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Bulat Shalvovich Okudzhava (; ბულატ ოკუჯავა; ; May 9, 1924 – June 12, 1997) was a Soviet and Russian poet, writer, musician, novelist, and singer-songwriter of Georgian-Armenian ancestry. He was one of the founders of the Soviet genre called "author song" ( авторская песня, avtorskaya pesnya), or "guitar song", and the author of about 200 songs, set to his own poetry. His songs are a mixture of Russian poetic and folk song traditions and the French chansonnier style represented by such contemporaries of Okudzhava as Georges Brassens. Though his songs were never overtly political, the freshness and independence of Okudzhava's artistic voice presented a subtle challenge to Soviet cultural authorities, who were thus hesitant for many years to give him official recognition.
Okudzhava's mother was the niece of a well-known Armenian poet, Vahan Terian. His father served as a political commissar during the Civil War and as a high-ranking Communist Party member thereafter, under the protection of Sergo Ordzhonikidze (1886-1937). His uncle Vladimir Okudzhava was an anarchist and terrorist who left the Russian Empire after a failed attempt to assassinate the Kutaisi governor.Bulat Okudzhava (2006). The Abolished Theater: A Family Chronicle. Moscow: Zebra E, 336 pages. Vladimir was listed among the passengers of the infamous sealed train that delivered Vladimir Lenin, Grigory Zinoviev and other revolutionary leaders from Switzerland to Russia in 1917. List of Passengers That Crossed Germany During the War published by Vladimir Burtsev on October, 1917 (in Russian)
In 1942, at the age of 17, 9th-grader Bulat Okudzhava volunteered for the Red Army infantry, and from 1942 he participated in the war against Nazi Germany. After his discharge from the service in 1944, he returned to Tbilisi where he passed his high school graduation exams and enrolled at Tbilisi State University, graduating in 1950. After graduating, he worked as a teacher, first in a rural school in the village of Shamordino in the Kaluga Oblast, and later in the city of Kaluga itself.
Soon he was giving concerts. He only employed a few chords and had no formal training in music, but he possessed an exceptional melodic gift, and the intelligent lyrics of his songs blended perfectly with his music and his voice. His songs were praised by his friends, and amateur recordings were made. These unofficial recordings were widely copied as magnitizdat, and spread across the USSR and Poland, where other young people picked up guitars and started singing the songs for themselves. In 1970, his lyrics appeared in the classic Soviet film White Sun of the Desert.
Okudzhava, however, regarded himself primarily as a poet and claimed that his musical recordings were insignificant. During the 1980s, he also published a great deal of prose (his novel The Show is Over won him the Russian Booker Prize in 1994). By the 1980s, recordings of Okudzhava performing his songs finally began to be officially released in the Soviet Union, and many volumes of his poetry were also published. In 1991, he was awarded the USSR State Prize. He supported the reform movement in the USSR and in October 1993, signed the Letter of Forty-Two.
Okudzhava died in Paris on June 12, 1997, and is buried in the Vagankovo Cemetery in Moscow. A monument marks the building at 43 Arbat Street where he lived. His dacha in Peredelkino is now a museum that is open to the public.
A minor planet, 3149 Okudzhava, discovered by Czech astronomer Zdeňka Vávrová in 1981 is named after him. Dictionary of Minor Planet Names – p.260 His songs remain very popular and frequently performed. Sentries of Love, Bulat Okudzhava's songs by Tatiana and Sergei Nikitin Songs of Bulat Okudzhava by Galina Khomchik Songs of Bulat Okudzhava by Zhanna Bichevskaya Blue balloon, song and music by Bulat Okudzhava, performed by Elena Frolova
Okudzhava tuned his Russian guitar to the "Russian tuning" of D'-G'-C-D-g-b-d' (thickest to thinnest string), and often lowered it by one or two tones to better accommodate his voice. He played in a classical manner, usually finger picking the strings in an ascending/descending arpeggio or waltz pattern, with an alternating bass line picked by the thumb.
Initially Okudzhava was taught three basic chords, and towards the end of his life he claimed to know a total of seven.
Many of Okudzhava's songs are in the key of C minor (with downtuning B flat or A minor), centering on the C minor chord (X00X011, thickest to thinnest string), then progressing to a G 7 (00X0433), then either an E-flat minor (X55X566) or C major (55X5555). In addition to the aforementioned chords, the E-flat major chord (X55X567) was often featured in songs in a major key, usually C major (with downtuning B-flat or A major).
By the nineties, Okudzhava adopted the increasingly popular six string guitar but retained the Russian tuning, subtracting the fourth string, which was convenient to his style of playing.
| 1961 | My Friend, Kolka! | Друг мой, Колька! | Merry Drummer; Over Sea, Over Land | |
| 1962 | Chain reaction | Цепная реакция | Last Trolleybus; Old Pier | actor ( bus passenger) |
| 1964 | I Am Twenty | Мне двадцать лет | Sentimental March | cameo (as himself) |
| 1965 | Faithfulness | Верность | screenplay | |
| 1966 | July Rain | Июльский дождь | A Song About Infantry | music |
| 1967 | Zhenya, Zhenechka and Katyusha | Женя, Женечка и «катюша» | Danish King's Elixir | screenplay, vocal, cameo ( soldier) |
| 1970 | White Sun of the Desert | Белое солнце пустыни | Your Honor, Lady Luck | |
| Belorussian Station | Белорусский вокзал | We Need Only One Victory | music | |
| 1974 | The Straw Hat | Соломенная шляпка | all songs | |
| 1975 | The Captivating Star of Happiness | Звезда пленительного счастья | romances | cameo ( bandmaster) |
| The Adventures of Buratino | Приключения Буратино | Lamplighters; Papa Carlo; Karabas Barabas (two songs); About Greed-Guts; The Field of Wonders; Pierrot's Serenade | ||
| 1976 | The Key That Should Not Be Handed On | Ключ без права передачи | Let's Exclaim | cameo (as himself) |
| The Strogovs | Строговы | actor (officer) | ||
| 1977 | One-Two, Soldiers Were Going... | Аты-баты, шли солдаты... | Take the Greatcoat, Let's Go Home | |
| 1979 | The Wife Has Left | Жена ушла | One More Romance | vocal |
| 1982 | The Pokrovsky Gate | Покровские ворота | Sentries of Love; Painters; Ditty About Arbat | vocal |
| 1984 | Dear, Dearest, Beloved, Unique... | Милый, дорогой, любимый, единственный... | One Wishes to Get Rich | vocal |
| 1985 | Legal Marriage | Законный брак | This Woman in the Window; The Skies are Freer After the Rain | actor ( train passenger) |
| 1986 | Guard Me, My Talisman | Храни меня, мой талисман | One Can't Return the Past; Family Photo Against Pushkin | cameo (as himself) |
| 2000 | Still Waters | Тихие омуты | Youth Ends Quickly | music |
| 2005 | The Turkish Gambit | Турецкий гамбит | Autumn Rain |
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