On July 15, one of the most controversial characters in Russian show business, Yuri Aizenshpis, would have turned 65 [discussion]

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In the last weekly, we began a story about the most controversial producer of domestic show business - Yuri Aizenshpis. From the biography of Yuri Shmilyevich, it is clear that in many ways he, without fear of anything, not even prison, went ahead to earn money, which he then invested in show business. And, as those who worked with him assure, today's face of our stage - with all the pluses and minuses - is in many ways the same as Aizenshpis saw him at one time. Today we continue our story about him. About a tough character“Yuri Shmilevich tried to control our every step, he had a lot of“ ears and informants ”in the company,” one of his pupils, singer Nikita, told KP. - He tried to get into literally everything, even advised which girl to be friends with. The one that I had seemed to him inappropriate, he wooed me with another. But one day I made him understand that I would not tolerate such excessive control, he was offended. He wanted to be friends, to be closer, and I am an introverted person, I was fascinated by music. Usually he gave advice to everyone on which parties you can go to and which not. I didn't go to parties at all, but sat in the studio - writing songs for myself. We often had clashes with him. He just screamed at me. But I also showed my teeth. One day he insisted that I sing a song that I didn’t like. It came to a conflict. Finally I was persuaded to make concessions to him. And I ... recorded a song with a Georgian accent. Yuri Shmilevich sat down to listen to the recording and how he shouted: "This is not Nikita singing, this is some kind of Georgian ?!" For a few more minutes his screams shook the walls of the studio. In his book, Yuri Shmilevich wrote that I was jealous of him towards Bilan. No, I had no jealousy. Although I did not understand why he makes the second Nikita out of the new Bilan. Everything that was worked out on me, he skated as a carbon copy in the promotion of Bilan. Apparently, he wanted to quickly recapture the money and earn. Shmilevich was counting on me very much, but I kicked up - I wanted to write electronic music, and he insisted that I remain in the pop image. As a result, "Shpis" decided to let me go. By this time, he began to promote Bilan even more actively, who did not argue with him. Although Dima demanded large financial investments. I wrote songs for myself, and I was not paid for it. - They say that Aizenshpis took revenge on you, blocked the oxygen?- I heard such conversations ... But I had no other way - with Aizenshpis I did not see development .... - I wrote songs for Aizenshpis' wards. I must admit, Aizenshpis was incredibly demanding of his subordinates. He himself fired up the idea and demanded the same "spark" from everyone who was around, - says "dynamite" Ilya Zudin. - Once I brought a disc with a new recording, but the disc does not turn on. Aizenshpis decided that I simply did not complete the work and was trying to blame everything on the technique. Shouted at me without choosing words. I heard such insults that I could not stand it - I slammed the door and promised to break off all contacts with this person. However, after a while he called: “Well, I got excited. Come on, come make up! " It turned out that the disk worked miraculously, and Yuri made sure that I had not deceived him ... He was despotic. Before my eyes, he threw various objects at people. He hit the head most often. People left with bruises. But they endured - to become the enemy of Aizenshpis, you know, dear to yourself! He could make trouble for those who wanted to cross his path. But he was easy-going ... On his tour in “Jurmala” Aizenshpis smashed the camera of a photographer who was taking “spy shots”. The shrapnel hit the face of a photo reporter who wrote a statement to the police. We “did our feet” from this “Jurmala”, fearing that Aizenshpis would be imprisoned. He could be cruel. But at critical moments he acted according to concepts. When my father died, he opened his bag, took out, without looking, an armful of dollars and thrust me: "Bury your father with dignity." Then he never remembered about this money and did not reproach them ...

"Blue Lobby" The name of Yu. A. is associated with the appearance of the "blue lobby" in showbiz. Allegedly, at first, the cool ones brought them to the producer for the promotion of mistresses, and then they began to bring ... lovers. - For some reason, in recent years, Yura began to spin some slender boys out of some of his own considerations. He chose pretty boys with sexy data, as he imagined, - told "KP" Artemy Troitsky. - I did not support him in this direction and told him about it, he was upset. Partly because of this, we almost stopped communicating with him. They often argued, even because of Bilan ... Rumors about Spis's unconventional orientation reached me. But I cannot reproach him with anything specific. He had a wife, a son. Why divorced, I do not know. When for some reason he painted his noble gray hair bluish-black, it seemed wild to me ... - My dancers were afraid of Aizenshpis, - producer Vitaly Manshin told KP. - I noticed that Aizenshpis calmly reacted to the girls, but quickly found a common language with the boys-dancers. I still could not find a dancer for him for Dima Bilan. He sent two girls. He rejected them. I offered him guys from the ballet "Mirage". Aizenshpis liked them. With them and with Bilan I went on tour, and upon their return the guys rushed to me with bulging eyes: "No, we will not work with Aizenshpis!" Then I made an agreement with three guys from the dance-master ballet (one of them was the ex-participant of Reflex Denis). The guys somehow hesitated and asked me about Aizenshpis: "Will he not bother us?" But guys with a normal orientation are working with him! However, after a few days of working with Yuri, Denis came running back to me: "No, I can't do that." Apparently, something was happening there ... He lured away a dance group from me, apparently, having managed to win over one dancer-leader. - Are you hinting at the unconventional orientation of Aizenshpis himself?- I didn't tell you that! You know, I still want to live. I don’t want them to come to me and shoot me in the head. “He’s dead, right?”- His friends remained. Therefore, I will not speak badly about him ... - The imprisonment could have influenced the orientation of Aizenshpis. If all the other producers in those years promoted only mistresses, wives, girls (if a boy-singer appeared, then most often he turned out to be the son of some producer), then Aizenshpis was drawn to untwist the guys. Many talked about his "blue lobby". Now you can hardly surprise anyone with this. I know that he did leftist concerts and received good money from the cool stars for inviting them to them, ”Alexander Stefanovich, ex-husband and promoter of Alla Pugacheva, told KP.

Alexander Tolmatsky: "Krutoy took the leadership from Aizenshpis"- I call Aizenshpis the best producer. He worked all his life. He started with me in the 70s, - told "KP" a former friend of Yuri Shmilevich Alexander Tolmatsky, producer Decl, Oleg Gazmanov, the group "Combination". - Since the end of the 70s, I and Yura Aizenshpis were among the first to engage in underground concerts, trade (then speculation) musical instruments, records. Yura, plus to this, also engaged in currency trading, for which he sat down. We also hosted discos. We are with him - one of those who stood at the origins of Russian show business. Everything else is a new generation that appeared in the 90s. Until 2000, I and Aizenshpis were in the lead in the music market. In my company "Mediastars" he worked as the director of Aizenshpis, and also among my founding partners was the then director of the Muz TV channel, who quietly sold the channel to Igor Krutoy, after which my company lost its leadership position, and Igor Krutoy gained influence on the music market. Against his background, Pugacheva was more likely an organizer, not a producer. And Kobzon is not a producer, but an artist. - They say Aizenshpis communicated with crime bosses?- You know, all the "authorities" in different spheres communicate with each other, this is how it happened. Everyone respected Aizenshpis. He never did anything in the dark. He was a very decent person. - Is it true that Aizenshpis brought the “blue lobby” into show business?- There is such an opinion (chuckling). He was often surrounded by boys. I will not comment on this point. But he knew a lot about singers promotion! Aizenshpis at the end of his life was very worried about Dima Bilan, who made friends with Yana Rudkovskaya. Yura came to visit me and talked about his experiences, he was afraid that Dima would be taken away from him. Those experiences affected the deterioration of Yura's health. Many of his charges were not very grateful. But when they left him, everything went out. CHAPTERS FROM THE BOOK Temptation of Dima Bilan * * * The singer wrote about his relationship with Aizenshpis in a book that will be published in the fall. A fragment from it "KP" was provided by the PR manager of Dima Bilan. “During the filming of the video“ I want to become an oligarch, ”we met two respected people - one is very famous in the business environment, the other - in the world of show business. Yuri Shmilevich and I received a very tempting offer - namely, about the "purchase" of my contract and about my transfer from StarPro to another production company. The acuteness of the situation was given by the fact that another producer offered a very large amount of money, which twice covered all the expenses of Yuri Shmilevich for my promotion. For me, absolutely fabulous horizons were opening up - the prospect of working with the best Western composers and musicians, which means that I would become both more popular and a better-off person.

What do you say? - Yuri Shmilevich asked me after hearing the details of the deal from the other party. - And you? - I asked him a counter question. “This is a very generous offer,” Yuri Shmilevich praised. “You need to think it over. Carefully and with a cool head. I took time to think ... ... Businessmen ordered me a very expensive car in St. Petersburg, which I could not even dream of at that time. They drove her over and put her right under the window of my rented apartment - at that time I lived on Sokol in a rather modest two-room apartment. In the morning I looked down, saw the beauty sparkling with bumpers and realized that all this could be mine as soon as I signed the necessary papers ... - Yuri Shmilevich! - I called one fine day. - Are you sure that you definitely need to accept this offer? - Let's meet and talk, - Aizenshpis immediately reacted ... ... We met in one of the cafes, each took a cup of coffee and sat in silence for a while. - You must understand one thing, Dim, - began to explain Yuri Shmilevich. “I cannot offer you the same conditions as these people. And in order for us to reach the same level that you can have with them now, we will need several years ... - But we can, right? - I raised my eyes to my mentor. Yuri Shmilevich was silent. He ... was ready to agree with any decision I made. - I do not want to leave you! - I said. - I am very comfortable with you, positive, easy to work with. We have been together for a long time, and there were a lot of things, but I don't know these people at all. I am sure that they will fulfill absolutely all their promises to the end. But I'm not sure that I can work with them ... I looked at Yuri Shmilevich, and it seemed to me that joy flashed in his eyes. The prickly glance softened, the face brightened and even somehow became younger ... - Okay, - he answered shortly. - Thank you for your friendship. * * * For the first couple of years, Yuri Shmilevich and I - or rather he personally - tested each other for strength. Aizenshpis constantly provoked me, threw some offensive things and at the same time carefully watched how I would react. There were a great many negative situations in communicating with him, since Yuri Shmilyevich definitely had to put the squeeze on to the very boiling point, beyond which a person loses patience and begins to actively protest. It was a kind of "test". Each of his artists or employees at least once reached the last brink when he decided to quit and declared: "That's it, I don't work here anymore!" Someone left irrevocably, someone eventually returned, but in such extreme conditions there was a forge of personnel named after Aizenshpis. And, as it seems to me now, Yuri Shmilyevich's "education program" necessarily included this item - a scandal check. Perhaps it had some kind of sacred meaning, because endless concerts and multi-day tours really eat up so much strength, emotions and nerves that not everyone can survive such stress. They trained us, that is.

PERSONAL IMPRESSION He either blacklisted journalists or recognized I was personally acquainted with Yuri Shmilevich. We felt sympathy for each other and communicated tenderly. Then I was often told about the cool and even cruel temper of the producer. He could be very rude to journalists, and to those who criticized his charges, he repaired dirty tricks. I could not help but believe in these stories, but Yuri Shmilevich turned to me “not with thorns, but with leaves” ... We met in Sochi at a hotel. I was on a business trip, he was on vacation. In shorts, in some kind of unimaginable flowered shirt and a smile full of his mouth, like a Nutcracker, Aizenshpis immediately attracted attention. Moreover, the first impression - the shock of his eerie appearance - instantly grew into an interest in this person. He knew how to bewitch. He could not sit still, everything began to spin and sparkle around him. He immediately ordered to set a table for me. Immediately the pages of magazines that had taken from somewhere rustled. Aizenshpis quickly explained that he had met a fashion designer here and decided to cooperate with him. I have already agreed with a local magazine that will publish a photo of Dima Bilan in the costumes of that fashion designer. “Are you going to write about Dima? Agree, it's a good hotel, my friend keeps it. You say you want to get to the concert of Maxim Galkin, we'll do it, the director of Festivalny is my friend, ”Yuri Shmilevich listened to me in one ear, and pressed his cell phone to the other, talking to some producer and praising the performance of his singer in Sochi, at which he didn't actually walk. On the run, he killed a dozen birds with one stone at once, trying to acquaint everyone, make friends and twist into one common cause. “The main thing is that everyone is profitable and interesting,” Aizenshpis told me. - You say our PR manager doesn't give information? I'll smear them all on the wall! Help yourself! I eat the trendy Volkov diet. Salad is specially prepared for me here. I have diabetes. I lost my health in the zone. And I want to live. I deny myself the pleasure of having a tasty meal ... Look at the photo of Bilan, is it really very sexy ?! " I nodded. I didn't argue with him at all. In each of our subsequent conversations, he did not forget to ask me when I would write about Dima Bilan. I jokingly excused myself: this is a very responsible business, and I need to prepare well. And along the way, I asked him for small news from the world of show business. Then I found out that any publication about Bilan was thoroughly analyzed by "Shpis", after which either the author was blacklisted or credited to its own. Neither the first nor the second happened to me. And all because I never wrote ANYTHING about Bilan. Perhaps this circumstance allowed Aizenshpis and me to communicate without problems until the end of his life ... I called him on his mobile two days before his death. I barely recognized his voice. He croaked that in the hospital, it is very bad for him. But then he said that nothing, not the first time, would break through. “I'll recover a little and go back to battle, Dima needs to tour,” hissed into the trumpet. - You give me a call to the PR manager, they will tell you something, tell me, I ordered. And two days later a message came that he was gone. The official diagnosis is the heart. There were rumors about AIDS. There is a version that this is the result of stem cell treatment. He was a pioneer in everything. Aizenshpis explained his success like this: “We can say that show business is an already formed industry, the same industry as the production of cars or the smelting of cast iron. It also has its own technology and its own laws ... Show is a sight. The word "concert" does not fit, it is associated with the classical genre, be it a symphony orchestra, Zykina or Magomayev ... Show business brought in a lot of money two or three years ago. Now the whole society is sick and the area where I work is sick. The sum of expenses for big shows today is not paid off by the cost of tickets. Advertisers and sponsors required. I believe that the advantage in business belongs to those in whose genes the blood of a business person flows. Real business is for talented people. This is art. I am helped by my ability to work, taste, which has not yet failed, knowledge of the matter. "

Biography
In 1968 he graduated from the Moscow Institute of Economics and Statistics with a degree in engineer-economist. He began his professional career in 1965, working as an administrator with the rock group "SOKOL". Developed an original scheme of the team's activities. After a verbal agreement with the director of the club for the concert, the administrator bought tickets for the evening demonstration of the film and distributed them at a more expensive price. For the first time he involved in the work of people who ensured order during the performance of the group. On January 7, 1970 he was arrested. As a result of the search, 15585 rubles and 7675 dollars were confiscated. Convicted under Article 88 (gold and currency transactions). He was released from prison in 1977, subsequently received a paper with an official apology.
For a short time he worked in the "Gallery" under the city committee of the Komsomol, organizing concerts of young performers. In early 1989 he was producing the KINO group. One of the first to break the state monopoly on the publication of records. Taking a loan of 5,000,000 rubles (1990), he released the last work of the "KINO" group - "Black Album". From 1991 to 1992 he cooperates with the TECHNOLOGY group. Helps musicians to release their debut album "Anything You Want", organizes the release of various printed products (posters, postcards, etc.). In 1992 he became a laureate of the national Russian music award "Ovation" in the category "Best Producer". In the period from 1992 to 1993 he worked as a producer with the groups "MORAL KODEKS" and "YOUNG GANZ". Since the summer of 1994 he has been collaborating with the singer Vlad Stashevsky (for 1997 4 albums were recorded, the debut one - "Love doesn't live here anymore" - was released on the "Aisenshpis Records" label). Participated in the organization of the international festival "Solar Adjara" (1994), as well as in the establishment of the music award "Star". In 1995, based on the results of work for 1993-94, he was again awarded the Ovation Prize. In 1997 he continued to work with Vlad Stashevsky, in parallel collaborating with the aspiring singer Inga.

Yuri Aizenshpis, a second year student at the Moscow Institute of Economics and Statistics, majoring in engineer-economist, devotes all his free time to his passionate hobby - music. Music is by no means official, in millions of copies stamped by domestic giants of the recording industry, but that, real, ideologically harmful and dangerous. Rock, jazz, and, by some absurdity, even Berry's sisters were declared as such.
“My first recordings were jazz compositions by the world's leading musicians. John Coltrane, Woody Herman, Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong ... I could name about a hundred such names. My first idols were John Coltrain, Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong.
Later I was drawn to the origins of rock music - rhythm & blues. He knew various directions - avant-garde jazz, jazz-rock, popular jazz. Then I was drawn to the origins of rock music, to the founders of such a direction as rhythm blues. The circle of music lovers was small, everyone knew each other. If my acquaintances had a record, I rewrote it. The records came to us from abroad through the strong barriers of customs laws and regulations, and then were sold on the "black" markets, which were dispersed every now and then. Neither exchange nor purchase and sale was permitted. The discs could be seized, could be prosecuted for speculation. Well, you are amazed. Nevertheless, the records were brought in and stuck with connoisseurs. "
Rock came to us with legendary records on "ribs" (artisans-underground workers cut soundtracks on X-rays) and with "native" contraband vinyls. Elvis Prestley, and later - The Beatles brought to the country the transatlantic spirit of free music, full of life and drive. Musicians have always hung out side by side with music lovers, often combining these two concepts. "

The new schemes were innovatively original: after an oral agreement with the director of the club, the group bought up all the tickets for the evening movie show and sold them at an overpriced price, but this time for their own concert, held instead of the movie, which was "canceled for technical reasons." The markup was in favor of the musicians, and the club received a sold-out fee even for the most non-cash films - so great was the popularity of "SOKOL". But music is created not only by creative thought. To create it, completely material things are needed - musical instruments, sound equipment. And this issue was resolved not only by funding. At that time in the USSR, only official philharmonic groups could afford a more or less decent apparatus or a branded electric guitar. And here again the entrepreneurial spirit of the young producer comes to the rescue.

“Our first amplifier,” says Yuri Aizenshpis, “we ordered in one of the Moscow research institutes, and for a fairly modest sum they made a good device for us. Unofficially, of course. "
It was a big step forward, but nevertheless, the creations of our engineers, who were not familiar with the specifics of the guitar sound, did not reach the branded devices that amazed the guys at concerts of visiting foreign bands. It is from foreign guest performers, or rather from their technical staff, that the guys begin to buy musical equipment and instruments.
“It was a mutually beneficial cooperation,” says Yuri Shmilevich, “foreigners willingly sold us the device, because they could buy something new in their country, but for us it was just a happy find.” Thus, the sound equipment of the Italian star Rita Pavone, the Yugoslav singer George Maryanovich and many others migrated to the SOKOL arsenal. Of course, they had to pay with currency, any transactions with which in the USSR were illegal and were severely punished by justice.
By 1969, "SOKOL" has become a fairly well-known group, and is on the "professional track" in ROSCONCERT. At the end of the year, the young director of the group, Yuri Aizenshpis, resigns. “I had to defend my graduation project,” says Yuri Shmilevich, “in addition, I worked at the Central Statistical Office, and the touring activity did not appeal to me.”
In my opinion, a producer is 50% intuition, 30% luck, 20% efficiency. My working day starts at 8 am and ends after midnight. And what can you teach here?
Meanwhile, the activities of the young impresario have long been monitored by the internal affairs bodies of the USSR. “We have evolved. The technical equipment required constant modernization. I am a creative person. Once having heard a good sound - live, clear, real - I can no longer listen to another reproduction. I bought the most advanced equipment at that time. And here for the first time I came across a real criminal law. And he began to overstep it. I started doing business. Today it is a solid occupation, but then ...
My business was connected with currency and gold - the most terrible, execution article. But the feeling of my own righteousness prevented me from correctly assessing the situation. There was no fear, not even a sense of danger. I thought I was acting naturally and normally. And much around, on the contrary, seemed unnatural and incomprehensible. Why is the initiative of one person stifled by state structures - be it trade, production, culture? Why does the state dictate what to sing? I thought about it, but could not find an explanation, the worldview, absorbed in the family, at school, at the institute, interfered. Somewhere in my heart I knew I was right. And that my business (even "business" was not said) is my own business. In short, he started with music and ended up in prison. "
On January 7, 1970, he was arrested, and all the equipment of the SOKOL group was confiscated. On charges of currency transactions, Yuri Aizenshpis is sentenced to 17 years in prison ... During these 17 years, the world has changed and changed greatly. By the second half of the eighties, communist dogmas were noticeably shaken. Freedom came step by step. It was felt even behind the prison bars.
“In 1986, during a medical examination in Butyrka,” says Yuri Shmilyevich, “after several routine questions about health, the doctor suddenly asked me:“ Aren't you the Aizenshpis who was involved in the Sokol group at the end of the sixties? ” I remember that I felt somehow uncomfortable, I was very worried. And the doctor gave me the magazine "Youth", which contained a lot of material about me. It said that for the Falcon group I was what Brian Epstein was for the Beatles. " As fate willed, after serving almost 17 years, Yuri Aizenshpis in the prison infirmary read about himself in a magazine, as a man who stood at the origins of Soviet rock ...
The world changed while I was away. A new generation has appeared. Old acquaintances may not have forgotten me, but I did not know where to find them. Having freed myself, I fell into a state of terrible depression. A lot of time has been lost. Friends have achieved something. And I had to start everything from scratch. No money, no apartment, no family. When they put me in prison, I had a girlfriend. What happened to her? Do not know.
I was afraid that I would never see my parents. Fortunately, I saw. They even caught my new takeoff. My father had his own opinion on this matter. My parents are participants in the war, they have awards, they are communists. It seemed to them abnormal that their son was fond of music and rock that they did not understand. My father considered me to be guilty. The mother may have doubted, but did not admit it. She is an internally freer person, very courageous, very real, like millions of ordinary communists who have gone through the war and all the difficulties. She herself is from Belarus. Despite her health, my mother went to Minsk for a rally of partisans. And she died among her own - where she was born. She outlived her husband for just a year.
Probably, I must have some kind of anger towards this system, towards everything Soviet. To sit in prison for 17 years - yes, any person would be embittered. But I have no anger. In the most difficult period for myself, I managed to concentrate, to collect will. Maybe because it was already tempered. After all, it exists - the struggle for existence. For survival.
When Solzhenitsyn describes the nightmares of Soviet reality, as he calls them, I say: he would have lived in the conditions in which I lived. He served a sentence among those convicted under articles mainly political. I was sitting among inveterate criminals. And this is really a nightmare. Blood is shed every day, every day is lawlessness, lawlessness. But I was not touched. I am a sociable person, I adapt to any conditions. I could make friends with the general who was sitting with me. He could talk with a terry anti-Soviet. I could listen to an adherent of the Marxist-Leninist ideology. He could talk to the last criminal and find a way into his soul. Many talk about anti-Semitism, about Zionism. These political phenomena somehow passed me by. I didn’t feel anything like that either at school or at the institute. And I didn't feel it in prison. But every day I saw so much blood, anger, toughness nearby ...
There, 70 percent of prisoners are starving. I was not starving. How? Money does everything, of course, unofficially. This is what my phenomenon is, my peculiarity. No matter what environment I got into, I had to visit different colonies, different zones, different regions - everywhere I had the highest standard of living for an ordinary convict. It is impossible to explain it only by organizational skills, it is a phenomenon of character. "
Released in 1987, Aizenshpis begins to work in a youth musical organization - TO "Gallery" at the city committee of Komsomol, organizing concerts of young performers. Such organizations, like mushrooms after the rain, began to be born in the fields of all Komsomol and Soviet organizations. “It was a kind of roof. Then the concept of "manager" had not yet appeared. One of my first actions was to organize a concert of Leningrad rock groups. At that time they performed mainly in the houses of culture, and I took them to the big stage.
“And so I met Viktor Tsoi. In principle, this is not an accident. I myself found him and convinced him to work with me, convinced that I am not an accidental person in music. He told me what he went through. This somehow influenced him, although I was completely unfamiliar to him, and Victor is not the kind of person who easily makes contact. "
At a meeting held in 1988 on a bench in the Hermitage garden, the musician and producer decided to work together.
“Our acquaintance turned into friendship. Then the friendship grew into a creative union. I do not want to ascribe to myself extra laurels. Of course, Choi and the Kino group were known before our meeting. But they are known among fans of the Leningrad basement rock. I decided to mold him into a rock star. And it succeeded.
“Internally, Choi is a very interesting person, unlike anyone else. He was strongly influenced by his second wife. She is an esthete, from the cinema circles and was a very good friend to him. I think she also did a lot to create the image that is known to the broad masses. He became from a hungry, angry Tsoi, imposing and mysterious. This is how I recognized him - a mature performer who had already starred in "Asse". And managed to help him become a superstar, or maybe even something more. "
After the tragic death of Tsoi in 1990, Aizenshpis released the last "Black Album" "Kino". Moreover, for the first time in the post-Soviet history of Russian sound recording, it does this regardless of the absolute monopolist in the record market - the Melodiya company, attracting funds from investors. The total circulation of vinyl editions of the Kino albums amounted to 1,200,000 copies.
The next stage in the career of Yuri Aizenshpis was the group "Technology" (1991). And if “Kino” at the start of working with it already had a certain initial speed, then the producer sculpted the success of “Technology” from scratch, being already an experienced sculptor. The new group included fragments of the disintegrated group "Bioconstructor", and the musical material consisted of three or four songs.
“My second project,” Yuri Shmilevich comments, “showed that you can take guys of an ordinary, average level and make them stars.” At first I instilled in them confidence in my abilities: here, guys, you work with me - you are already stars. This confidence gave them the opportunity to liberate themselves. And when a creative person relaxes, he has a burst of energy, he begins to create something genuine. So after 4 months they became the group of the year and kept the highest rating all the time we worked together. "
The song "Strange Dances" has not left the TOP 10 of the "Soundtrack of MK" for 14 months. The first album "Anything You Want" (1991) becomes a bestseller. Then their popularity falls. “There are many objective reasons for this, including, I believe, our gap. So even a superstar without a talented producer today cannot do anything. We can say that show business is an already formed industry - the same industry as the production of cars or there the smelting of cast iron. It also has its own technology and its own laws. "
In 1992, Yuri Aizenshpis became a laureate of the national Russian music award "Ovation" in the nomination "Producer of the Year", which was held in Moscow in the concert hall "Russia". In this nomination were also presented: tandem Leonid Velichkovsky (better known as the husband of Lada Dene). Igor Seliverstov (produced by the groups "Strelki" and "Virus"). Valery Belotserkovsky, creative "dad" of Alsou. When summarizing the results, the results of a survey conducted by several Moscow publications, radio charts, data from sociological services and voting by members of the Higher Attestation Commission were used. Nevertheless, in the circles of the music community, this award is considered one of the most corrupt.
Young Guns (1992 - 1993)
A short history of "domestic Guns'n'Roses", as they were called in the press,
is equally instructive and typical of both musicians and producers. Having released a couple of striking hits, the group simply exploded from the internal confrontation of the members. “Each of the Young Guns musicians,” comments Yuri Aizenshpis, “wanted to be a leader, they constantly swore, fought, and broke instruments. My fault was that I did not stop them in time. "
LINDA
It was Yuri Aizenshpis who noticed the talented graduate of the jazz college in 1993 and helped the singer take her first steps on the big stage. Their joint work lasted less than a year, after which the creative paths of the artist and the producer diverged.
Vlad Stashevsky (1994-1999)
The sex symbol of the mid-nineties, a favorite of girls of all ages, Vlad Stashevsky, in collaboration with Yuri Aizenshpis, released 5 albums, each of which became a national bestseller. The acquaintance of Yuri and Vlad took place in the Master nightclub, where the Young Guns group produced by Aizenshpis performed. Yuri Shmilevich heard Vlad singing songs by Willie Tokarev and Mikhail Shufutinsky on a frustrated piano backstage, and asked where he studied music. As a result, they exchanged phones, and after a while Aizenshpis called Vlad and made an appointment. Arriving at the place, Stashevsky met Vladimir Matetsky. Together with Yuri Shmilevich, they arranged an audition for Stashevsky, and a week later the first song for his repertoire was ready. It was called "The Roads We Go On". The first performance of Stashevsky to the general public took place on August 30, 1993 at a festival in Adjara.
The debut LP "Love Doesn't Live Here Anymore" was the first release of the newly formed company "Aizenshpis Records". In 1995, the producer was again awarded the Ovation Prize. In 1996, Stashevsky's third album, Vlad-21, sold 15,000 copies in the first week alone, which was an astronomical figure for the very young Russian CD market. In the same year, the performer rises to the top of yet another, not quite ordinary chart: the expert magazine recognizes him as the “most pirated” artist of the year. In 1997, at the invitation of the US Senate, Vlad Stashevsky gives a recital at Brooclin park in front of more than 20,000 audiences.
Inga Drozdova (1996-1997)
The infamous model, who starred in two clips of Vlad Stashevsky, in collaboration with Yuri Aizenshpis, records a Russian-language cover version of the song Fever - "Zhazhda". Then on which the clip is shot. The first sex symbol of Russia, according to Playboy magazine, Inga prefers modeling to music and does not continue her career as an artist. She is now successfully working in the United States.
Sasha (1999-2000)
Once in Moscow, Sasha accidentally got hold of Yuri Aizenshpis's phone. I called. A remarkable conversation took place.
- I would like to become a singer.
- And you, in fact, what can you do?
- And all.
- What all?
- I can give it in the face.
So the fate of Sasha was decided. If only it were that simple. For "I can give in the face" on stage is not taken out ...
I am a wealthy person. My car is not just good, but luxurious. Apartment too. They are constantly going to work for me, I can invite friends. Whoever comes, even foreigners, everyone says - this is the level! I have a good wardrobe and good taste. I dress, perhaps, brightly, but very solidly, solidly, fashionably. Since I'm in show business, I should dress appropriately. The jokes in the press about me are not always pleasant, but they also work for the excitement. For the first time in several years, the Palace of Sports was sold out when my show - "Me and My Friends" was on.
When you are abroad, you think: what an unfortunate people we are! Today we are in complete ruin. People have become like predators towards each other. Although maybe this is a natural process? Everything was already in the history of every country where capitalist relations were born.
To be honest, I do not believe that the processes in which we all participate are reversible. We are now in a political and state crisis. But stabilization will come anyway. Even if a military junta comes, even if the communists return, they will not establish a dictatorship. Because there is a level of world civilization. Whatever happens, I will never leave the country. Despite what I went through here, I am a patriot by nature. Like a bird that was born in this area, it will die in this area. The entire nation is responsible for what is happening in our country. And I am a part of it.
And it so happened that Yuri Aizenshpis liked Sasha's music. Her frantic energy, mysterious charm, positive attitude and extraordinary voice did not go unnoticed. Aizenshpis helped Sasha enter big show business. In the spring of 2000, the song "Around the Night City" sounded on the air, later the compositions "It's Just Rain" and "Love is War" were released. All three hits received video versions that contributed to the disclosure of not only vocal, but also choreographic data of the singer. And then ... Then she was noticed by the Moscow media, moreover, in the press next to Sasha's name, the definitions "Russian Madonna" and "standard of style" began to flash more and more often. Touring activities were gaining momentum, and everything seemed to be good ...
But in the summer of 2001, as a result of a serious conflict with the leaders, Sasha Antonova left the production project and decided on an independent career. Here is just one quote from Sasha Antonova's website during that difficult time:
“- I was treated like a slave. Any discontent was accompanied by shouts, stamping feet, spitting, threats and insults. They demanded complete submission from me. We controlled everything: from how I dress, to who I communicate with and who my friends are. After another conflict, the threats turned into reality. Mena was simply beaten. I was even in the hospital. And I finally realized that I was working with inadequate people, and finally decided: I would not work with schizophrenics. And she left ... "
Nikita (1998-2001)
The scandalous and outrageous artist shocked the Russian show business with his sexual frankness, sensuality and style. After the debut album "Flew Forever" (1999), the "Aizenshpis Records" company released the artist's second successful disc, "In Your Love, I Will Drown" (2001). Together with her, a new stage in the producer's work begins: Nikita's song "You are not mine" is being recorded in Yuri Shmilevich's own newly built recording studio, called Star Production.
Dynamite (2001 to present)
In 2001, Yuri Aizenshpis was invited to take the post of CEO of the then largest production company Media Star. Having accepted the offer, Aizenshpis works and gets to know the talented composer and performer Ilya Zudin, who shows his songs to Yuri Shmilevich. Seeing Ilya's great potential as an artist, the producer decides to create a new group that could take the vacant place of the Russian boy band # 1 at that time. After a thorough casting, the line-up was formed, which is named "Dynamite", which later proved itself more than once. Dynamite is literally blowing up the Russian music market. With their original sound, stylish laconic arrangements, professionalism of studio work and concert performances, Dynamite raised the bar for performing skills of Russian popular artists to new heights. Over the three years of the group's existence, viewers saw 15 video clips of the group, and each of the three Dynamite albums rose to the top of various charts and charts.
In 2001, with other producers and their wards, Yuri organized the "Stars for Safe Sex" action. The stars have safer sex on the upcoming World AIDS Day (December 1). As Yuri Aizenshpis put it: “They are still just taking off into the starry sky, but, despite this, they should attract the attention of young people, smiling sweetly from the packaging of a condom of“ European quality with a Russian price. I was one of the first to try these condoms, and I can to say that they are not inferior in quality to Western ones, ”however, he did not specify the portrait of which star was on his condom.
Dima Bilan (2002 - 2005)
While studying in the third year of the Gnessin School, he met Yuri Aizenshpis. The first composition "Baby", the song "Boom" and the first clip, participation in the "New Wave 2002" competition in Jurmala. In 2003, the presentation of the first debut album "I am a night hooligan" took place. In 2004, the second solo album "On the Shore of the Sky" was released. Videos for the following hit compositions were filmed: "Boom", "You, only you", "Night bully", "I was wrong, I got it", "I love you so much", "Mulatto", "On the shore of the sky", "Congratulations ". became a laureate of the international festival "Bomb of the Year - 2004" and the prize "Stopudovy Hit - 2004". Among his trophies is the "Golden Disc" of the National Federation of Phonogram Producers. Collaboration with world famous composers Diane Warren and Shaun Escoffery.
Andrey Maksibit

Based on materials: www.aizenshpis.com; www.history.rin.ru; www.peoples.ru
More information on the site

Born on July 15, 1945 in Moscow.
In 1968 he graduated from the Moscow Institute of Economics and Statistics with a degree in engineer-economist. He began his professional career in 1965, working as an administrator with the rock group SOKOL. Developed an original scheme of the team's activities. After a verbal agreement with the director of the club for the concert, the administrator bought tickets for the evening demonstration of the film and distributed them at a more expensive price. For the first time he involved in the work of people who ensured order during the performance of the group. On January 7, 1970 he was arrested. As a result of the search, 15585 rubles and 7675 dollars were confiscated. Convicted under Article 88 (gold and currency transactions). He was released from prison in 1977, subsequently received a paper with an official apology.

For a short time he worked in the "Gallery" under the city committee of the Komsomol, organizing concerts of young performers. At the beginning of 1989 he was producing the KINO group. One of the first to break the state monopoly on the publication of records. Taking a loan of 5,000,000 rubles (1990), he released the last work of the KINO group - Black Album. From 1991 to 1992 he cooperates with the TECHNOLOGY group. Helps musicians to release their debut album "Anything You Want", organizes the release of various printed products (posters, postcards, etc.).
In 1992 he became a laureate of the national Russian music award "Ovation" in the category "Best Producer". In the period from 1992 to 1993. worked as a producer with the groups "MORAL KODEKS" and "YOUNG GANZ". Since the summer of 1994 he has been collaborating with singer Vlad STASHEVSKY (for 1997 4 albums were recorded, the debut one - "Love doesn't live here anymore" - was released on the label "Aisenshpis Records"). Participated in the organization of the international festival "Solar Adjara" (1994), as well as in the establishment of the music award "Star". In 1995, based on the results of work for 1993-1994, he was again awarded the Ovation Prize. In 1997, he continued to work with Vlad Stashevsky, at the same time collaborating with the aspiring singer Inga Drozdova. From 1999 to 2000 he was involved in the SASHA project. From 1998 to 2001 - he raised the performer NIKITU to the heights of popularity.

He passed away on September 20, 2005 in Moscow. Buried at the Domodedovo cemetery near Moscow.

Zhidovsky TV. Discrimination against Russians on television. Collection of articles and notes. Compiled by Anatoly Glazunov et al.

"Shark of show business" Yuri Aizenshpis - a Jew

Tens of thousands of Russian fans of the famous "pop stars" did not know and do not know about this Jew, but this Jew lit several famous stars. It was the Yidovin Aizenshpis who introduced the concept of "producer" into the everyday life of Russian show business, was one of the first producers in Russia, and "convincingly proved that anyone can be made a pop star."

Yuri Shmilevich Aizenshpis was born in 1945 in Chelyabinsk, where his mother, a Muscovite Maria Mikhailovna Aizenshpis (1922-1991), was evacuated. She is a Jew by nationality. Father - Shmil Moiseevich Aizenshpis (1916-1989) - Polish Jew. He fled from Poland to the USSR, fleeing the Germans, was at the front. Parents returned to Moscow after the war. We worked in GUAS (Main Directorate of Airfield Construction).

Currency Aizenshpis

Producer of Dima Bilan and Viktor Tsoi served more than 17 years in Soviet camps

Rock underground manager

A graduate of the Moscow Institute of Economics and Statistics, Aizenshpis did not like his boring profession. Since childhood, he was drawn to sports and music. At the age of sixteen, he arranged semi-underground concerts of the first Soviet rockers, and then became the administrator of the Sokol group, with which he even got a job at the Tula Philharmonic. Since the musicians toured a lot, Aizenshpis' monthly income reached 1,500 rubles (Soviet ministers then received only a thousand).

In 1968, 23-year-old Aizenshpis resigned from the Philharmonic and went to work as a junior research assistant at the Central Statistical Office of the USSR with a salary of 115 rubles. But at the workplace, the "major", smelling of French perfume, was rarely shown. Using connections with store directors, he was able to knock out almost two hundred hard-to-find grocery orders for his colleagues. Therefore, they turned a blind eye to his constant absences. Such a free regime helped Aizenshpis to lead a second, parallel life, which brought him completely different incomes.

An underground millionaire at 25

Aizenshpis's guide to the world of currency fraud was Eduard Borovikov, nicknamed Vasya, who played in the Dynamo football team of masters. “I bought foreign currency or checks,” Aizenshpis said, “using them in the Berezka store, I bought scarce goods and then sold them through intermediaries on the black markets. For example, a synthetic fur coat could be bought at Beryozka for $ 50 and sold for 500 rubles. "

His career developed according to a knurled pattern: henchman - junior partner - equity holder. Then Aizenshpis dared to work alone. His first major independent business was the purchase of Panasonic radios at the Beryozka foreign exchange store. They were elegant four-band pieces in two models, $ 33 and $ 50 each. Aizenshpis decided to take 25 Panasonic cars to Odessa, where they were still a wonder and cost much more than in Moscow. And he made the right decision - the receivers were gone.

In 1969, two seemingly imperceptible, but very remarkable events took place in Moscow. A certain Mammadov, the first secretary of the Oktyabrsky District Party Committee of the city of Baku, opened a savings account in the capital in the name of his wife and put 195 thousand rubles on it - the then salary of an ordinary worker for 108 years. In the same year, a commercial office of Vneshtorgbank was opened on Pushkinskaya Street, where they sold gold of the highest standard in bars weighing from 10 grams to one kilogram. Any citizen could buy gold, but only for currency.

What do these events have to do with Aizenshpis? The most direct. The USSR was already decaying, the shadow economy and corruption flourished in the southern republics. In the same Azerbaijan, for example, positions were sold almost openly: the director of the theater - 10 thousand rubles, the secretary of the district party committee - 200 thousand, the minister of trade - a quarter of a million. "Buyers", to justify their expenses, were engaged in extortion and embezzlement. The money received had to be invested somewhere. Best of all in "imperishable" - currency, diamonds and gold.

To the services of these people in Moscow there were about a hundred people who dealt with currency and gold on a large scale. Aizenshpis also managed to find his "theme". A kilogram of gold in the very office of Vneshtorgbank was sold for one and a half thousand dollars. Even if you buy dollars at 5 rubles, it cost 7.5 thousand. Plus one ruble per gram was paid to foreign students who bought gold. As a result - 8,500 rubles per kilogram ingot. And it was sold for 20 thousand rubles. 11,500 rubles in profit is a huge profit, if you remember that the nurse then received 60 rubles a month.

The precious metal trade went briskly. Aizenshpis had to buy almost every day from one and a half to three thousand dollars at the rate of 2-3 rubles per dollar. Every evening he contacted a large number of people - taxi drivers, prostitutes, waiters and even diplomats (for example, the son of the Indian ambassador). "The volume of transactions that I made, - said Aizenshpis, - reached a million dollars."

The underground millionaire was then only 25 years old. ]

Ten years with confiscation

At the end of 1969, a prominent currency dealer Henrikh Karakhanyan, nicknamed the Crow, was arrested in Moscow, and in January 1970 it was Aizenshpis's turn. At the time of his arrest, he had 18 thousand rubles in his pocket, that is, the salary for about ten years of work in his native research institute. The main indictments in the Aizenshpis case were 154, part 2 ("Speculation on an especially large scale"), and 88, part 2 ("violation of currency transactions"). In their totality, in the case of the first term, they were given, as a rule, no more than 5 - 8 years. But Aizenshpis got "top ten". Moreover, the enhanced regime. According to the verdict of the court, not only currency, gold, mohair were confiscated from him (the list took seven pages), but also a collection of vinyl records in 5 thousand discs, and most importantly - a room of 26 square meters in an apartment where he lived with his parents and why- then I made a separate personal account.

After serving in Krasnoyarsk, Tula and Pechora, Aizenshpis was released - on parole - in May 1977. But Yuri Shmilevich breathed the air of freedom for only three months. Already in August, having bought 4 thousand dollars from foreigners, he and a companion were arrested on the Lenin Hills. A former athlete, Aizenshpis started to run. On the way, he managed to throw away all the dollars, rubles and even the keys to the apartment.

It didn't help ... This time he was given eight years. Plus the fact that he did not sit out on parole. In total - again "ten". He served his second term in Mordovia, in the notorious Dubrovlag. The zone was called "The Meat Grinder" because three to five people were killed there every day.

Under the hood of the KGB

In August 1985, Aizenshpis was released again on parole - the term for good behavior was thrown off for a year and eight months. Returning to the capital, he met in a restaurant with a woman who was married to an Arab who often traveled abroad. A new acquaintance suggested that Yuri Shmilevich update his wardrobe. The offered things were of higher quality than in the notorious "Birch". First, Aizenshpis dressed himself, then dressed his friends, and then turned the resale of fashionable clothes into a craft. His monthly salary was several thousand rubles. Incomparable with what he had on gold, but still 5 - 6 times more than the ministers and secretaries of the Central Committee.

The trouble began when the resourceful Arab fell under the hood of the KGB. Tracking all his connections, the Chekists reached out to Aizenshpis. In October 1986, Aizenshpis arrived at the next meeting near the Mossovet Theater in a newly bought Zhiguli of the sixth model. Here he was detained by police officers. In the trunk they found several Grundig cassette recorders, a couple of super-deficient video recorders and videotapes.

Aizenshpis was incredibly lucky that his Arab accomplice managed to escape abroad in time. Without the main defendant, the criminal case, through the efforts of lawyers, has successfully collapsed. Yuri Shmilevich left the prison bunk in April 1988, after serving seventeen months in a pre-trial detention center. This was his last release.

Karabas-Barabas and his puppets

Once free, Aizenshpis found himself in the very heat of perestroika. Soon, his friend Alexander Lipnitsky (stepson of Vadim Sukhodrev, Brezhnev's personal translator) introduced him to the then rock party. At first, Aizenshpis headed the directorate of the "Intershans" festival, slowly exploring the behind-the-scenes and hidden springs of home-grown show business, and soon began to produce the pop group "Technology". Yuri Shmilevich stated his credo very frankly: "To promote" an artist is a functional responsibility of a producer. And here any means are good. Through diplomacy, bribery, threats or blackmail. ”This is exactly how he acted, earning the nickname“ shark of show business. ”But even the commercial successes of his wards - the groups“ Technology ”,“ Dynamite ”,“ Kino ”, singer Linda, Vlad Stashevsky and Dima Bilan - brought him immeasurably, less money than he earned in his own stellar peak on gold-currency transactions.
http://www.rospres.com/showbiz/7620/

So, he got out of prison in 1988 after serving 18 years in prison.

Works in the creative association "Gallery" at the city committee of the Komsomol, organizing concerts of young performers. In early 1989, Aizenshpis produced the Kino group and was one of the first to violate the state monopoly on the publication of records. In 1990, having borrowed 5,000,000 rubles, he released the last work of the Kino group.

From 1991 to 1992 he cooperates with the "Technology" group.
From 1992 to 1993 he produced the Moral Codex and Young Guns bands. In 1994, he makes a star out of Vlad Stashevsky - a guy with very dubious vocal abilities, but a bright appearance. In 1993, he noticed a graduate of the jazz college Linda and helped her take her first steps. In 1997 he produced the singers Inga Drozdova and Katya Lel, and from 1998 to 2001 - the singer Nikita, and in 1999-2000 the singer Sasha. In the book by Evgeny Dodolev “Vlad Listyev. Biased Requiem "it is mentioned that the Jew Aizenshpis in promoting some artists was helped by the criminal authority Alexander Makushenko known as" Sasha Tsygan ".

“The courts do not work here,” said the tough Jew Aizenshpis. - And “promoting” an artist is a functional responsibility of a producer, and for him there is no concept of “good” or “bad”. The main thing is the goal. At any cost. Through diplomacy, bribery, threats or blackmail. Ultimately, these are just emotions. But at the moment of moving towards the goal, you must act like a tank. "

Since 2000 he has been in charge of the Dynamite group. Since 2001 - General Director of the Media Star company. He died in September 2005 from myocardial infarction.

Shortly before his death, he wrote the book "Kindling the Stars".

Aizenshpis wrote in this book: “I am a Jew. My mother is Jewish and my father is of the same nationality. And what of it? Absolutely nothing ... I do not respect Judaism, I do not know its traditions and am not interested in its history. I do not consider Jews to be either the smartest, or the most persecuted, or generally some kind of exceptional people. They say that Jews in Russia have always been oppressed. I don’t know, I’m not sure. In any case, as my family was bypassed by the Stalinist repressions, anti-Semitism did not touch me at all. Neither in school, nor further in life, I have not heard offensive words like "Jew" or "Jew muzzle" thrown in the face or in the back. "

“Many people talk about anti-Semitism, about Zionism. These political phenomena somehow passed me by. I didn’t feel anything like that either at school or at the institute. And I didn’t feel it in prison ”.

“The late Yuri Shmilevich Aizenshpis was also known for not only having all his pop fosterlings himself, but also supplying them to homosexuals from among our new elite. All his fopp stars have passed through this conveyor ... "

What is our life? The game...

Yuri AIZENSHPIS: "17 years in prison is too heavy a punishment for the mistakes of youth. During all this time I had three contacts with women."

The legendary producer passed away on September 20. He gave the last interview to "Boulevard"
Aizenshpis was the first on the territory of the Soviet Union to test Western show business technologies.

Aizenshpis was the first on the territory of the Soviet Union to test Western show business technologies. He brought Viktor Tsoi to the stadiums, made the mega-popular rock group Tekhnologiya, created Vlad Stashevsky out of nothing and Dima Bilan out of the same. It was Yuri Shmilevich who introduced the concept of "producer" into the everyday life of Russian show business and convincingly proved that anyone can be made a pop star. In 1970, Aizenshpis was convicted and served a total of 17 years. After his release in 1988, he took up his most famous project - the "Kino" group, headed by Viktor Tsoi. With his help, "Kino" became the main group of the Union. After the death of Tsoi, Aizenshpis was the first to break the state monopoly on the production of records and published the last work of "Kino" - the funeral "Black Album". The years spent in prison did not pass without leaving a trace. The producer hid his diagnosis to the last, although, by and large, Aizenshpis died due to a number of serious illnesses. But the root cause was cirrhosis of the liver against the background of hepatitis B and C. With severe gastrointestinal bleeding, Yuri Shmilyevich was admitted by ambulance to one of the Moscow clinics. Doctors did their best to prolong the life of the terminally ill producer, but a severe attack resulted in myocardial infarction.

"MEDICINE COULD NOT HELP ME, AND I WAS ENJOYED WITH MUSIC"

I have never and do not strive for popularity. I've already gone through all this. I just do my favorite thing - producing. By the way, during the Soviet era, I became the first to call myself a producer. I officially declare this to you. I try not to give interviews and not participate in television programs - for this I need to be divorced.

Since I managed to breed you for an interview, let's talk about the word "first" in your life. Is it true that you were the first in the Union to create a rock group, were the first to use Western technologies to promote an artist, were the first to break the state monopoly on the release of records?

It's all true. In the early 60s, when I was still a student, my friends and I created the first rock group in the Soviet Union "Sokol". Everyone lived in the Sokol metro area, so they decided to call the group that way. I took over the organizational functions: I got instruments, did concerts. Everything happened in underground conditions, but I managed to promote the group so that it was known not only in Moscow, but also far beyond its borders. Moreover, in the Western press, the Falcon was compared to the Beatles.

- Who did you learn the tricks of the production skills from?

Oh, then there was not even such a concept - a producer. There were impresario, director. But neither one nor the other suited me. These are all administrative functions, and I considered myself a creative person. And in general he was a terrible music lover.

- Why did a creative person and a terrible music lover enter an economic institute?

It does not interfere. I graduated as an engineer-economist. He was seriously involved in athletics, had high achievements. But he received a serious injury to the meniscus. Soviet medicine could not help me. I had to leave sports, and I became interested in music: jazz, rock, pop ... Love resulted in collecting music records.

By the age of 18, despite the Iron Curtain, he managed to collect a huge collection of very rare vinyls - about seven and a half thousand pieces. Moreover, the original notes, not a reprint. Believe me, it was an expensive pleasure: each disc cost about 150 rubles - this is the salary of a Soviet engineer. So, unlike many contemporary musicians, I know a lot about the evolution of jazz-rock-pop music.

- How did you get the collectible records?

Thanks to friends. I spoke with foreign diplomats.

- Was it possible that an ordinary Soviet citizen was on a short leg with a foreign diplomatic corps?

I was a very contact person. Well, there are such initiative people who make the right connections with the right people. I had many friends from among the children of ambassadors. At that time he knew very well the son of the Ambassador of India, the daughter of the Ambassador of France, the son of the Ambassador of Yugoslavia ...

At that time, such an acquaintance was a dangerous occupation, since it was associated with buying and selling. This could be seen as a crime. And, in the end, they saw it. They put me behind bars.

- Where is your collection now?

When I was brought to criminal responsibility, everything was confiscated. Today I have restored the collection, only now not on vinyl, but on CDs. It is a pity that the first collection was never returned ... After all, nowadays musical recordings are not as exclusive as before, today you can buy any disc.

"IN PRISON I SAT WITH THE SON OF THE HEAD OF THE KGB INVESTIGATION DEPARTMENT"

In 1969, an office of Vneshtorgbank of the USSR was opened in Moscow, where they sold gold in bars ... Almost every day, gold was bought for me in this amazing office ... But the most laborious work consisted in acquiring the maximum possible amount of currency. And I was doing this business all the time, day and night ...

Brokers bought me currency all over the city. Up to a dozen taxi drivers brought me their foreign exchange earnings, even foreign exchange prostitutes or prostitutes supplied me with "greens" ... By the way, in those years I used the services of prostitutes not only commercially. Sometimes, and in their immediate specialty with discounts. "

- Why were you arrested?

Articles 88 and 78 of the Criminal Code: "Smuggling and violation of the rules of foreign exchange transactions."

- How did the detention take place?

Well... (He is silent for a very long time).

- If you don't want to tell, we can change the subject ...

Not that I don’t want to, it’s just a conversation for more than one hour. I was taken on January 7, 1970. I was 24 then. The apartment was searched. Arrested, taken to an isolation ward, sentenced to 10 years. I served time, was released, and a few weeks later I pulled off a major sale and purchase of 50,000 counterfeit dollars. He sat down for another seven years.

- Why didn't your diplomatic friends help you?

What do you mean "helped"? Then the society was not so corrupt. I was in prison with the son of the head of the KGB investigation department. And there were many such examples. It is now possible to close a criminal case for money. It was very difficult then.

- What turned out to be the most terrible during that period?

Never mind! Believe me, the only thing that helped me endure the cruel punishment was faith in myself and a great love for life. 17 years in prison is too harsh a punishment for the mistakes of youth. Although I do not consider these to be errors. There were just such laws, we lived in such a state. It is now to go abroad and bring what you liked - equipment, clothing, currency, not a crime.

I went through everything: a small cell, where there were still about 100 convicts, and a liquid soup instead of food, and ... In general, that's it. You know, in films and books it is very embellished and distorted. And I personally experienced, experienced, felt. Because he was in those places not one or two years, but 17 years and eight months.

- Was it really impossible to submit a petition for amnesty?

- (Smiling)... You are thinking in a very modern way. I was convicted under the articles according to which the amnesty was not supposed. I was a state criminal. Everything.

- The prison could not but affect your health ...

While I was in the zone, my medical card was clean. That is, the health was excellent. Although those who served three to five years necessarily acquired professional prison ailments: stomach ulcers, tuberculosis, sexually transmitted diseases or mental illnesses. God had mercy on me.

- How did you fit into the prison hierarchy?

Fine. A prisoner always has traces of beating on his head. If you cut my head bald, there won't be a single bruise, not a single scar. Because in the zone, not a single hair fell from my head. This is my uniqueness. So I put myself.

"WHEN I RELEASED, I FALLED IN DEEP DEPRESSION, WHICH LEADED TO INFARCTION"

- (Abruptly interrupts. Very defiantly)... Yes, that's it! For all the time I managed ... three times ... there were such contacts with women. It was very dangerous because they were employees ... that is, female employees, civilians. If the authorities found out, she would be fired, I would be transferred to another zone. That was usually the end of it.

“When Solzhenitsyn describes the nightmares of Soviet reality, I say: he would have lived in the conditions in which I lived. He was serving a sentence among those convicted under articles mainly political. chaos. But I was not touched. I am a sociable person, I adapt to any conditions ...

... There, 70 percent of prisoners are starving. I was not starving. How? Money does everything, of course, unofficially. This is what my phenomenon is, my peculiarity. No matter what environment I got, I had to visit different colonies, different zones, different regions - everywhere I had the highest standard of living for an ordinary convict. It is impossible to explain it only by organizational skills, it is a phenomenon of character. "

Today you are a wealthy person holding a fairly high position in society. Former inmates don't pester you?

At first, faces appeared, let's say so, who knew me and asked for help. I helped them. Those whom I did not know also contacted. But I refused them, because I was not obliged to help them out.

- After your release, did they refuse to cooperate with you because of your prison history?

At first, there was a certain amount of discrimination towards the convicts. But I did not notice this, such things are not done openly. Moreover, then it was the height of perestroika. And it turned out that almost the entire Soviet country consists of criminals.

- And today you are complex because of your past?

No! Khodorkovsky is sitting, prime ministers, presidents are sitting ...

You know, in the zone I had friendships and relationships with people whose gravity of the crime was terrifying. But after all, they become a criminal due to certain circumstances. It happens that a person is unable to control himself, commits a crime in a state of passion. But these are not fallen people. They just accidentally stumbled. Believe me, many convicts have much higher human qualities than politicians.

- Do you still have friends from the zone?

Yes. I still maintain a relationship with them. But there are very few of them left, many for a long time in the afterlife.

You know, I have lost quite a long period of time in my life. It left a mark on my mind, but it did not make me cruel. This is a feature of my psyche. There were also dangerous situations in the zone, but I passed them. This tempered my will. I came out of there as a man capable of rebuilding life in a new way. Which I did.

- So simple - forgot almost 18 prison years and started all over again?

Not right away. When I was released - on April 23, 1988, I was already 42, - I looked around at the world around me and fell into a deep depression. I came out completely devastated: no family, no money, nothing. Friends managed to achieve a lot in life: who went into politics, who became a businessman, reached great heights. And I - no stake, no yard. In general, depression led to a heart attack.

- Why did the depression appear after, and not during, imprisonment?

Because in the zone a person is always in tension. You can't relax there, because the main thing is to go free. And as it came out - some kind of relaxation piles along with depression.

From the book by Yuri Aizenshpis "Kindling the Stars ...":"The world has changed while I was gone. A new generation has appeared. Old acquaintances, maybe they have not forgotten me, but I did not know where to find them ... A lot of time was lost ... No money, no apartment, no family. When I was imprisoned, I had a girlfriend. What happened to her? I don't know. The first time I got married and became a father only at the age of 47.

Love passed me by. I did not experience this feeling in adulthood and in mature forms ... As for the thought of getting married ... In my youth there were options for interesting marriages, but they did not attract me. For example, with the daughter of a Yugoslav diplomat. After my release, there was still a promising option - the daughter of one of the leaders of Vneshtorg, who wanted to pay for my marriage to his daughter with "Zhigulenkom". I refused...

Now, when I have a family, with whom I do not live, though, a son, a certain position in society, I somehow do not want to start serious novels ... If the mood and desire allow, then why not have free sex? "

In the year of your release, you became the producer of Viktor Tsoi and his group "Kino". Aren't famous musicians embarrassed by your criminal past?

I met Tsoi two years before his death. Then I wanted to go back to what I was doing in my youth - producing rock bands. Meeting Victor was a pleasure. It is doubly pleasant, because we immediately found a common language. You know, after all, real glory came to Tsoi when we began to work together.

We were introduced by our common friend Sasha Lipnitsky. The Kino group was known only in the musical get-together, was a member of the Leningrad rock club. I had no doubts that only television and radio would make "Kino" popular. But at that time there were no commercial radio stations, only state ones. There was no television that broadly covered musical events. There were only two musical television programs - "Morning Mail" and "Ogonyok". It was impossible to get on the air, then it was believed that "Kino" is an amateur performance.

I started by popularizing Kino. With the help of his connections, he managed to promote the group to the then popular "Look" program, and then to the "Morning Mail". Well, I connected the press on the sly.

Victor recorded two albums in my presence, and died in my presence. I was directly involved in organizing the funeral. And he fulfilled his desire - he released the last "Black Album" of the "Kino" group.

"STASHEVSKY WAS AN ARTISTIC ARTIST"

Ouch. (Sighs)... Many people ask me about this. He had some creative attempts after me. But they turned out to be sterile. This suggests that a producer is necessary for an artist. Even for a talented one. Unfortunately, Vlad is a product, unlike my artists today.

- What does "product" mean?

This is when, with the help of technology, I made a finished product of show business. Roughly speaking, many years ago I did with Vlad Stashevsky what they do now at the "Star Factory". He was an artificial artist.

- Why did you volunteer to work with him?

I just wanted to prove to myself and others the importance of the producer. When our contract ended, Vlad felt like a big star. I thought that I could continue to exist on my own in show business. That's all.

- Your current ward, Dima Bilan, has not yet caught a star fever?

He is a man of a different upbringing and, unlike Vlad Stashevsky, is a real talent, not a synthetic product. I met Dima at a concert-presentation of a youth magazine. As always, there were many strangers wandering around behind the scenes. How they get there is still a mystery to me. Among these people was Dima. I immediately noticed him among the crowd: an interesting lively young man, he danced and sang all the time. He came up to me and said: "I know you. You are Yuri Aizenshpis." - "It's very good that you know," - I answer. And gave him a phone. But we met much later. I put it off every time: it is always difficult to start, and there was no time. When he did come to the studio, we got to talking. It turned out that Dima is studying at the faculty of academic vocal at the Gnessin School. That is, in front of me was a person who was professionally studying vocal skills. That was enough for me to start working with him.

- How much money does it take to make a show business product?

On average, from 700 thousand to one and a half million dollars. Although there are artists who have invested five million dollars.

However, a lot depends on the potential of the artist. Every day they call me, they come to the office, to the studio, hundreds of girls and boys who say: I am talented, I sing so-a-ak, I even have an album recorded. The diagnosis is the same for all - they imagined themselves to be stars. And in fact, it turns out that they are far from just star peaks, but also just good performance.

- But what about the statement that the performer is, first of all, appearance plus charisma?

For me, the main thing is vocal data.

- How long does it take for the invested funds to bring profit?

In the case of Dima Bilan, it is too early to talk about this: there is a constant reproduction, the creation of clips. You know, I'm generally a creative person. Therefore, business in this matter is the second thing. I do not save money, but I spend everything on fast and high-quality promotion of the artist. I think soon Dima will pay for himself ...

P. S. Three days before his death, Yuri Aizenshpis had a heart attack. He was hospitalized. The producer felt better, and he begged the doctors to let him go home: he really wanted to support Bilan at the awards ceremony for the Russian version of the prestigious MTV-2005 music award. Yuri Shmilevich did not live to see the triumph of his pupil for exactly two days. He died at the age of 61, and Bilan was recognized as "Best performer" and "Best artist" of 2005. Dmitry took the stage with Aizenshpis' eight-year-old son Misha, and the audience froze in a minute of silence ...

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