NIKOLAI OKHOTNIKOV, A PERFORMER OF CHAMBER VOCAL LYRICS OF RUSSIAN COMPOSERS OF THE PAST

The article examines the activities of the remarkable Russian bass singer Nikolai Okhotnikov as a performer of chamber vocal music. The artist’s repertoire in this area was extremely wide. A special place in it was occupied by the works of Russian composers of the past. The article systematises Okhotnikov’s concert repertoire, analyses the features of the singer’s performance of Russian folk songs, as well as a number of his renditions of the music of M. Glinka, M. Mussorgsky, A. Dargomyzhsky, P. Tchaikovsky, Ant. Rubinstein, A. Borodin, N. Rimsky-Korsakov and others. A conclusion is made about the high significance of Okhotnikov’s activities as a chamber performer in the Russian vocal culture of the 20th-21st centuries.