Today, on the day of the 125^th birth anniversary of Alexander Pirogov, the column "Legends of the Bolshoi Theatre" features a life story of the Russian and Soviet opera singer.

While his stage activity, Alexander Pirogov performed over forty parts in operas by Russian and foreign composers. During his work at the Bolshoi Theater, Pirogov sang practically entire classical Russian and foreign bass repertoire, as well as a number of roles in the new Soviet operas. The part of Boris Godunov in the cognominal opera by Modest Mussorgsky is considered the magnum opus in his career.

He performed as a chamber singer as well and his repertoire was huge. First of all, the songs by M. Mussorgsky, romances by A. Dargomyzhsky, A. Borodin, P. Tchaikovsky, S. Rachmaninoff and folk songs. The singer demonstrated the mastery of skill of a musician-interpreter that possesses the means of psychological expressiveness, wide range of timbres, dynamics, and intonations In his chamber repertoire,. In large vocal and symphonic works, the artist captured the scope of feelings and power of dramatic expression. He was among the first performers of the oratorios "The Legend of the Battle for the Russian Land" (premiered in 1939, the part of Dmitry Donskoy) and "On the Kulikovo Field" (premiered in 1944, the role of the Warrior) by Y. Shaporin, "Yemelyan Pugachev" by M Koval.

The singer possessed a voice of a voice of gold, with wide range and unique timbre.

These are the words of his contemporaries and connoisseurs of singing art:

"A beautiful, powerful voice, singular artistic personality, excellent performing skills always assist him to be convincing, always grip the attention of the audience", Mark Reisen

“Knowing Pirogov for many years, we ... admired his efficiency, indefatigability, tireless striving for improvement ... An excellent vocalist, Pirogov never bask in his voice, never demonstrates it. Singing for him isn't an end in itself for him, but the means of expressing the character's thoughts, his state of mind ", Sergey Lemeshev.

“The voice of a large, peculiar timbre, any word is expressive, all movements are sculptural, everything is finished to the smallest detail, is presented to the auditorium on a large scale ...”, Galina Vishnevskaya

We invite you to listen to the musical selection comprised of vivid operatic parts performed by the artist.