#001
The Alexandrov Ensemble sings The Courageous Don Cossacks (Донцы-молодцы) at the Albert Hall, London, 1963. A traditional Don Cossack song praising the exploits of the Russian soldiers who routed Napoleon's army in 1812.
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The photo is of the patriarch of the Ensemble, Alexander Vasilyevich Alexandrov (left), who died in 1946, and his son Boris Alexandrovich who was director until he retired in 1987. I chose this great image of a blokey moment because I like to imagine that they used to dream up these hilarious musical spoofs when they were blatted (sadly, they did it sober).
Spoof, you say? What spoof? You Londoners are so used to hearing that lovely brass-and-cymbals stuff around Horseguards and Buck House that you've forgotten that you can't hear it played in that style and to that standard anywhere else in the world. London does it best . . . or it did until this lot came along and spoofed it up so magnificently. And the football chant? Now you're getting it.
Talk about panache . . . what a way to start the show! The audience must have been on their feet and yelling when that piece finished . . . what would I give to have been there.
As far as I know, the usual 1963 recordings of this, repeated on most CDs, were made at the Abbey Road studios in London, but this recording of the live Albert Hall concert itself is rarely heard. This recording was put onto tape, then vinyl for sale in Russia, then later digitalised in Russia, so it has come on a long journey to us here on Youtube.
The Albert Hall was the only indoor space big enough for the Ensemble in 1963. It's a huge and very high circular space, holding at least 5,500 people - and it was full at that concert. The acoustics are famously so difficult that the audience up in the "gods" hear the music long after they see the conductor wave his baton, or the drummer beat his drum. Yet this recording is, I think, more satisfying than the studio recordings.
Albert Hall 1963 playlist:
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list...
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