Andrey Labinsky

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Andrey Markovich Labinsky was a Russian opera tenor born in 1871 in Tobolsk, in the Russian Empire. He grew up in exile in Siberia and began singing in church choirs there from 1881, later moving to Tyumen and then joining the Synodal Choir. After finishing school, he sang with the Synodal Choir and studied solo singing at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory, finishing in 1899 under professors S. Gabel and V. Samus. He had an even, flexible voice and could sing up to F in the third octave.

From 1896 he sang in the Mariinsky Theatre chorus. He was a soloist there from 1899 to 1912 and again from 1919 to 1924. After 1926 he worked at the Bolshoi Theatre. His best-known roles included Lensky, Hermann, Almaviva, Faust, Don José, Raoul, Bayan, Lykov, Sadko, Radames, Lohengrin, and Luciano in Francesca da Rimini by Eduard Nápravník.

He performed with Feodor Chaliapin and Antonina Nezhdanova. He was very popular, especially with female fans who were nicknamed “Labinistki” and followed him on tours across Russia. A Russian Musical Gazette note from 1905 said front-row tickets for his chamber concerts with bass Kastorsky cost ten roubles. The same issue tells of a tragicomic incident when the furious husband of a Labinistka shot at Labinsky, but missed. Labinsky was the understudy of Leonid Sobinov. The composer S. Kashevarov wrote the ballad “Silence” for him.

Labinsky was killed during the first bombardment of Moscow in August 1941.