Today, our traditional column "Legends of the Bolshoi Theatre" features life story of Alexander Baturin (1904-1983) – opera singer (bass-baritone), People's Artist of the RSFSR, winner of the Stalin Prize of the first degree.

Alexander Baturin was in the vicinity of Vilnius (Lithuania). The future singer came from a family of a village teacher. His father died when Sasha was a year old. Besides little Sasha, his mother had three other children to support, and the family was in great need. In 1911, the family moved to Odessa, where a few years later the future singer entered the courses of auto mechanics. To help his mother, the young man started working in a garage. While working with the engine, the young man was always humming. The first listeners of Alexander Baturin his work fellows, and when his shift was finished – the future singer gave "concerts" for all comers. In the early 1920s, the Professional Union of Transport Workers sent Alexander Baturin to study at the Petrograd Conservatoire.

After the entrance examinations, the young man was accepted into the class of Professor Joachim Tartakov. In 1924, Baturin graduated with honours from the Petrograd Conservatoire. At the final exam Alexander Glazunov made a note: "Excellent voice of beautiful timbre, strong and plummy. Possesses the most brilliant talent. Clear utterance. Yielding recitation. The People's Commissar of Education A.V. Lunacharsky, having familiarised himself with this assessment of the famous composer, sent the young singer to Rome for improvement. There Alexander entered the Music Academy "Santa Cecilia", where he studied under the guidance of the famous Mattia Battistini. At La Scala theatre in Milan, the young singer performed the roles of Don Basilio in “The Barber of Seville” and King Philip in the opera “Don Carlos”, and appeared in operas “Bastien und Bastienne” by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Baturin also toured to other Italian cities, participating in performances of Verdi's Requiem and appearing in symphony concerts.

After graduating from the Rome Academy, the singer toured in Europe, visiting France, Belgium and Germany. He returned to the USSR in 1927, but not to Leningrad, – to Moscow. Baturin was immediately enrolled as a soloist at the Bolshoi Theatre. His first performance in Moscow was as Melnik in the opera “Rusalka” by Alexander Dargomyzhsky. Since then Baturin had performed over twenty roles at the Bolshoi Theatre. He sang both bass and deep baritone parts, since the range of his voice was unusually large. The singer's expressive voice, smooth in all registers, was characterised by the sound intensity and soft velvet timbre. A. Baturin was most successful in epic images in Russian operas: Ruslan ("Ruslan and Lyudmila" by M. Glinka, staged in 1931, 1937 and 1948), Prince Igor (Borodin's opera of the same name), Pimen and Dosifey ("Boris Godunov" and "Khovanshchina" by M.P. Mussorgsky). Tomsky in the operas by P. Tchaikovsky “The Queen of Spades”, Ibn-Hakia in “Iolanta”, Kochubey in “Mazepa”), Nilakanta in “Lakme” by Léo Delibes and Escamillo in the opera “Carmen” by Bizet, were also among the best roles of the singer. This singing range was the result of the singer's dogged work on his voice technique. Of course, the excellent vocal school that Baturin had undergone, his acquired ability to use various registers of the voice and his study of phonation technique also had an impact. The singer was particularly keen to work on the Russian opera characters. Alexander Baturin creative range was broadened by his acquaintance with Russian folklore. Baturin sang heartfelt Russian folk songs with great panache. The critics noted that the singer was especially successful in "Hey, Dubina” and "Along the Piterskaya Street...".

During the Great Patriotic War, when the Bolshoi Theatre was evacuated to Kuibyshev (Samara), it staged a production of the opera “William Tell” by of Giacomo Rossini. Alexander Baturin, who performed the title role, told about this work: "I studied the material for a long time, tried to feel the spirit of the epoch to fill in a true realistic image of a noble folk hero.

The singer's concert work included the performance of Russian folk songs and an extensive chamber repertoire. The singer enthusiastically performed works by contemporary composers, including the songs "March of pilots", "My Country", "Farewell, Papanin's Ice Floe", "Sentry" and others. Baturin performed with great success at the Leningrad Philharmonic Hall. Russian opera and chamber music dominated the singer's repertoire. His first recital in the Philharmonic Hall took place in February 1938, and until 1954, the name of Baturin name constantly appeared on the Philharmonic poster. The singer most often performed romances by Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Sergei Rachmaninoff and Mikhail Glinka. His wife, harpist Vera Dulova, often participated in the concerts. The Baturin-Dulova family had a friendly relationship with Dmitri Shostakovich. The singer's repertoire included works by Tikhon Khrennikov, Oles Chishko and Yuri Shaporin – Baturin soloed in his cantata “On On The Field of Kulikovo”. On April 22, 1954, Alexander Baturin performed for the last time with symphonic poem “The Bells” (opus 35) Sergei Rachmaninoff, written to a poem by Edgar Allan Poe and translated by Konstantin Balmont. The prominent singer was accompanied by the Orchestra conducted by Boris Khaikin.

Alexander Baturin was the first performer of six romances the Shostakovich dedicated to him. The singer's creative achievements include performing the solo part in the Ninth Symphony by Ludwig van Beethoven. The singer appeared in three films: “A Simple Case”, “Concert-Waltz” and “Earth”.

After the Great Patriotic War, Baturin taught solo singing at the Moscow Conservatoire. In addition, he prepared a scientific and methodological work "The School of Singing", in which he endeavoured to systematise his vast experience and give a detailed description of the methods of teaching singing. With his participation, a film was created in which issues of vocal theory and practices were covered in detail. For a long time, Baturin worked as a teacher-consultant at the Bolshoi Theatre.

A. Baturin died on January 31, 1983. He is buried at the Kuntsevskoye cemetery in Moscow.

In 2000,  the Collection of paintings of A. Baturin (58 artworks) was donated to the Tretyakov Gallery.

The singer's voice, eminent in its beauty, strength and volume, with its warm and sonorous timbre, has been preserved in the fairly abundant discography. To mark the 120^th birth anniversary of Alexander Baturin birth, we have prepared a musical selection of famous operatic parties that he performed.