Sofia Rotaru
Sofiia Mykhailivna Yevdokymenko-Rotaru, known simply as Sofia Rotaru, is a Ukrainian singer.
Rotaru, nicknamed "Bukovinsky Solovey", emerged in 1966 as a pop folk star in the movie Solovei iz sela Marshyntsi in the Romanian-speaking world after her manager and future husband Anatoliy Yevdokymenko made her change her music style from folk to pop music with Chervona Ruta.
In 1972, she released the multilingual album Sofia Rotaru, re-released three times and covered by numerous singers, establishing herself as a viable pop artist in the countries of the former Soviet Union. She first gained international recognition after participating in 1968 in the International Youth Song Festival in Bulgaria and winning first prize at the Golden Orpheus in 1973 and second prize in the category of Polish songs at the Sopot International Song Festival in 1974. In the former USSR her career was marked by her stage success and numerous controversies.
Rotaru has been performing for more than 40 years, and topped the Moscow airplay with "Ya nazovu planetu imenem tvoim" in 2008.
She reported the highest income of all celebrities in Ukraine in 2008 and 2010.
Her repertoire consists of more than 40 albums and 400 songs recorded in many languages. She has received awards, deemed a Merited Artist of the Ukrainian SSR, People's Artist of Ukraine, People's Artist of Moldavian SSR, Laureate of the Lenin Komsomol Prize, Hero of Moldova, and Cavalier of the Republican Order of Moldova. In August 2002, former president of Ukraine Leonid Kuchma and President of Russia Vladimir Putin gave awards to Sofia Rotaru for her 55th birthday, bestowing upon her the high rank of the Hero of Ukraine for her "outstanding personal merits in the sphere of art", and the Russian order "For Merit to the Fatherland", respectively. She has been acknowledged by the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate.
Rotaru's official surname is Yevdokymenko-Rotaru. Yevdokymenko was the surname of her late husband. Yalta is her main residence, although she also has homes in Moscow, Kyiv, and Baden-Baden.
Early life
Sofia Rotaru, who comes from the Romanian minority in Ukraine, was born in Marshyntsi, Chernivtsi Oblast to a family of brigadiers and wine-growers. Marshyntsi is a village of Novoselytskyi Raion, close to the border with Moldova, and the majority of its population is Romanophone. The area was part of Kingdom of Romania before 1940, when Soviet Union occupied and annexed it after an ultimatum.She was the second child in a family of six children. Her siblings are Zina, Lidia, Aurica, Eugen and Anatol. A passport office employee misreported her birthdate on her passport as 9 August; as a result, Rotaru reportedly celebrates her birthday twice.
Her father, Mykhail Fedorovich Rotaru, spent World War II as a heavy machine gunner and traveled to Berlin. Injured, he returned home only in 1946, and was the first person to join the Communist Party in the village. Her older sister, Zinaida, was born on 11 October 1942. Zina endured severe childhood illness and went blind, but possessed perfect pitch and easily memorized new songs, so she taught Sofia folk songs. Sofia said of her elder sister: "We all learned from her – what a musical memory, what a soul!". Zina spent hours listening to the radio and learned numerous songs, as well as the Russian language, which she later taught to her brothers and sisters. At home, the Rotaru family spoke only Romanian. As a child, Sofia participated in regional competitions of pentathlon and running.
She started singing from the first grade in the school choir, as well as in the church choir. However, the latter was not acceptable to the school officials. Hence, she was threatened with an exclusion from the Young Pioneer organization. Rotaru was attracted by the theatre. She practiced in drama classes and sang popular folk songs in vocal classes. In the evenings, she used to take the only bayan at school and hide in the barn trying to find the proper melodies for her most loved Moldavian songs. Rotaru said:
Career
1962–1964: Career start and Ukrainian pop-folk
Rotaru's victory at a vocal competition of amateur performers opened the door to a regional review in 1962. In 1963 in Chernivtsi, she earned a first degree diploma at the regional amateur art review. In 1964, she won the all-republic festival of popular talents in Kyiv. On this occasion her picture made it on the cover of No. 27 of the magazine Ukraine in 1965. After graduation from high school, Rotaru decided to become a singer and entered the vocal and conductor department of the Chernivtsi Musical College. In addition, she took lessons at Chernivtsi Philharmonic from the famed singer and actress Sidi Tal. In 1964, Rotaru performed at the State Kremlin Palace. The first pop song she performed was "Mama" by Alexander Bronevitskiy.1968–1973: International recognition
In 1968, after graduation from college, Rotaru performed as a delegate of the IX World Festival of Youth and Students in the capital of Bulgaria, as a member of an artistic group. She won First Prize in the competition of singers of folk popular songs. Bulgarian newspapers were full of headlines: "21-year old Sofia has conquered Sofia". Her performances of the Ukrainian folk pop song "Na kameni stoyu", Moldavian folk pop songs and "Valentina" by Gheorghite made headlines. The latter song was dedicated to the first female cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova, who was present in the concert hall. In 1968, Rotaru married Anatoliy Yevdokymenko, who at that time was a student at Chernivtsi University and a trumpet player in a student pop band.In 1971, producer Roman Alekseev shot a musical film Chervona Ruta for Ukrtelefilm. The plot was about the tender and pure love of a girl from the mountains and her relationship with a man from the industrial city of Donetsk. The name of the film means rue, a flower derived from an ancient Carpathian legend. Rue blossoms only on Ivan Kupala Night and the girl who succeeds in finding a blooming rue will be happy in love. Songs of the composer Volodymyr Ivasyuk and other writers were co-performed by Zinkevich, Yaremchuk and other singers. The film enjoyed significant success. After the film was released, Rotaru received an offer to work in the Chernivtsi Philharmonic Society and with a backing ensemble called Chervona Ruta. Anatoliy Yevdokymenko, Rotaru's husband, became the artistic director of the ensemble.
As a result of collaborating with Volodymyr Ivasyuk, a cycle of songs was written based on the roots revival material in an orchestration characteristic of the 1960s and the 1970s in Continental Europe. Resulting works brought Rotaru great popularity in the Soviet Union, especially in Ukraine. This was largely due to the fact that the Soviet authorities eagerly promoted her art as an example of international Soviet culture, as she was an ethnic Moldavian/Romanian singing in Moldavian/Romanian, Ukrainian and Russian languages. Consequently, Rotaru gained regular airplay on state radio and television and was systematically billed for state-organized concerts.
In 1972, Rotaru and Chervona Ruta participated in a tour in Poland with the programme Pesni i tantsy Strany Sovetov.
In the same year Sofia Rotaru collaborated with Don Backy, performing the Ukrainian version of his hit from the 60s L'immensità - "Syzokrylyi ptakh".
In 1973, she received First Prize at the international contest of Golden Orpheus in Burgas, Bulgaria, performing the song "Moy gorod" and Second Prize in the category of foreign performance of a song in the Bulgarian language. In 1973, she also was awarded the Meritorious Artist of the Ukrainian SSR. Later, the songs which she performed in the Moldavian/Romanian language, "Codru" and "Moy gorod", became soundtracks for the film Vesenniye sozvuchiya – 73.
1974–1979: New authors and Moldavian lyricism
In 1974, Rotaru graduated from the Chişinău Art Institute of Gavriil Musicescu in the choral conducting class with professor Lydia Axionova and participated in the Sopot International Song Festival in Poland, performing "Vospominaniye" by B. Rychkov, and "Vodohrai" by Ivasjuk. She received second prize in the category of Polish song for her performance of "Ktoś". In 1976, she moved from Chernivtsi to Yalta, transferring from the Chernivtsi Philharmonic Society to the Crimean Philharmonic Society. After the death of Volodymyr Ivasyuk in 1979, a number of songs by Moldavian composers appeared in her repertoire penned by the Teodorovici brothers. By that time, Rotaru had ceased collaboration with Moldavian authors, primarily Eugen Doga.Rotaru's songs of the period were created in collaboration with the following composers and lyricists: Arno Babajanian wrote "Verni mne muzyku" ; Aleksey Mazhukov – "A muzyka zvuchit" and "Krasnaya strela" ; Pavel Aedonitskiy – "Dlya tekh, kto zhdyot" ; Oscar Feltsman - "Only For You"; David Tukhmanov – "Aist na kryshe", "V dome moyom", and "Val's" ; Yury Saulsky – "A Usual Story" and "Osennyaya melodiya" ; Aleksandra Pakhmutova – "Temp" ; Raimonds Pauls – "Tanets na barabane" ; Aleksandr Zatsepin – "Sovsem kak na Zemle" ; Vladimir Migulya – "Zhyzn'", and others.
She was the first performer of Eugene Martyunov's songs, including "Lebedinaya vernost", "Yabloni v tsvetu", and "Ballada o materi". A patriotic song, "Shchastye tebe, Zemlya moya", caused some political controversy.
1980–1983: Acting career and new connections
In 1980, at the international song festival held in Tokyo, Rotaru won first prize for her performance of Ljupka Dimitrovska's song "Obeshchaniye" / "Obećanje" and received the Order of the Badge of Honor. She continued to experiment and was the first Soviet female singer to appear wearing trousers on stage. While doing this, she performed a hip-hop style song "Temp" with music composed by Aleksandra Pakhmutova and lyrics written by Nikolay Dobronravov. The songs "Temp" and "Ozhidaniye" were specially written for the cultural programme of the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow. The song was used as the soundtrack theme for the drama film Ballada o sporte, produced by Yuri Ozerov. In the same year, for her performance of "Ozhidaniye", Rotaru won the All-Union Song of the Year award.In 1980, Rotaru starred in the leading role in a film released by Moldova-Film and called Gde ty, lyubov'?. Among other songs in the film, Rotaru performed "Pervy dozhd'". The movie featured her riding a motorcycle on a narrow sea embankment without a stunt double. According to the autobiographic plot, a village teacher is invited to join an ensemble and wins the Grand Prix at an international festival with the song "Gde ty, lyubov'?". The music for the song was composed by Raimonds Pauls and lyrics by Ilya Reznik. A double album of the soundtrack was released. More than 25 million movie goers viewed the film in 1980. The title song of the film was banned from state radio by Gennadiy Cherkassov, director of the music department.
In 1981, at the XIVth All-Union Cinema Festival in Vilnius, the film received the jury's prize for popularisation of the singing art of Soviet composers, in the section of drama films. This movie was the first public exposure for Rotaru in a dramatic role. Critics lambasted the film but it garnered support from audiences and some of its themes became popular. Rotaru's next artistic period began with a new style – rock music. The film Dusha with Rotaru's new rock band Mashina Vremeni was released in 1981, including songs by Aleksandr Zatsepin and Andrey Makarevich. As she was ill, her doctors recommended she not participate in the movie production and that she cancel all concert performances.
This incident caused Alexander Borodyansky and Alexander Stefanovich to write an autobiographical scenario for the film using the dramatic situation in the singer's life, characterising her loss of voice with an opening of her soul. This was shown in dialogue on a pier with an older man and included a reevaluation of her values. After having seen the new rewritten scenario and new songs, written in a completely new style, Rotaru agreed to star in the movie and decided to temporarily forego all concert performances. In 1983, Rotaru performed a national concert tour of Canada, organised by the National Concert Agency Inc. The concerts were supported by the issue of an LP, titled Canadian Tour 1983 and released by Cansov Exchange Inc.