Peter Leshchenko was arrested for this. A tragic, but still happy biography of Peter Leshchenko. A meeting that changed life

The life path of the Soviet singer and dancer Pyotr Leshchenko turned out to be bright, eventful, but not too long. A stingy fate gave him only 56 years, a significant part of which fell during both world wars and the difficult post-war years. Despite this, Pyotr Leshchenko managed to become famous for his rich creative heritage and many legends about himself.

More questions than answers

In July 1954, a man died in the prison hospital in Targu Ocna. Fans of the work of Pyotr Leshchenko would hardly recognize in this beaten man, exhausted by torture and hunger, their idol, who was applauded by Europe for his unique performance of the songs “Black Eyes”, “My Marusechka”, “Curly-haired forelock” and others.

The exact place where the “sweet-voiced nightingale” is buried is still unknown. Also, no one knows for sure why the popular pre-war performer died: from an open stomach ulcer, poisoning or beating. Together with Peter Konstantinovich, other secrets also disappeared into oblivion.

Either an Odessa resident or a Moldovan

Biographers even find it difficult to name the exact place of birth of the future pop star. All that is known for sure is that Peter spent his childhood in Chisinau. The family lived modestly, if not poorly. Petya and his half-sisters were raised by their mother and stepfather. But the street became the boy’s main teacher. Here he sang for the first time for the crowd, collecting money in a dusty hat.

He did this out of annoyance at the priest, who did not give Petya, who was guilty of something, another meager “salary” for singing in the church choir. Thanks to his soulful voice, the boy earned almost as much in a day as he did in a month in church. Leshchenko is expelled from the choir for his impudent act, but this does not bother him.

Peter already understands that his singing touches the souls and hearts of people. Friendship with gypsies, gatherings around a fire on the river bank, first lessons in playing the guitar - and gypsy romances will become firmly established in the life and work of the famous chansonnier. He performed them in a particularly masterly, passionate, inspired way.

A dancer is no worse than a singer

Participation in the First World War cost the 19-year-old warrant officer Leshchenko a serious injury. The long recovery in the Chisinau hospital ended after the October Revolution, so Peter returned home as a citizen of Romania.

He made a living in different ways. He was a turner, sang in church and cemetery choirs, and was a soloist in a vocal quartet and opera. Leshchenko went on tour as part of various pop groups.

Once in Paris, he did not miss the opportunity to graduate from Vera Trefilova’s ballet school. Here he met his first wife, Zinaida Zakitt. Their dancing couple performed successfully in restaurants in Europe and the Middle East until Zina became pregnant. The only son will be named Igor, but that will happen later. Now Peter needs to decide what to do next. And he decides to sing again.

The triumph of Europe's new idol

Leshchenko gives his first solo concert in Chisinau. Soon, in addition to his own, simple but charming songs, compositions from venerable authors of that time appeared in his repertoire. Tours in Paris, Berlin, London, Riga, Belgrade. Hits in Russian, Romanian, English and French. Huge circulations of records. It was a stunning success and rapid wealth.

Using his own funds, the “king of romances” opened his own restaurant, “U Leshchenko,” where he performed and where, without regret, he invested a lot of money. Even the Romanian royal couple admires the singing of the “sweet-voiced nightingale,” but little is known about it in the USSR. A successful emigrant is not written about in newspapers, and after World War II, the popularization of his work will become a criminal offense.

Despite this, already at the end of the 1930s, the performer’s romances were secretly listened to in many Soviet apartments. Leshchenko dreams of going to his homeland, and in 1942 he goes on tour to Nazi-occupied Odessa. There he will meet his last love and second wife Vera Belousova, a conservatory student who is 25 years younger than the famous singer.

Traitor or spy

In Odessa, the enterprising singer not only gives concerts, but also opens another restaurant of his own. In the midst of the war, only the German occupiers can afford gourmet food and entertainment, so Leshchenko quickly earns a negative reputation among Soviet citizens and state security agencies. Almost 10 years later, for some reason he will be called a foreign spy.

An appeal to Joseph Stalin about returning to the USSR will only aggravate the situation of Pyotr Konstantinovich and will ensure close attention to his person. The thought of visiting the Soviet Union turns into a fixed idea.

In the early 1950s, Leshchenko receives approval, but does not have time to make the trip. During the next concert, Romanian police take him away for interrogation by representatives of the Soviet secret services.

The popular singer was taken to different prisons for 3 years, from where he never returned. Not underground, but official records with songs by Pyotr Leshchenko began to appear in the USSR only during the era of perestroika. The voice of the “king of romances” sounded again in his homeland, as the talented performer once dreamed of.

Pyotr Konstantinovich Leshchenko was born on June 14, 1898 near Odessa in the village of Isaevo. The father was a small clerk. His mother, Maria Konstantinovna, an illiterate woman, had an absolute ear for music, sang well, and knew many Ukrainian folk songs - which, of course, had the desired influence on her son.

From early childhood, Peter showed extraordinary musical abilities. They say that at the age of seven he performed before the Cossacks in his village, for which he received a pot of porridge and a loaf of bread...

At the age of three, Petya lost his father, and a few years later, in 1909, his mother remarried, and the family moved to Bessarabia, to Chisinau. Petya is placed in a parochial school, where the boy is noticed to have a good voice and is enrolled in the bishop's choir. Let’s add along the way that the school taught not only literacy, but also artistic gymnastic dancing, music, singing...

Despite the fact that Petya only completed four years of training, he gained a lot. At the age of 17, Petya was drafted to ensign school. A year later he was already in the active army (the First World War was in progress) with the rank of ensign. In one of the battles, Peter was wounded and sent to a Chisinau hospital. Meanwhile, Romanian troops captured Bessarabia. Leshchenko, like thousands of others, found himself cut off from his homeland, becoming an “emigrant without emigration.”

It was necessary to work somewhere, to earn a living: young Leshchenko entered the Romanian theatrical society “Scene”, performed in Chisinau, presenting dances that were fashionable at that time (including the Lezginka) between sessions at the Orpheum cinema.

In 1917, the mother, Maria Konstantinovna, gave birth to a daughter, they named her Valentina (in 1920 another sister was born - Ekaterina) - and Peter already performed in the Chisinau restaurant "Suzanna" ...

Later, Leshchenko toured Bessarabia, then, in 1925, came to Paris, where he performed in a guitar duet and in the balalaika ensemble “Guslyar”: Peter sang, played the balalaika, then appeared in a Caucasian costume with daggers in his teeth, stabbing the daggers with lightning speed and dexterity. to the floor, then dashing “squats” and “Arab steps”. Has tremendous success. Soon, wanting to improve her dance technique, she entered the best ballet school (where the famous Vera Aleksandrovna Trefilova, née Ivanova, who recently shone on the Mariinsky stage and won fame in both London and Paris), teaches.

At this school, Leshchenko meets a student from Riga, Zinaida Zakit. Having learned several original numbers, they perform in Parisian restaurants, and are successful everywhere... Soon the dancing couple becomes a married couple. The newlyweds go on a long tour of European countries, performing in restaurants, cabarets, and theater stages. Everywhere the audience enthusiastically receives the artists.

Best of the day

And here it is 1929. The city of Chisinau, the city of youth. They are given the stage of the most fashionable restaurant. The posters read: “Every evening, famous ballet dancers Zinaida Zakit and Pyotr Leshchenko, who came from Paris, perform at the London restaurant.”

In the evenings, the jazz orchestra of Mikhail Weinstein played in the restaurant, and at night Pyotr Leshchenko, wearing a gypsy shirt with wide sleeves, came out performing gypsy songs to the accompaniment of a guitar (given by his stepfather). Then the beautiful Zinaida appeared. The dance numbers began. All evenings were a great success.

“In the spring of 1930,” recalls Konstantin Tarasovich Sokolsky, “posters appeared in Riga announcing a concert of the dance duet Zinaida Zakit and Peter Leshchenko, in the premises of the Dailes Theater on Romanovskaya Street No. 37. I was not at this concert, but after a while I saw their performance in the divertissement program at the Palladium cinema.They and the singer Lilian Fernet filled the entire divertissement program - 35-40 minutes.

Zakit shone with the precision of her movements and the characteristic performance of Russian dance figures. And Leshchenko did dashing “squats” and Arab steps, making transfers without touching the floor with his hands. Then came the Lezginka, in which Leshchenko temperamentally threw daggers... But Zakit left a special impression in solo character and comic dances, some of which she danced on pointe shoes. And here, to give his partner the opportunity to change clothes for the next solo number, Leshchenko came out in a gypsy costume, with a guitar and sang songs.

His voice had a small range, a light timbre, without “metal”, with a short breath (like a dancer’s) and therefore he was not able to cover the huge cinema hall with his voice (there were no microphones at that time). But in this case this was not of decisive importance, because the audience looked at him not as a singer, but as a dancer. But in general, his performance left a good impression... The program ended with a couple more dances.

In general, I liked their performance as a dancing couple - I felt the professionalism of the performance, the special practice of each movement, I also liked their colorful costumes.

I was especially impressed by my partner with her charm and feminine charm - such was her temperament, some kind of bewitching inner burning. Leshchenko also left the impression of a wonderful gentleman...

Soon we had the opportunity to perform in the same program and get to know each other. They turned out to be pleasant, sociable people. Zina turned out to be our Riga resident, a Latvian, as she said, “the daughter of the landlord at 27 Gertrudes Street.” And Peter is from Bessarabia, from Chisinau, where his whole family lived: his mother, stepfather and two younger sisters - Valya and Katya.

Here it must be said that after the First World War, Bessarabia ceded to Romania, and thus the entire Leshchenko family mechanically turned into Romanian subjects.

Soon the dance duo found themselves out of work. Zina was pregnant, and Peter, left to some extent without work, began to look for opportunities to use his voice data and therefore came to the management of the Riga music house "Youth and Feyerabend" (these are the names of the directors of the company), which represented the interests of the German gramophone company "Parlophone" and offered his services as a singer...

Subsequently, it seems in 1933, the company “Youth and Feyerabend” in Riga founded its own recording studio called “Bonophon”, where I, in 1934, after my first return from abroad, first sang “Heart”, “Ha- cha-cha", "Charaban-apple", and the comic song "Antoshka on an accordion".

The management received Leshchenko's visit with indifference, saying that they did not know such a singer. After Peter’s repeated visits to this company, they agreed that Leshchenko would go to Germany at his own expense and sing ten test songs on Parlophone, which Peter did.

In Germany, the Parlofon company released five discs of ten works, three of which are based on the words and music of Leshchenko himself: “From Bessarabia to Riga”, “Have fun, soul”, “Boy”.

Our Riga patrons sometimes organized dinner parties to which popular artists were invited. On one of these evenings at the “doctor of ear, nose and throat” Solomir (I don’t remember his name, I just called him “doctor”), where I visited more than once with the composer Oscar Davydovich Strok, we took Pyotr Leshchenko with us. He came with a guitar...

By the way, the walls of Solomir’s office were covered with photographs of our opera and concert singers and even guest performers, such as Nadezhda Plevitskaya, Lev Sibiryakov, Dmitry Smirnov, Leonid Sobinov and Fyodor Chaliapin, with touching autographs: “Thank you for saving the concert,” “To the miracle worker.” , who gave me back my voice in time."... Solomir himself had a pleasant tenor timbre. He and I always sang romances as a duet at such evenings. It was the same that evening.

Then Oscar Strok called Peter, agreed on something with him and sat down at the piano, and Petya took the guitar. The first thing he sang (as I remember) was the romance “Hey, Guitar Friend.” He behaved boldly, confidently, his voice flowed calmly. Then he sang a couple more romances, for which he was rewarded with unanimous applause. Petya himself was delighted, went up to O. Strok and kissed him...

To be honest, I really liked him that evening. There was nothing like when he sang in cinemas. There were huge halls, but here, in a small living room, everything was different; and of course, the fact that the wonderful musician Oscar Strok accompanied him played a huge role. The music enriched the vocals. And one more thing, which I consider one of the main points: for singers, the basic principle is to sing only with diaphragmatic, deep breathing. If in performances in a dance duet Leshchenko sang in a short breath, excited after dancing, now some support for the sound was felt, and hence the characteristic softness of the timbre of his voice...

At some similar family evening we met again. Everyone liked Peter's singing again. Oscar Strok became interested in Peter and included him in the concert program, with which we went to the city of Liepaja, on the shores of the Baltic Sea. But here again the history of performance in cinema repeated itself. The large hall of the Marine Club, where we performed, did not give Peter the opportunity to show himself.

The same thing was repeated in Riga, in the Barberina cafe, where other conditions were unfavorable for the singer, and it was not clear to me why Peter agreed to perform there. I was invited there several times and was offered a good fee, but, valuing my prestige as a singer, I always refused.

In old Riga, on Izmailovskaya Street, there was a small cozy cafe called "A.T." I don’t know what these two letters meant; they were probably the initials of the owner. A small orchestra led by the excellent violinist Herbert Schmidt was playing in the cafe. Sometimes there was a small program there, singers performed and especially often a brilliant, witty storyteller-entertainer, artist of the Russian Drama Theater, Vsevolod Orlov, brother of the world famous pianist Nikolai Orlov.

One day we were sitting at a table in this cafe: Doctor Solomir, lawyer Elyashev, Oscar Strok, Vsevolod Orlov and our local impresario Isaac Teitlbaum. Someone suggested the idea: “What if Leshchenko gave a performance in this cafe? After all, he could be successful here - the room is small, and the acoustics, apparently, are not bad.”

During the break, when the orchestra paused, Herbert Schmidt came to our table. Oscar Strok, Elyashev and Solomir started talking to him about something - we, sitting at the other end of the table, did not pay attention at first. Then, at Teitlbaum’s request, the cafe manager came up, and it all ended with Solomir and Elyashev “interesting” Herbert Schmidt to work with Leshchenko, and Oscar undertook to help him with the repertoire.

Peter, when he learned about this, was very happy. Rehearsals have begun. Oscar Strock and Herbert Schmidt did their job and two weeks later the first performance took place.

Already the first two songs were a success, but when it was announced that “My Last Tango” would be performed, the audience, seeing that the author himself, Oscar Strok, was in the hall, began to applaud, turning to him. Strok went up to the stage, sat down at the piano - this inspired Peter and after the tango was performed, the hall burst into thunderous applause. In general, the first performance was a triumph. After that, I listened to the singer several times - and everywhere the audience received his introductions well.

It was at the end of 1930, which can be considered the year the singing career of Pyotr Leshchenko began.

Zina, Peter's wife, gave birth to a son, who, at his father's request, was named Igor (although Zina's relatives, Latvians, suggested a different, Latvian name).

In the spring of 1931, I was with the troupe of the Bonzo miniature theater under the direction of the comedian A.N. Werner went abroad. Peter stayed in Riga, performing at the A.T. cafe. At this time, in the same place, in Riga, the owner of the large book publishing house Gramatou Drauge, Helmar Rudzitis, opened the Bellacord Electro company. In this company, Leshchenko records several records: “My last tango”, “Tell me why” and others...

The management really liked the first recordings, the voice turned out to be very phonogenic, and this was the beginning of Pyotr Leshchenko’s career as a record singer. During his stay in Riga, Peter also sang on “Bellacord”, in addition to the songs of O. Strok and the songs of another of ours, also from Riga, composer Mark Iosifovich Maryanovsky “Tatyana”, “Marfusha”, “Caucasus”, “Pancakes” and others. [In 1944, Maryanovsky died in Buchenwald]. The company paid a good fee for singing, i.e. Leshchenko finally got the opportunity to have a good income...

Around 1932, in Yugoslavia, in Belgrade, in the cabaret "Russian Family", owned by the Serb Mark Ivanovich Garapich, our Riga dance quartet "Four Smaltsevs", which had European fame, performed with great success. The head of this number, Ivan Smaltsev, heard P. Leshchenko perform in Riga, in the A.T. cafe, he liked his singing, and therefore he invited Garapich to engage Peter. The contract was drawn up on brilliant terms for Leshchenko - 15 dollars per evening for two performances (for example, I’ll say that in Riga you could buy a good suit for fifteen dollars).

But fate again did not smile on Peter. The hall turned out to be narrow, large, and even before his arrival, the singer from Estonia Voskresenskaya, the owner of a vast, beautiful timbre of a dramatic soprano, had performed there. Petya did not live up to the management's hopes, he got lost - and although the contract with him was concluded for a month, twelve days later (of course, having paid in full under the contract) they parted with him. I think that Peter drew a conclusion from this.

In 1932 or 33, the company of Gerutsky, Cavour and Leshchenko opened a small cafe-restaurant called "Casuca Nostru" ("our house") in Bucharest, on Brezoleanu Street 7. The capital was invested by the personable-looking Gerutsky, who greeted the guests, the experienced chef Cavour was in charge of the kitchen, and Petya with a guitar created the mood in the hall. Petya’s stepfather and mother took visitors’ clothes into the wardrobe (it was at this time that the entire Leshchenko family from Chisinau moved to live in Bucharest, and their son Igor continued to live and be raised in Riga, with Zina’s relatives, and therefore the first language he began to speak - Latvian).

At the end of 1933 I arrived in Riga. He sang all the musical reviews at the Russian Drama Theater and traveled to neighboring Lithuania and Estonia.

Petya came to Riga several times to visit his son. When they went for a walk, I was always the translator, because Petya did not know the Latvian language. Soon Peter took Igor to Bucharest.

Things were going well at Casutsa Nostra, the tables were taken, as they said, by fighting, and the need arose to change the premises. When in the fall of 1936, under a contract, I came to Bucharest again, there was already a new, large restaurant on the main street of Calea Victoria (N1), which was called “Leshchenko”.

In general, Peter was very popular in Bucharest. He was fluent in Romanian and sang in two languages. The restaurant was visited by sophisticated Russian and Romanian society.

A wonderful orchestra played. Zina turned Peter's sisters, Valya and Katya, into good dancers, they performed together, but, of course, the highlight of the program was basically Peter himself.

Having learned all the secrets of singing on records in Riga, Petya made an agreement with the branch of the American company Columbia in Bucharest and sang many records there... His voice in those recordings has a wonderful timbre and is expressive in performance. After all, this is the truth: the less metal in the timbre of the voice of the performer of intimate songs, the better it will sound on gramophone records (some called Peter a “record singer”: Peter did not have voice material appropriate for the stage, while performing intimate songs, tango on gramophone records , foxtrots, etc. I consider him one of the best Russian singers I have ever heard; when I sang songs in the rhythm of tango, or foxtrot, requiring softness and sincerity of the voice timbre, I always tried, when singing records, to also sing with a bright sound, completely removing metal from the timbre of the voice, which, on the contrary, is necessary on the big stage).

In 1936 I was in Bucharest. My impresario, S.Ya. Bisker once tells me: soon there will be a concert by F.I. here in Bucharest. Chaliapin, and after the concert the Bucharest public organizes a banquet in honor of his arrival at the Continental restaurant (where the Romanian virtuoso violinist Grigoras Nicu played).

The Chaliapin concert was organized by S. Ya. Bisker, and of course a place for me at the concert and at the banquet was secured...

But soon Peter came to my hotel and said: “I invite you to a banquet in honor of Chaliapin, which will take place in my restaurant!” And indeed, the banquet took place in his restaurant. It turned out that Peter managed to come to an agreement with Chaliapin’s administrator, managed to “interest” him, and the banquet from the Continental was moved to the Lescenco restaurant.

I sat fourth from F.I. Chaliapin: Chaliapin, Bisker, the critic Zolotorev and me. I was all attention, all the time listening to what Chaliapin was saying to those sitting next to him.

Speaking in the evening's program, Peter was on fire; while singing, he tried to address the table at which Chaliapin was sitting. After Peter’s performances, Bisker asked Chaliapin: “What do you think, Fedor (they were on you), Leshchenko sings well?” Chaliapin smiled, looked towards Peter and said: “Yes, stupid songs, he sings well.”

Petya, at first, when he learned about these words of Chaliapin, was offended, and then I explained to him with difficulty: “You can only be proud of such a remark. After all, what you and I sing, various fashionable hits, romances and tangos, are really stupid songs according to compared to the classical repertoire. But they praised you, they said that you sing these songs well. And who said this - Chaliapin himself! This is the biggest compliment from the lips of the great actor."

Fyodor Ivanovich was in a great mood that evening and did not skimp on autographs.

In 1932, the Leshchenko spouses returned from Riga to Chisinau. Leshchenko gives two concerts in the Diocesan Hall, which had exceptional acoustics and was the most beautiful building in the city.

The newspaper wrote: “On January 16 and 17, the famous performer of gypsy songs and romances, who enjoys enormous success in the capitals of Europe, Pyotr Leshchenko, will perform in the Diocesan Hall.” After the performances, the following messages appeared: “Peter Leshchenko’s concert was an exceptional success. The soulful performance and successful selection of romances delighted the audience.”

Then Leshchenko and Zinaida Zakit perform at the Suzanna restaurant, after which they travel again to different cities and countries.

In 1933, Leshchenko was in Austria. In Vienna, at the Columbia company, he recorded records. Unfortunately, this best and largest company in the world (whose branches were in almost all countries) did not record all the works performed by Pyotr Leshchenko: the owners of the companies in those years needed works in rhythms that were fashionable at that time: tango, foxtrots, and they paid for them several times more than for romances or folk songs.

Thanks to records released in millions of copies, Leshchenko gained extraordinary popularity; the most famous composers of that time willingly worked with Peter: Boris Fomin, Oscar Strok, Mark Maryanovsky, Claude Romano, Efim Sklyarov, Gera Vilnov, Sasha Vladi, Arthur Gold, Ernst Nonigsberg and others. He was accompanied by the best European orchestras: the Genigsberg brothers, the Albin brothers, Herbert Schmidt, Nikolai Chereshny (who toured Moscow and other cities of the USSR in 1962), Frank Fox's Columbia, Bellacord-Electro. About half of the works in Pyotr Leshchenko's repertoire belong to his pen and almost all of them belong to his musical arrangement.

It is interesting that if Leshchenko experienced difficulties when his voice “disappeared” in large halls, then his voice was recorded perfectly on records (Chaliapin even once called Leshchenko a “record singer”), while such masters of the stage as Chaliapin and Morfessi, who sang freely in large theater and concert halls, were always dissatisfied with their records, as K. Sokolsky noted, they conveyed only a certain proportion of their voices...

In 1935 Leshchenko came to England, performed in restaurants, and was invited to appear on the radio. In 1938 Leshchenko and Zinaida in Riga. An evening took place in the Kemer Kurhaus, where Leshchenko and the orchestra of the famous violinist and conductor Herbert Schmidt gave his last concert in Latvia.

And in 1940 there were the last concerts in Paris: and in 1941 Germany attacked the Soviet Union, Romania occupied Odessa. Leshchenko receives a call to the regiment to which he is assigned. He refuses to go to war against his people, he is tried by an officer's court, but, as a popular singer, he is released. In May 1942 he performed at the Odessa Russian Drama Theater. At the request of the Romanian command, all concerts had to begin with a song in Romanian. And only then the famous “My Marusichka”, “Two Guitars”, “Tatyana” sounded. The concerts ended with "Chubchik".

Vera Georgievna Belousova (Leshchenko) says: “I lived in Odessa then. I graduated from music school, I was 19 years old then. I performed in concerts, played the accordion, sang... Somehow I saw a poster: “The famous, inimitable Russian performer is performing and gypsy songs Pyotr Leshchenko." And at the rehearsal of one of the concerts (where I was supposed to perform), a short man comes up to me, introduces himself: Pyotr Leshchenko, invites me to his concert. I sit in the hall, listen, and he watches sings at me:

You are nineteen years old, you have your own path.

You can laugh and joke.

But there is no return for me, I have been through so much...

That’s how we met and soon got married. We arrived in Bucharest, Zinaida agreed to a divorce only when Peter left the restaurant and apartment to her...

We settled with his mother. In August 1944, Russian troops entered the city. Leshchenko began offering his performances. The first concerts were received very coldly, Peter was very worried, it turned out that an order was given: “Leshchenko should not be applauded.” Only when he gave a concert in front of the commanding staff did everything immediately change. We both began performing in hospitals, in units, in halls. The command allocated us an apartment...

So ten years flew by like one day. Peter kept seeking permission to return to his homeland, and one day he received this permission. He gives the last concert - the first part passed with triumph, the second begins... but he doesn’t come out. I went into the artist’s room: there was a suit and a guitar, two people in civilian clothes came up to me and said that Pyotr Konstantinovich had been taken away for a conversation, “clarification is needed.”

Nine months later they gave me an address for a date and a list of things I needed. I arrived there. They measured me six meters from the barbed wire and told me not to approach. They brought Peter: neither to say nor to touch. Parting, he folded his hands, raised them to the sky and said: “God knows, I have no guilt before anyone.”

Soon I was also arrested, “for treason,” for marrying a foreign national. Brought to Dnepropetrovsk. They sentenced him to death, then changed it to twenty-five years and sent him to a camp. In 1954 he was released. I found out that Pyotr Konstantinovich was no longer alive.

I started performing and traveling around the country. In Moscow I met Kolya Chereshnya (he was a violinist in Leshchenko’s orchestra). Kolya said that in 1954 Leshchenko died in prison, allegedly from canned food poisoning. They also say that they imprisoned him because, having gathered his friends for a farewell dinner, he raised his glass and said: “Friends! I am happy that I am returning to my homeland! My dream has come true. I am leaving, but my heart remains with you. "

The last words were the ruin. In March 1951, Leshchenko was arrested... The voice of “the favorite of the European public, Pyotr Konstantinovich Leshchenko,” stopped sounding.

Vera Georgievna Leshchenko performed on many stages throughout the country as a singer, accordionist and pianist, and sang in Moscow, at the Hermitage. In the mid-eighties she retired, just before our meeting (in October 1985) she returned with her husband, pianist Eduard Vilhelmovich, to Moscow from the city where she spent her best years - from the beautiful Odessa. Our meetings took place in a friendly and relaxed atmosphere...

Pyotr Leshchenko’s sister, Valentna, once saw her brother when a convoy was leading him down the street, digging ditches. Peter also saw his sister and cried... Valentina still lives in Bucharest.

Another sister, Ekaterina, lives in Italy. The son, Igor, was a magnificent choreographer of the Bucharest Theater, died at the age of forty-seven years...

Vera and Peter Leshchenko.

Russian viewers finally saw the series “Peter Leshchenko. Everything that was…”, created back in 2013.

Reports from the set of this series more than once, with reference to authoritative sources, stated that there was no distortion of historical truth in it. And this despite the fact that the screenwriter of “Everything That Was...” Eduard Volodarsky did not hide: he wrote Leshchenko’s fate. Based, of course, on undeniable biographical conflicts.

Although Pyotr Leshchenko was a fairly open person and, at least in a narrow circle of friends, loved to tell various fascinating stories from his life, in particular about his service in the White Army, little is known about him. These stories were probably not written down or retold.

The biography of Peter Leshchenko, which wanders around numerous sites with slight variations, is compiled on the basis of a 17-page protocol of one of the interrogations of the artist arrested by the Romanian State Security Service. The interrogation was conducted by a Soviet investigator, the protocol was in Russian.

Another popular source of information about the singer is the book by his widow Vera Belousova-Leshchenko “Tell me why?” Vera Georgievna took it up at the age of 85, but claimed that she began to take the first notes about her famous husband much earlier. Belousova did not live to see the start of filming. Her friend Olga Petukhova, who became a consultant for the series, already spoke about why the role of Leshchenko (in adulthood) was played by Konstantin Khabensky.

Vera Belousova thought about which artist could play Pyotr Leshchenko on the screen even when this series was not even in the project. After all, the idea of ​​making a picture about her famous husband fascinated Eldar Ryazanov. Vera Georgievna watched different films on TV, but she never met anyone who reminded her of Pyotr Leshchenko.

And suddenly one day she called Petukhova and told her friend to turn on the TV. Khabensky was shown on TV. “He has delicacy, restraint, and strength of character is felt. That’s how Petenka was!” – Petukhova heard.

The director of the series, Vladimir Kott, went his own way to choosing the artist for the main role. He laid out photographs of Leshchenko in front of him, and the more he looked at them, the more clearly Khabensky’s face appeared before him. According to Kott, Khabensky has the same intelligence with a clear tendency towards hooliganism, the same nervousness.

As a result, Khabensky was approved without casting, and after that they began to look for a young artist similar to him - for the role of Leshchenko in his youth.

The biggest disappointment of many viewers was the director’s decision not to include songs performed by Pyotr Leshchenko himself in the series. Khabensky, who also sings in the film, does it well, but this is not Leshchenko at all, whose voice made especially sensitive ladies gasp with delight and were ready for madness. However, Kott’s words that Leshchenko was a phenomenon of his time and would not have made such an impression on the public today also have their own bitter truth.

Reading the protocol of Leshchenko's interrogation suggests that some episodes of the film were made to spite the security officers. To mock them. The investigator is interested in Leshchenko’s foreign acquaintances, and here you have it, in the series, an episode of the singer’s meeting with a friend of his youth - a Russian underground fighter. That is, for a Romanian citizen, Leshchenko is with a foreigner. The singer agrees to carry out the most dangerous task - to smuggle a suitcase with explosives into occupied Odessa to be handed over to local anti-fascists.

The investigator insisted that by joining her life with Leshchenko, Vera Belousova had betrayed her Motherland? And here’s another episode about Vera. After all, she, a young singer from a restaurant, turns out to be a messenger who must pass the explosives further along the underground chain...

If Pyotr Leshchenko and Vera were at least somehow connected with the partisan underground, Belousova would undoubtedly talk about it in her book. But she only remembers that shortly before the occupation of her native Odessa, she performed as part of a concert brigade in Soviet military units. It would have been difficult to expect anything else in that situation from a conservatory student, Komsomol member, daughter of an NKVD employee who volunteered for the front. And Pyotr Leshchenko, according to her testimony, more than once helped Jewish acquaintances cross to territory that was safe for them and avoid extermination.

There are two documentary versions of the first meeting of Pyotr Leshchenko and Vera Belousova. One can be found out by reading the protocol of Leshchenko’s interrogation, the other by reading Belousova’s book of memoirs.

Leshchenko told the investigator that, having arrived in Odessa with a concert, he heard about a young singer who sings to her own accompaniment on the accordion in one of the restaurants, and wanted to hear her. This was Vera. He really liked both her and her songs. He invited Vera to perform at his concert.

And Vera Georgievna writes about how she dreamed of going to Leshchenko’s concert, but there was no money for a ticket. Fortunately, she met a good friend, a musician who was supposed to play in the orchestra at this concert. He couldn’t take Vera to the celebrity concert, but he couldn’t take Vera to the concert rehearsal. Leshchenko even introduced her. Pyotr Konstantinovich asked Vera to sing something. She sang Tabachnikov’s song “Mama,” and tears welled up in Leshchenko’s eyes. This is where it all started for them.

Did either spouse's memory fail? Perhaps Leshchenko simply made up his story of meeting Vera so that the young musician who introduced them would not also appear in the case.

There is a romantic version that Leshchenko died because he refused to betray his wife. From the moment Soviet troops entered Bucharest, Leshchenko and his wife performed without fail wherever they were invited by Soviet military officials and the new local authorities. The Soviet military often asked if Leshchenko was thinking about returning to his homeland, and he answered that he had always dreamed about it.

Once a similar dialogue took place in the presence of Vera Georgievna, and a certain Soviet military official suggested that he fulfill his dream without delay, and Belousova directly said: “It will take a year or two to fell the forest.” And then he lied. For what they were going to accuse her of, it was impossible to get away with a year or two. Leshchenko's wife was sentenced to death by a military tribunal.

Leshchenko did not even want to think about returning to his homeland without Vera. However, even if he had decided to do so, he still would not have avoided arrest. Vera Georgievna recalled that the investigator asked her why she married this renegade and White Guard?

"White Guard and renegade." This is how he was and remained in the eyes of the then authorities.

What then?

According to the official version, Pyotr Leshchenko died in a prison hospital after an unsuccessful operation for a stomach ulcer. His case has not been declassified to this day, and it is unknown where his remains are buried.

For Vera Belousova, the death penalty was replaced with 25 years in the camps, but she was released two years after her arrest: Stalin died, and a wave of rehabilitation began. Belousova was released with her criminal record expunged.

She worked in regional philharmonic societies, married twice and remained a widow again. Both of her husbands, even before meeting her, were sincerely interested in the work of Pyotr Leshchenko.

In the last years of her life, Vera Georgievna complained that although Pyotr Leshchenko returned to the cultural landscape of Russia, his image is often distorted, giving him criminal features, but he was never like that and never sang criminal songs. On Sundays I went to church and sang during the choir service. Once Vera Georgievna thought to please Leshchenko with an observation: the parishioners listened to his singing!

“My dear child,” Pyotr Konstantinovich answered his young wife, “they don’t sing in church for the parishioners.” I don't sing, I talk to God.

Are Pyotr Leshchenko and Lev Leshchenko relatives or namesakes? As often happens, many people associate talented people working in the same direction and having the same last names with kinship. Take, for example, Peter and Lev Leshchenko. Singer Pyotr Leshchenko was famous long before his namesake, Lev, appeared on the stage.

Pyotr Konstantinovich Leshchenko (1898-1954) is known as a Romanian and Russian pop singer who also performed folk dances. At first I was a military man. His creative career began with a dance group. Later, the vocal talent of this artist clearly manifested itself. Lev Valerianovich Leshchenko (born in 1942) is a Soviet and Russian pop and operetta singer. Since 1983 he has had the title of People's Artist of the RSFSR. Pyotr Leshchenko first saw the light of day on June 2, 1898. A native of the Kherson province, the small village of Isaevo (now Odessa region in Ukraine). The boy was born out of wedlock, so he bore his mother’s surname, and in the birth certificate in the line “father” they wrote “illegitimate.” His mother, Maria Kalinovna, had an absolute ear for music; she sang folk songs wonderfully, which influenced the formation of the boy, who already in early childhood showed extraordinary abilities in music. When the baby was nine months old, Maria Kalinovna left for Chisinau with her little son and her parents.

Until the age of eight, the boy was raised and educated at home, and in 1906 he was accepted into the soldiers’ church choir, since Petya was very capable in music and dancing. In addition to these talents, he also very quickly learned languages, spoke Russian, Ukrainian, German, Romanian and French. The choir director helped place the boy in the Chisinau parish school, informs ftimes.ru. And by 1915, Peter already had a musical and general education. In 1907, his mother married Alexei Vasilyevich Alfimov. The stepfather turned out to be a simple and kind man, he loved the boy. Later, Peter had sisters: Valya in 1917, Katya in 1920. Alfimov worked as a dental technician, was a little interested in music, played the guitar and harmonica. His stepfather accepted Petya as his own son, saw that the boy was growing up talented and in adolescence gave him his guitar. In addition to studying at school and singing in the choir, Petya from childhood He helped with the housework, worked a lot and even had a small independent income. At the age of 17, the young man’s voice changed, and he could no longer sing in the church choir. Having lost his salary, he decided to go to the front. Until the end of autumn 1916, Peter was in the Don Cossack Regiment. From there he was sent to the Kyiv Infantry School of Ensigns, from which he graduated in the early spring of 1917 and received the corresponding rank. From Kyiv, through the reserve Odessa regiment, the young man was sent to command a platoon of the Podolsk infantry regiment on the Romanian front. Less than six months later, Peter was seriously wounded and shell-shocked, and therefore he was sent for treatment. At first he was in a field hospital, later the patient was transferred to Chisinau, where he learned about the revolutionary events.

In 1918, Chisinau was declared the territory of Romania and Peter left the hospital as a Romanian subject. The beginning of a creative journey. In the early autumn of 1919, Peter was accepted into the Elizarov dance group, with which he performed for four months at the Alhambra Theater in Bucharest, and then at the Orpheum and Suzanna cinemas. These were Leshchenko's first steps in his creative career. For about five years he toured Romania as part of various groups as a singer and dancer. In 1925, Peter went to Paris, where his performances in cinemas continued. He performed many numbers that were successful with the public: he performed in the balalaika ensemble “Guslyar”; participated in a guitar duet; performed Caucasian dances with a dagger in his teeth. He considered his dance technique imperfect, so he entered the best French ballet school to study. Here he met the artist Zinaida Zakitt, her stage name was Zhenya. Zinaida was Latvian by origin, originally from Riga. Together with Peter, Zhenya learned several numbers, and they began performing together in Paris restaurants, reports ftimes.ru. Resounding success quickly came to them, and soon Peter and Zinaida got married. Since 1926, Leshchenko and Zakitt toured Europe and the Middle East with Polish musicians for two years. They were applauded in Thessaloniki and Constantinople, in Athens and Adana, in Aleppo and Smyrna, Damascus and Beirut. After the tour, the couple returned to Romania, where they went to work at a theater called Teatrul Nostra, which was located in Bucharest. But they did not stay in one place for long. We performed in a restaurant in Chernivtsi for about three months, then performed in cinemas in Chisinau. Later, their refuge became Riga, where Peter alone went to work at the restaurant “A. T." as a vocalist. They stopped dancing because Zinaida was pregnant. At the beginning of 1931, the couple had a son, Igor. While working in a restaurant, Peter met the composer Oscar Strok, who later wrote many songs and romances for the singer. His musical compositions were gaining popularity, Leshchenko began collaborating with other composers and in 1932 began recording at record companies. In 1933, Peter, his wife and child, settled in Bucharest, from where he sometimes went on tour and for recordings. Zinaida also returned to dancing, and the couple began performing together again. In 1935, Peter opened his own restaurant called “Leshchenko”, in which he performed himself, and the ensemble “Leshchenko Trio”, which included Zinaida and Peter’s younger sisters, was extremely popular.

After the war, Leshchenko spoke a lot to a diverse audience in Romania. But he really wanted to return to his homeland, he wrote repeated petitions to this effect addressed to Stalin and Kalinin, but did not receive a positive answer for a long time. In the early spring of 1951, after another appeal to the leadership of the Soviet Union, Pyotr Konstantinovich was given the go-ahead to return, but did not have time to do so. Romanian security authorities arrested him. This happened right during the intermission, Leshchenko was giving a concert, the hall was sold out, and between the first and second parts the singer was taken straight from the dressing room. Pyotr Konstantinovich was interrogated as a witness in the case of Vera Belousova-Leshchenko. His young wife was accused of betraying the Motherland. On July 16, 1954, Pyotr Konstantinovich Leshchenko died in the prison hospital; all materials on his case still remain closed. Due to such secrecy, there is no exact data, but most likely, Pyotr Leshchenko was one of the thousands of builders of the Danube Canal who remained unknown and nameless. Until now, no one knows where the singer’s grave is. In the summer of 1952, Vera was also arrested for marrying a foreign national, which was classified as treason, and also for taking part in concerts in occupied Odessa. The court sentenced her to death, but then the punishment was commuted to 25 years in prison. And in 1954, Vera was released, her criminal record was cleared and she was sent to Odessa. She died in Moscow in 2009.

Pyotr Leshchenko and Lev Leshchenko: biography and life path of Lev Valerianovich. Lev Valerianovich was born in the Moscow Sokolniki district on February 1, 1942. There stood an old, merchant-built, two-story wooden house in which the Leshchenko family lived. It was there, and not in the maternity hospital, that the boy was born. There was a war going on, there were especially fierce battles near Moscow, but despite this, the life of the Leshchenko family in those years could not be called difficult. Their house was almost fully equipped, which was an extreme luxury for that time; they only had to light the stove themselves. Although my father was at the front, he served in a special-purpose regiment located in Bogorodskoye, not far from Sokolniki. Therefore, he was able to often visit his family and bring food from his dry rations. The Leshchenko family lived in one of the three rooms of a communal apartment, where neighbors lived in the other two - Aunt Nadya and Grandma Zhenya, who took Lev’s newly born child into her arms. Leshchenko’s family consisted of his mother, a newborn boy and his older sister Yulia, and of course, his father, when he managed to visit his relatives. Lev Valerianovich is now perplexed as to how they could have housed the whole family in a small room back then. That February day, in honor of the birth of his son, the father came home and a whole feast was arranged. Dad brought half a loaf of bread, a quarter of alcohol and some more food from his ration. On this occasion, the stove was well heated with wood, and the house became warm. The father of the future singer, Valerian Andreevich, graduated from the Kursk gymnasium before the war and began his career on a state farm. In 1931, he was sent to the capital to the Krasnopresnensky vitamin plant, where he worked as an accountant. He took part in the Soviet-Finnish war, returning from which he went to serve in the NKVD. From the beginning to the victorious end he went through the Great Patriotic War, was awarded many orders and medals, after the war and until his retirement he served in the MGB. Dad Lev Leshchenko can be considered a long-livers; he died at 99 years old. The singer’s mother, Klavdia Petrovna, died very early, when the boy was only one year old, and by that time she herself was barely 28 years old. After the death of his mother, little Leo was raised by his grandparents. And 5 years later, in 1948, the father married for the second time, reports ftimes.ru . Lev Valerianovich remembers his stepmother Marina Mikhailovna with respect and warmth; according to him, she always treated him like her own son, the boy did not experience a lack of love and attention. And in 1949, Lev’s little sister Valya was born. In his earliest childhood, his father often took little Lev with him to the military unit; the soldiers jokingly nicknamed him “son of the regiment.” Since the boy grew up very playful and active, it was difficult to keep track of him, so the father assigned Sergeant Major Andrei Fesenko to the child. The boy had lunch with the soldiers in the canteen, went to the cinema with them in formation, at the age of four he had already been to the shooting range and wore a military uniform. Sergeant Major Fesenko also taught the kid how to ski in winter, which were three times longer than the boy himself. And little Leo had a chance to encounter music in early childhood. He often visited his grandfather Andrei Vasilyevich Leshchenko. He worked at a sugar factory as an accountant and in his free time played the violin in a factory string quartet, and before the revolution he sang in a church choir. Grandfather was a very gifted man in terms of music and little by little he taught little Leo to this art: he played the violin and taught him to sing. Leshchenko spent his childhood in Sokolniki, and then the family moved to the Voikovsky district, where the boy began his studies at secondary school No. 201. In addition to the school curriculum, he became a soloist in the choir at the House of Pioneers, was fond of swimming in the pool, and was involved in an art club and a brass band. Soon, the choir teachers advised Lev to abandon all other hobbies and clubs, focusing only on singing. And the boy himself had already firmly decided to connect his future with creativity, but had not yet decided who he would like to become more - an artist or a singer. Therefore, I left myself two classes - in the choir and drama club. And at home he listened to records with Utesov’s songs, adored his style of performance, and imitated the great singer. After some time, the vocal boy performed Utesov’s songs at all school events, and then at city competitions. Army and Institute After school, an attempt to enter a theater university was unsuccessful. Lev went to work as a stagehand at the Bolshoi Theatre, he worked during the day, and in the evenings he watched performances from the gallery. Then he tried himself as a fitter at a measuring instruments factory. In 1961, Lev Leshchenko was drafted into the ranks of the Soviet Army. At the military registration and enlistment office, the young man said that he would really like to serve at sea, but his father adjusted all his plans, enlisting his son in the Soviet tank forces, which were located in the GDR. But already from the first months of service, the army leadership sent Lev to the song and dance ensemble, where he soon established himself as the main soloist. In addition to solo performances of songs, Lev recited poetry, hosted concert programs, and participated in a quartet ensemble. Lev Valerianovich considers his military service to be the beginning of his musical career and a long successful creative path. Every free moment he had in the army, he prepared to enter the theater institute. And in 1964, after finishing his military service, Leshchenko entered GITIS. In 1969, at the Moscow Operetta Theater, Lev was already a full member of the troupe; he had many roles to his credit, but something was missing. He wanted big work on stage. At the beginning of 1970, he successfully passed the competition and became a soloist of the USSR State Television and Radio. Following this, he won the All-Union Variety Artists Competition. His popularity grew at a frantic pace, and it was rare that a concert on radio or television could do without the participation of Lev Leshchenko. In 1972, Leshchenko was a laureate of two prestigious music competitions: the Bulgarian Golden Orpheus and the Polish Sopot. The victory in Sopot made him famous throughout the country, and a fashion for Leshchenko began in the Soviet Union. One after another he received awards and prizes: the Moscow Komsomol Prize (1973); title of Honored Artist of the RSFSR (1977); Lenin Komsomol Prize (1978); Order of Friendship of Peoples (1980); title of People's Artist of the RSFSR (1983); Order of the Badge of Honor (1985).

The biography of Pyotr Leshchenko, one of the most famous artists of the 20th century, known today, consists of scattered facts that often do not have documentary evidence. During the singer’s lifetime, no one thought about how important it was to record the facts and details of his biography; besides, there was no time to do this, and there was no one to do it.

Little is known for certain. In the village of Isaevo, located near Odessa, a boy was born into a poor peasant family in 1898. And three years later his father died. The mother remarried and moved the children to Chisinau. Petya was lucky with his stepfather; Alexey Vasilyevich knew how to play musical instruments and instilled a love for this activity in his stepson.

In Chisinau, Peter Leshchenko sang in the church chapel and helped (as best he could) his parents. With the outbreak of the war, he enrolled in the school of warrant officers and soon became an officer in the Russian army. Then participation in military events, injury, hospital. Having not yet fully recovered, the future artist learned that he was now a subject of the Romanian crown. The fact is that Romania treacherously annexed the territory of Bessarabia to its lands, although it was a Russian ally.

The former front-line officer was forced to earn a living by all means available to him. However, he perceived the career of a carpenter or a dishwasher as a forced occupation. The young man dreamed of singing from the stage. Performances at the Suzanna and Orpheum cinemas are the first steps towards his goal. Almost two years of this stage practice contributed to professional development and the emergence of faith in future success.

The biography of Peter Leshchenko is connected not only with Chisinau, but also with Riga, Paris and Odessa. At the age of twenty-five, the young artist sought to improve his professional skills. He wanted to study, and therefore went to the Eternal City, where there was a famous ballet school, where mainly Russian emigrant dancers taught. Here Peter met the Latvian Zinaida Zakis, who, despite her young age (she was 19 years old), had already achieved success in They perform together, tour, performing joint choreographic numbers, sometimes Leshchenko sings. Professional cooperation could not help but develop into a closer relationship, they got married.

In 1930, the biography of Pyotr Leshchenko takes a sharp turn. If until now he was a dancer and his wife's partner, now he is becoming a professional singer. He is 32 years old, he has a not very strong, but pleasant voice, but that is not so important. He is popular, his vocals are wonderfully suitable for recording, and his repertoire deserves special attention. Leshchenko managed to do something that no one could do before him. He combined two of the most beloved genres by the public: romance and tango. The result exceeded all expectations.

In the pre-war years, the biography of singer Pyotr Leshchenko is quite fully illustrated by the recordings he made on Columbia and Bellacord. He works closely with these companies; records are sold in millions of copies everywhere: from Buenos Aires to Tokyo. There is no time for anything that does not relate to music.

Leshchenko was not interested in politics. In 1942, having arrived in Odessa occupied by the Romanians, he gives concerts at the Russian Theater, and then opens his cabaret on Teatralny Lane. The biography of Peter Leshchenko is connected with the sunny Black Sea city not only in connection with creativity, but also on a personal level. It was to Odessa that he owed a new deep feeling that gripped the far from young artist. He met Vera Belousova, who became the main love of his life. But Zinaida’s wife did not want to give in, she wrote a letter (essentially a denunciation) to the military command, in which she recalled that her husband was a Romanian citizen, and also liable for military service. The world-famous singer is dressed in a bright green overcoat, an angular Romanian army cap and sent to Crimea, where he is entrusted with managing the officers' mess and organizing soldiers' leisure time. This harsh measure turned out to be ineffective, and the couple divorced in 1944.

After the surrender of Romania, Leshchenko performed for eight years in front of a wide variety of audiences. He loved to sing for Soviet military personnel; these concerts were a great success. And in 1952, an employee of the Romanian counterintelligence, already communist, wrote on the cover of a cardboard folder in Latin letters a name known to the whole world: “Peter Leshchenko.” The artist’s biography was supplemented by another event: he was arrested.

The singer died in 1954. The circumstances of his death are unknown. Was he beaten? Apparently not. Leshchenko was most likely tortured by overwork and meager food. He was sent to prison, probably at the request of his “Soviet comrades.” What was he accused of? This also remains unclear. But gramophone records with a recording of his voice have survived, which still gives inexplicable pleasure to lovers and connoisseurs of popular music.