The present Doodle commends the 125th birthday celebration of Soviet musician, singer, and actor Leonid Utyosov who is credited with driving one of the Soviet Union’s initial jazz groups.
Lazar Iosifovich Weissbein was conceived on this day 1895 to a working class family in Odessa (presently part of Ukraine). Before the finish of his teenager years, he had accepted work as a bazaar stunt-devil, stand-up comic, and theater entertainer, expecting the stage name Leonid Utyosov. In the wake of winning a singing rivalry, the multi-gifted Utyosov shaped a band and started visiting Moscow, showing up normally at the city’s popular Hermitage Theater.
While on visit in 1928, Utyosov encountered his first experience with American jazz, and he was snared. The following year, he appeared the Tea-Jazz Orchestra, which mixed various styles, including American jazz, Jewish people music, Argentinian tangos, and Russian bedtime songs, and accomplished significant fame.
In an arrival to acting, Utyosov featured in the Hollywood-style hit film Vesyolye rebyata (Jolly Fellows, 1934) which acquainted Soviet crowds with an assortment of new music and earned him expanded introduction the nation over.
For his impressive commitments to music and film, Utyosov was assigned the 1965 People’s Artist of the USSR, and in 2000, a statue was raised in his respect in his old neighborhood of Odessa.
Happy birthday, Leonid Utesov!
