Songs for Fat People: Affect, Emotion, and Celebrity in the Russian Popular Song, 1900-1955

374 Pages·9.456 MB·English

by  David MacFadyen

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Songs for Fat People
david macfadyen, associate professor in the Department of Slavic
Languages at ulca, is the author of Red Stars: Personality and the Soviet
Popular Song, 1955–1991 and two books on Joseph Brodsky.
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SONGS FOR FAT PEOPLE
AFFECT, EMOTION, AND CELEBRITY
IN THE RUSSIAN POPULAR SONG, 1900–1955
David MacFadyen
McGill-Queen’s University Press
Montreal & Kingston · London · Ithaca
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©McGill-Queen’s University Press 2002
isbn 0-7735-2441-x
Legal deposit fourth quarter 2002
Bibliothèque nationale du Québec
Printed in Canada on acid-free paper.
This book has been published with the help of a grant from the
Humanities and Social Sciences Federation of Canada, using funds
provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
ofCanada.
McGill-Queen’s University Press acknowledges the financial support of
the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry
Development Program (bpidp) for its publishing activities. We also
acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts for our
publishing program.
The author would like to offer special thanks to Erin Fox, for help
and advice.
National Library of Canada Cataloguing in Publication
MacFadyen, David, 1964–
Songs for fat people: affect, emotion, and celebrity in the Russian
popular song, 1900–1955 / David MacFadyen.
Includes bibliographical references, filmography, discography, and
index.
isbn 0-7735-2441-x
1. Popular music – Soviet Union – History and criticism. 2. Popular
music – Social aspects – Soviet Union. 3. Singers – Soviet Union –
Biography. i. Title.
ml3497.m145 2002 782.42164’0947’0904 c2002-90247-9
Typeset in New Baskerville 10/12
by Caractéra inc., Quebec City
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For my parents, brother, and sister
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CONTENTS
Illustrations ix
Introduction: A Quick Comment before We Begin in Earnest 3
part one in practice: eleven famous
performers, loved by tens of millions
1 Grace under Friendly Fire: The Gypsy Romances of Izabella
Iur’eva and Tamara Tsereteli 9
2 The Romance in Exile: Iurii Morfessi and Petr Leshchenko 38
3 Internal(ized) Exile: The Mystery of Vadim Kozin 64
4 Exit Stage Left: Aleksandr Vertinskii and Cabaret 87
5 Affectation and Buffoonery: Leonid Utesov and Odessa Jazz 114
6 Klavdiia Shul’zhenko: “Let’s Have a Smoke, Comrade!” 142
7 Mark Bernes: Hushed Songs from the Silver Screen 169
8 Prison and Prestige: The Folk Songs of Lidiia Ruslanova and
Liudmila Zykina 200
part two in theory: soviet entertainment
seen from today’s perspectives
9 Time to Speculate and Take Stock: 1 January 2000 in Russian
Light Entertainment 237
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contents
10 Conclusion and Unsolicited Encore 253
Notes 273
Audio-Visual Sources 343
Index 353
viii
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Izabella Iur’eva
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Tamara Tsereteli