Monday, May 11, 2015

The Sacred War

On June 24, 1941 Vasily Lebedev-Kumach published a new verse "The Sacred War" in two major Soviet newspapers, namely Izvestia and Krasnaya Zvezda. The next day Alexander Alexandrov, Alexandrov Ensemble founder and future music composer of the Soviet national anthem, wrote music for the lyrics.

His ensemble performed the newly-born song June 26 at the Belorussky Railway Terminal of Moscow, while mobilized troops were departing to the front. In fact, it was sung five times one after one, and became an immediate and great success across all the fighting country.

The video starts with the first official radio announcement of the war,
that shocked the Soviet people at noon (Moscow time)
 of the wonderful sunny summer Sunday, June 22, 1941.

I would even say, the song became an informal anthem of the war, which was soon baptized as the Great Patriotic War, as it was indeed.

It is a kind of magic. I was born 25 years after the war; both my parents were born after the Great Patriotic War (yet before the end of the WWII). But every time I hear this song duly performed, my fingers make fists.



Here is a decent modern performance by Elena Vaenga.


There are titles in Serbian, Russian, Hebrew, Spanish, French, Polish and English, so you won't miss the sense.

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