. Although the author of the book – Lazar Lagin – did not really want his work put on the stage.
In his last year at the conservatory, Zatsepin wrote the music for the film “Our dear doctor.” The song “The Blue Sky Above Me” performed by Ermek Serkebaev brought him his first popularity and became the hallmark.
Creative trio
After moving to Moscow, Alexander Zatsepin met the poet Leonid Derbenev, in collaboration with which many well-known songs were written – “But we do not care,” “People are not killed by beer …”, “There is only an instant”, “Cap-cap-cap” , “Bonfire on the snow”, “Love is guilty alone”, “Island of Bad Luck”, “Song of Cupid”, “Help me”, “Talk with happiness” and other equally magnificent.
Zatsepin’s long and fruitful collaboration with director Leonid Gaidai began quite by accident. At the film studio “Mosfilm” Alexander Sergeevich periodically went to leave to listen to their compositions. There they already knew him thanks to the song “The Blue Sky Above Me” by composer Alexander Zatsepini “A Fire in the Snow”. One day, an assistant Gaidai called him and said that Leonid Iovich wanted to meet with him. By that time, the director had quarreled with composer Nikita Bogoslovsky, who wrote the music for the comedies “Dogs Barbos” and “Samogonschiki”. Thus began the epoch of Gaidai and Zatsepin.
What did not Alexander Sergeyevich invent, in order to emphasize Leonid Iovich’s eccentric comedies with music. He used hunting decoys for recording melodies, and referee whistles, and measuring roulettes.
Such wonderful artists as Nina Brodskaya, Aida Vedischeva, Oleg Dal, Oleg Anofriev, Andrey Mironov and Yuri Nikulin performed Zatsepin’s songs in the movies. The merciless bodies of censorship were carping towards many lyrics, but Gaidai managed to defend the compositions by hook or by crook.
