Leonid Bortkevich: interesting facts about the musician and his life in the States
soulful and strong voice Leonid Bortkevich, one of the legendary "pesnyarov", is well known to every Soviet listener. It was this artist who gave the sound to such famous songs like "Alexandrina", "Veronica", "Belarus".
And today, in his respectable 70 years, Bortkiewicz continues to manage Pesniary, however, not the first ones, but those that were formed after of death Vladimir Mulyavin. During his long and fascinating life, in which creativity has always played one of the most important roles, this man managed to surround himself halo incomprehensible gossip and speculation.
Today we will look at seven truthful and most interesting facts about the legendary musician.
Designed the main Minsk cinema
By education, Bortkiewicz is architect. Before devoting himself to the stage, Leonid graduated from the Minsk Architectural College and even managed to work for some time in his specialty. Cinema "October", which is located in the very center of Minsk, was designed according to the graduation project of the famous "pesnyar".
He boasted that he had an affair with Pugacheva
Once, Bortkevich shared with journalists his intimate memories of how the star of a traveling musician brought him to the same hotel from the rising prima donna of the pop scene - Alla Borisovna Pugacheva.
The singer hinted that there was something between them morethan harmless friendly communication - they say, they even spent the night together in one of the rooms. Upon learning of this, Pugacheva for a long time called Leonid a dreamer.
Was married to an Olympic champion
This couple was really stellar: the legendary "singer" Leonid Bortkevich and the world-famous gymnast Olga Korbut. The news of their marriage immediately gave rise to the most incredible gossip. And to this day there is a legend that the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Belarus Peter Masherov allowed the newlyweds to get married at their country dacha in Drozdy.
Citizen of Belarus and USA
Fans of Leonid Bortkevich should certainly know about the singer's joint project released in the mid-90s with Danchik, a Belarusian-American artist. Back in the late 80s, Bortkiewicz, together with his family got over to the States, where Leonid received citizenship.
The fight against fraud in the States
When only Bortkevich and his wife moved to the States, new location immediately demonstrated to the naive Soviet citizens the cruel nature of capitalism - a family of celebrities immediately tried to cheat in the truest sense of the word. The scammer turned out to be the translator of the spouses, whom they hired for the first time to help them with paperwork. The artists themselves of the English language at that time still did not know.
The villain, wanting to cash in on the rich simpletons from the Union, took advantage of their ignorance of English and slipped the documents according to which the property of the spouses passed to her. The documents, which the translator gave to the spouses, in the USA, as a rule, people who are dying are drawn up in order to transfer property in favor of relatives.
As a result, the girl failed to enrich herself at the expense of others: court sided with Bortkevich and Koburt, although, of course, the proceedings required a lot of effort and money from them. They didn't make the same mistakes again.
Cheating wife
The musician often said in an interview that he never regretted that he and his wife had left for the West. But here's what it's really about regretted, is that in the late 90s, at the invitation of Vladimir Mulyavin, he returned home.
Returning, the musician left his family in the States, he was simply sure that he would bring his relatives to him later. But his wife did not want to leave America at all, and while the musician was performing in Belarus, she found an American husband and divorced with Bortkiewicz.
Taught his American grandchildren the Belarusian language
Leonid Bortkevich came up with an interesting way learning children to the Belarusian language. The singer advised to hang up a radio in the house of every family, broadcasting exclusively in Belarusian from morning to evening. This allows the child to eventually begin to understand what is being said on the radio, and at the same time learn to speak independently.
Bortkevich said that such an experiment he spent on grandchildren living in the West. According to Bortkiewicz, after a few months, the children could already speak Belarusian with him:
“With me, in a few months, all the children of Belarus would speak their native language, and without hesitation. We cannot force a child to teach or listen, but we can make it happen on a subconscious level. Just install a loudspeaker on the walls in every room and let it broadcast national channels from morning to evening. I conducted such an experiment with my grandchildren who live across the ocean. They did not know the Belarusian language at all, and literally after a couple of months they spoke it as their own. This is because the speech that we hear every day is involuntarily deposited in our heads.
The musician's grandchildren can only be envied. Not everyone who lives in the US can boast of knowing Belarusian. And here they are after talking with my grandfather and a loudspeaker - may.
