"Cranes": the story of one of the most famous songs about the war
The Gazdanov family from the village of Dzuarikau in North Ossetia had seven sons. One died in 1941 near Moscow. Two more - during the defense of Sevastopol in 1942. After receiving the third funeral, their mother died. Three more sons of the Gazdanovs fell in battles in Novorossiysk, Kiev, and Belarus. The village postman refused to carry the funeral for the last, seventh son, who died during the capture of Berlin. And then the elders of the village themselves went to the house where his father was sitting on the doorstep with his only granddaughter in his arms: he saw them, and his heart was broken ...
In 1963, an obelisk was installed in the village: a mourning mother and seven birds flying away. The monument was visited by the Dagestan poet Rasul Gamzatov. Impressed by this story, he wrote a poem. In their native language, Avar. The translation of the poem into Russian was done by Naum Grebnev, a famous translator of oriental poetry. This translation is familiar to all of us.
Sometimes it seems to me that the soldiers
From the bloody fields that didn’t come,
Not once they fell into our land,
And turned into white cranes.
They are still from the time of those distant
They fly and give us voices.
Not because it’s so often and sad
Are we silent while looking to heaven?
A wedge flies across the sky, tired -
Flying in the fog at the end of the day
And in that order there is a small gap -
Maybe this place is for me!
The day will come, and with the crane flock
I will swim in the same gray haze,
From the sky, calling out like a bird
All of you whom I left on earth.
The poem caught the eye of Mark Bernes, for whom the war was a deeply personal topic. He turned to Jan Frenkel with a request to compose music for the song on these lines.
Two months after the start of work, Frenkel wrote the opening vocal and immediately called Bernes. He came, listened and burst into tears. Frenkel recalled that Bernes was not a sentimental man, but cried when something really touched him. After that, work on the recording went faster. But not only because of inspiration.
Bernes was ill with lung cancer. After he heard the music, he began to rush everyone. According to Frenkel, Bernes felt that time was running out and wanted to put an end to his life with this particular song. He had difficulty moving, but nevertheless, on July 8, 1969, his son took him to the studio, where Bernes recorded the song. From one take. A month later, on August 16, he was gone.
From the Internet
