Exhibits are the foundation of museum collections. They are proud of them, protected and preserved. People from all over the world seek to admire them. But exhibits are not just silent illustrations of an interesting fact. They have their own voice and their own history.
A simple, at first glance, thing can tell us a lot about people, events, customs, traditions. Some of the museum items were real family heirlooms. Among them are things belonging to the opera singer Kenis Victoria Isaakivna.
Describing the evacuation is a thankless task, experiencing it is even more difficult: bombing, cars standing on the spare tracks, boiling water at the station, hunger... But here is Stalinsk (now Novokuznetsk). A huge metallurgical plant. Young Victoria immediately began working as a proofreader for the newspaper “Bolshevik Steel”. A job that requires attention, responsibility, and always at night, because in the morning the newspaper must go to press. And in the afternoon – again studying at the local university.
Memorable document from September 25, 1945 - Department of the UNKVD militia in the Kemerovo region on the permission of Kenis Victoria Isaakivna to follow her studies from the station Novokuznetsk to the station Odesa. Then graduation from the university and further life path; everything seemed to be determined, but ... But an amazing voice – a coloratura soprano. As it turned out later, it was one of the best voices in the country. And excellent acting skills. Victoria began to sing at the university. For some reason, I remembered the award for singing in those years – a staple cut. In 1948, Victoria graduated with honors from the Dnipropetrovsk Glinka Music School (now the Dnipro Academy of Music). There were so many concerts and tours! Victoria worked as a soloist on our city's radio. A wonderful woman Natalia Sats returns from the camp. The organization of a children's musical theater is still far away, and Sats headed for the Touring Theater (the first professional musical theater for children and youth in the USSR). Victoria plunges headlong into work: she works for Natalia Sats. But the main problem is that she does not have a Moscow residence permit. She must go to Irkutsk, then seven years at the Vinnytsia Philharmonic.
Thousands of concerts. Gilda and Rosina's parts, dozens of arias, romances, songs. Correspondence with Anatoly Kos-Anatolsky (Ukrainian composer, People's Artist of Ukraine, laureate of the State Prize of the Ukrainian SSR named after T. G. Shevchenko) and the first performance of his romances. Another memorable document is the composer's letter to Kenis Viktoriya Isaakivna, in which he informs her that he is sending her “Nightingale Romance”, wishes her great success in its performance and expresses hope for further creative cooperation…
For the last 20 years of her career, Viktoria Isaakivna taught at the Dnipropetrovsk Music School.
A great and bright life was lived, where many things did not work out, even though there was talent and abilities – “an ordinary story.” Thank you to Viktoriya Isaakivna for sharing her life experience and memories.!
Lyudmila Sandul