Zurab Sotkilava

The name of the lyric-dramatic tenor Zurab Sotkilava is known far beyond the borders of the country in which he was born. The singer's creative biography began in sunny Sukhumi, continued in Milan and further developed in Moscow, where the tenor became a soloist of the Bolshoi Theater and its pride.

Sotkilava's concerts were accompanied by unchanging sold-out. The artist's emotional dedication, the strength and beauty of his voice, and the noble manner of performance made millions of opera lovers fans of Zurab Lavrentievich. The teacher and professor of the Moscow Conservatory has trained and released hundreds of talented young singers.

The future People's Artist of the USSR was born in the spring of 1937 in the largest city of Abkhazia - Sukhumi. In the Sotkilava family, the mother and grandmother of the future star sang and played the guitar. In early childhood, Zurab sat down next to them on a bench near the house and sang along with women who gave "concerts" to neighbors and bystanders. The repertoire included old Georgian songs, melodic and lingering. Zurab Sotkilava did not dream of a career as a singer - all thoughts and plans in childhood and youth were related to football.

In his primary school age, Zurab Sotkilava chased the ball in the school team. At the insistence of his mother (a doctor by profession), who had perfect pitch, the son attended a music school, where he learned to play the violin and piano. At the age of 16, a promising Georgian footballer joined the youth team, becoming its captain. In the mid-1950s, the team won the all-Union competitions, the captain was taken to the main team of Tbilisi "Dynamo".

The rising football star was a full-back, attacked rapidly (he covered the 100-meter distance in 11.1 seconds) and made a sports career. Later, having become an opera celebrity, Zurab Sotkilava shared his memories of the most memorable game - with Dynamo Moscow. As part of the Georgian team, Sotkilava fought with Lev Yashin himself, the legendary goalkeeper. The Georgians lost the match with a score of 1: 3, but the acquaintance with Yashin continued when Sotkilava became a singer.

Zurab Sotkilava had to say goodbye to sports routine after playing in Czechoslovakia: a serious injury put an end to his career. Before that, the footballer received a fracture in Yugoslavia. The young athlete tried his hand at vocals by accident: the pianist Valeria Razumovskaya, who heard Zurab singing together with his mother and grandmother, came to the house. She was the first to recognize a singer in Sotkilava. The woman took the 21-year-old boy to a friend of the conservatory professor, who listened to the "Sukhum nightingale" skeptically. 

But the meetings with the professor continued: in gratitude for the fact that Zurab Sotkilava got him the scarce tickets for the games of the Tbilisi "Dynamo", the teacher studied the vocal with the football player. Soon the vocal exercises were crowned with success: the professor announced to Zurab that he had a brilliant operatic future. But then the prospect of becoming an opera tenor made the football player laugh. It was necessary to recall the words of the teacher of the conservatory Zurab Sotkilava after being expelled from the team in 1959.

In the summer of 1960, Sotkilava defended his diploma from the Polytechnic Institute in Tbilisi, where he studied at the mining faculty, playing in the national team. In the same year he entered the local conservatory. The son was supported by his father, who had no musical ability, but his mother turned out to be a categorical opponent of Zurab's vocal career. At first, the voice of the novice vocalist was defined as a baritone, but in the 3rd year Sotkilava was taught a lyric and dramatic tenor. In 1965, the future opera star graduated from the Tbilisi Conservatory, and 7 years later - graduate school.

The young singer was admitted to the troupe of the Tbilisi Opera and Ballet Theater, where Zurab Sotkilava successfully debuted. Soon he was entrusted with the leading roles in the operas Tosca and La Bohème by Giacomo Puccini. Then Sotkilava performed solo in Rigoletto by Giuseppe Verdi and sang in the national operas Abesalom and Eteri and Mindia.

The tenor has performed on the stage of the Georgian State Opera and Ballet Theater for 9 years, since 1965. In 1966, Zurab Sotkilava was sent to train at La Scala in Milan, where he was taught by bel canto teachers. Maestro and vocal teacher Genarro Barra admired the Georgian singer, whose voice reminded him of the old tenors Enrico Caruso and Beniamino Gigli.

Two years after starting classes with Milan teachers, Zurab Sotkilava took part in the Golden Orpheus festival of young vocalists in Bulgaria. The performance of the Georgian singer was triumphant: Sotkilava was awarded the main prize. In 1970, Zurab Sotkilava took second place in Moscow at the International Tchaikovsky Competition. In the same year, the tenor won first prize in Barcelona, ​​which hosted an international vocal competition.

At the end of 1973, Zurab Sotkilava made his debut on the stage of the Bolshoi Theater, playing the part of Jose. He was invited to the BT troupe. Soon the vocalist was entrusted with the part of Othello in the opera by Giuseppe Verdi. This is how opera connoisseurs discovered a new star - the vocal tenor Sotkilava was a revelation. The audience and listeners noted the work of the singer: Zurab laid out on stage in full force. Later, he admitted that Othello's party became that peak, after which he did not lower the bar for performance, working for wear and tear.

Another achievement of the artist is the role of Turiddu in the opera Rural Honor by the Italian composer Pietro Mascagni. The expressiveness, the intensity of passions conveyed by the vocalist, the technical virtuosity of Sotkilava were noticed by the fans, whose army has grown significantly.

In the Paris Theater of the Champs Elysees, the voice of Zurab Sotkilava was called brilliantly beautiful: the tenor's triumphal tour began in Paris. Soon the Soviet star was discovered by lovers of opera in America, Italy and Japan, noting that his voice is beautiful in all registers, and the singer's artistry "comes directly from the heart."

The tour of the late 1970s turned Zurab Sotkilava into a world-class star, bringing him the title of People's Artist of the USSR. The last bastion taken by the opera star was the role of the Pretender in Modest Mussorgsky's opera Boris Godunov. Less often Zurab Sotkilava performed on the stage, where his repertoire consisted of romances, Russian and Italian music. Since 1976, Zurab Sotkilava taught at the Moscow Conservatory, where he taught a solo singing class. In 1987 he became a professor and headed the department.

In 1995, opera fans heard Sotkilava on the BT stage: he sang the part of Golitsyn in Dmitry Shostakovich's production of Khovanshchina. He returned to the party in 2002 on the same stage. Music lovers of the London Royal Opera enjoyed the voice of Zurab Sotkilava. German opera fans saw the singer on the stage of the Bavarian State Opera. 

We heard the Russian tenor at the Dresden opera, at the Teatro Kommunale in Bologna, the Liceo Theater in Barcelona and the La Fenice in Venice. In the last decade, Zurab Lavrentyevich performed in concert halls in Moscow and St. Petersburg, and visited the neighboring countries. His repertoire included opera arias, romances by Pyotr Tchaikovsky and Sergei Rachmaninoff, Georgian and Russian folk songs.

Zurab Sotkilava was proud of his friendly and strong family. He married once and for all. Until the last days, the artist's half and right hand remained the wife of Eliso Turmanidze, who gave birth to her husband two daughters, Teya and Keti. 

The couple lived together for half a century. Zurab Lavrentievich waited for his two beloved grandchildren - Keti and Levan, in whom he doted. 

In the summer of 2015, the artist admitted that he was seriously ill. Doctors diagnosed him with pancreatic cancer. In the same year, Sotkilava underwent surgery in Germany, in Russia they underwent a course of treatment, chemotherapy. The singer took the stage in October 2015. The concert in Sergiev Posad near Moscow was sold out, it seemed that the disease had receded.

Zurab Sotkilava decided to talk about cancer, having learned about the same diagnosis of colleagues and friends of Elena Obraztsova and Dmitry Hvorostovsky. For the last two years, Zurab Sotkilava taught at the conservatory and, overcoming his illness, went on stage. In 2017, he planned to give an anniversary concert - the opera star turned 80 years old. But cancer made adjustments to the plans - the vocalist died on September 17.

Richard ("Ball-in-maschera", Giuseppe Verdi) Manrico ("Troubadour", G. Verdi) Mario Cavaradossi ("Tosca", G. Puccini) Vaudemont ("Iolanta", P. Tchaikovsky) Radames ("Aida", G. Verdi) Indian guest (Sadko, N. Rimsky-Korsakov) Arzakan (The Abduction of the Moon, O. Taktakishvili) Othello (Othello, G. Verdi) Richard (Masquerade Ball, G. Verdi) Turiddu ( Rural Honor, P. Mascagni) Baron Calloandro (The Beautiful Miller Woman, G. Paisiello) Pretender (Boris Godunov, M. Mussorgsky) Golitsyn (Khovanshchina, M. Mussorgsky) Izmail (Nabucco, J. Verdi)

Zurab Sotkilava 's estimated Net Worth, Salary, Income, Cars, Lifestyles & many more details have been updated below.

Let's check, How Rich is Zurab Sotkilava in 2020?

Zurab Sotkilava Net Worth 2021

Zurab Sotkilava 's revenue is $1.3M in 2021. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Zurab Sotkilava and could vary in the range between $731.6K - $1.8M.

Zurab Sotkilava Net Worth 2020

Zurab Sotkilava 's revenue is $1.7M in 2020. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Zurab Sotkilava and could vary in the range between $538.1K - $1.4M.

Zurab Sotkilava Net Worth 2019

Zurab Sotkilava 's revenue is $1M in 2019. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Zurab Sotkilava and could vary in the range between $706.4K - $1.8M.

Zurab Sotkilava Net Worth 2018

Zurab Sotkilava 's revenue is $1.6M in 2018. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Zurab Sotkilava and could vary in the range between $689.6K - $1.4M.

Zurab Sotkilava Net Worth 2017

Zurab Sotkilava 's revenue is $1.6M in 2017. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Zurab Sotkilava and could vary in the range between $758K - $1.4M.

Zurab Sotkilava Net Worth 2016

Zurab Sotkilava 's revenue is $1.1M in 2016. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Zurab Sotkilava and could vary in the range between $732.8K - $1.2M.

Zurab Sotkilava Net Worth 2015

Zurab Sotkilava 's revenue is $1.7M in 2015. It is an approximate forecast of how rich is Zurab Sotkilava and could vary in the range between $968.1K - $1.6M.

It is an overall forecast for the net worth of Zurab Sotkilava. The evaluation covers the latest 5 years and an approximation for next year. See above to learn how much money does Zurab Sotkilava makes a year.

The range above shows an estimation based on evaluation generated by public information about sponsorships or other sources found on the internet. It's summarized data from Zurab Sotkilava's projects existing in AidWiki's repository. It's an approximation of the revenue compiled by AidWiki and may not correspond with the real amount.