God endowed Zara Dolukhanova not only with natural feminine beauty and a beautiful voice. The famous opera singer left behind a significant artistic legacy. Recordings of her concerts, tour performances, a large number of well-trained opera singers have forever written the great singer in the memorable book of cultural heritage.
Biography
The date of birth of Zara Alexandrovna Dolukhanovai is 1918, March 15th. The opera singer was born into an Armenian family living in Moscow. Her maiden name is Makaryan. The parents of the musical child Agasiy Markovich and Elena Gaikovna Makaryan approved of Zara's passion for singing.
After graduating from secondary school, the girl enters the third demonstration technical school of music, where she studied violin art from 1933 to 1938. Her music teacher was V. M. Belyaeva-Tarasevich.
Without completing the violin course, Zara Dolukhanova chooses a singing career and leaves for Yerevan. Here in Armenia, a career awaited her at the A. Aspendiarov Opera and Ballet Theater. Thanks to her unique coloratura mezzo-soprano, the young opera singer performed in all the leading parts of the performances that were staged in the forties at the Yerevan theater.
Work and career in Moscow
In 1944, the singer was invited to Moscow to work on the All-Union radio and television. She preferred concert activity in the capital and left the Yerevan Opera and Ballet Theater. Chamber concerts have become the main type of performance of opera numbers accompanied by symphony orchestras. In 1959 Zara Dolukhanova transferred to the Moscow Philharmonic.
For forty years of creativity, the opera singer toured a lot both in the cities of the Soviet Union and abroad. Her concerts, in which she performed opera arias from the works of Mozart, G. Rossini, G. Verdi, G. Puccini, vocalizations and romances by Sergei Prokofiev, G. Sviridov, Dmitry Shostakovich, enjoyed constant success among fans of opera.
Contribution to cultural heritage
She toured a lot (Romania, East Germany, Italy, France, England, Greece, Argentina, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, USA, Poland, Yugoslavia, Japan, Israel, New Zealand, etc.). She sang in the best concert halls in Europe, North and South America, Asia, Australia and New Zealand. In most of the largest music centers in the world, she gave concerts regularly and with great success.
Tours and concerts did not prevent Dolukhanova's dawn from continuing her professional education. She studied at the Gnessin Music and Pedagogical Institute, as she dreamed of the profession of a teacher. In the same educational institution, she began teaching in 1972. In the eighties she received the title of professor and the position of head of the department of solo singing. Her high taste and subtle ability to feel talents were appreciated by experts, Zara Dolukhanova often had to take part in the work of the jury at singing festivals and competitions.
The famous Amber Nightingale competition, which takes place in western Kaliningrad, is dedicated to the memory of the Soviet performer and bears her honorary name.
Personal life
Zara Dolukhanova was married twice. The singer's first husband belonged to the Armenian diaspora and was engaged in composing music. The singer gave birth to a son, Mikhail, to Alexander Pavlovich Dolukhanyan.
The second marriage was with the architect Igor Yakovlevich Yadrov, who became the father of Zara Dolukhanova's second son Sergei.
Both marriages were happy and ended with the death of the men.
Zara Dolukhanova lived a wonderful long life and left it in 2007, on December 4th. People's Artist of the Soviet Union, laureate of several state awards was buried in the old Armenian cemetery of the capital of Russia.
