Sergei Migai

Born May 18 (30), 1888, in Mogilev; died Dec. 8, 1959, in Moscow. Soviet Russian singer (baritone); teacher. People’s Artist of the RSFSR (1939).

Migai graduated in 1911 from the Odessa Music School, where he studied under lu. A. Reider. From 1918 to 1920 he studied at the Opera Studio under K. S. Stanislavsky. He was a soloist at the Bolshoi Theater from 1911 to 1924 and at the Leningrad Theater of Opera and Ballet from 1924 to 1927. From 1927 to 1941 he performed regularly in Moscow and Leningrad. From 1941 to 1948 he was a soloist for the All-Union Radio Committee. He began teaching at the Moscow Conservatory in 1948 and became a professor there in 1952.

Migai’s voice had a rich, warm timbre and an unusual range of more than two octaves. Among his best parts were Onegin in Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, Mizgir’ and Griaznoi in Rimsky-Korsakov’s The Snow Maiden and The Tsar’s Bride, the Demon in Rubinstein’s The Demon, and Rigoletto and Count di Luna in Verdi’s Rigoletto and Il Trovatore. Migai also gave solo recitals. He was awarded two orders of the Red Banner of Labor and various medals.