Konstantin Sokolsky (also spelled: Sokolski, , original name Konstantin Kudryavtsev (Константин Кудрявцев)) (7 December 1904 – 12 May 1991) was a Latvian singer. Sokolsky was born in

Saint-Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...

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, but for most of his life lived in

Riga Riga ( ) is the capital, Primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Latvia, largest city of Latvia. Home to 591,882 inhabitants (as of 2025), the city accounts for a third of Latvia's total population. The population of Riga Planni ...

Latvia Latvia, officially the Republic of Latvia, is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the three Baltic states, along with Estonia to the north and Lithuania to the south. It borders Russia to the east and Belarus to t ...

(his father came from Ludzas County, which is where the family moved to after the revolutionary turmoil of 1917 began in

). There he worked as a woodcutter and loader, until in 1928 at Riga's 'Mars' cinema he first appeared on stage as a singer. Initially, he tried to imitate

Alexander Vertinsky Alexander Nikolayevich Vertinsky (; – May 21, 1957) was a Russian and Soviet artist, poet, singer, composer, cabaret artist and actor who exerted seminal influence on the Russian tradition of artistic singing. Early years Alexander Vertinsky ...

(for example, he too sang in a

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costume), but later found his own style. He got acquainted with popular composer Oscar Strok, author of

tango music Tango ( or ; ) is a style of music in Time signature, or time that originated among Great European immigration wave to Argentina, European immigrants of the Great Wave to Argentina and Uruguay. It has mainly Culture of Spain, Spanish, Cultu ...

, and became the first to sing all his new songs. In the same time, he himself wrote lyrics and music for several songs. In the 1930-1940s, first with the Riga Bonzo Theatre and later individually, he went on tours of

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Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland beca ...

and

Yugoslavia , common_name = Yugoslavia , life_span = 1918–19921941–1945: World War II in Yugoslavia#Axis invasion and dismemberment of Yugoslavia, Axis occupation , p1 = Kingdom of SerbiaSerbia , flag_p ...

, where he became very popular among different audiences, including many Russian

émigré An ''émigré'' () is a person who has emigrated, often with a connotation of political or social exile or self-exile. The word is the past participle of the French verb ''émigrer'' meaning "to emigrate". French Huguenots Many French Hugueno ...

s. Sokolsky's stage image was refined, but could still be interpreted as acting the 'Russian bear', with a sense of self-parody. Very tall, joyous, with self-respect — he reminded many Russian émigrés of their Mother Russia, which they had had to leave, sooner or later after the

Bolshevik The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...

revolution. In Russia, his songs also became popular, released on L.P.'s with the Bonophon and Bellaccord labels. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, he stayed in Latvia. In 1944 he was arrested by the Germans, but escaped.

References

External links

Sokolsky's biography in Russian and songs in VQF
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sokolsky, Konstantin 1904 births 1991 deaths 20th-century Latvian male singers Soviet singers