Mikhail Zabeida-Sumitski was a famous Belarusian singer and educator. He was a well-known tenor throughout the world and stood among the best opera singers of the 20th century.
Background
Mikhail Zabeida-Sumitski was born on June 14, 1900 at one of 3 villages: Sheypichi (today’s Pruzhany region), Podorosk, or Nestserovichy (now Volkovysk region), Grodno Governate, Russian Empire, into a poor family of peasants. Father Ivan Andreevich Zabeyda was from Nestserovichy (today’s Svisloch region). He died when Michael was only three years old. Mother Alexandra Feliksovna, nee Sumitskaya, was from Sheypichi. They had seven children. When Mikhas’ was 8-9 years old, he began to work at the local manor estate.
Education
Mikhail studied in Sheipichy and Zelzin. In 1914, he finished a parochial school in Golovchytsy village and in 1918, he graduated from Molodechno Teacher's Seminary. Mikhail began to study professional singing in Harbin in 1922. His teacher was Yuliya Platnitskaya, Chaliapin’s former colleague. He also learnt playing the piano. At the same time, Mikhail studied at the Economic Department of the Faculty of Law, Harbin University and graduated in 1929.
Career
At the age of 15, Mikhail together with his family left Sheipichy because of the World War I. They moved to Tombov Governate, then to Penza, Smolensk. After his graduation from Molodechno Teacher's Seminary in 1918, he worked as a teacher in Ust-Kalmanskae village in Siberia till 1920. He organized choirs and drama circles there.
In 1920, as a result of the civil war, Mikhail Zabeida-Sumitski lived in Harbin, at the station Veyshahe of the Chinese Eastern Railway. He began to study music in Harbin. After his successful graduation from the Harbin Russian University in 1929, he was proposed to continue his studies in Harbin, but he couldn’t live without signing and became a soloist of the Harbin opera. At that time, he had the experience of singing in children's choir, and self-mastery of musical instruments (violin, guitar, mandolin, balalaika, harmonica). His debut role was Lensky in the opera "Eugene Onegin" by Pyotr Tchaikovsky. He worked in the Harbin opera for 3 years and performed 15 parties: Faust in "Faust" by Gounod, Alfred in "La Traviata", the Duke in "Rigoletto", Vladimir in "Prince Igor" by Alexander Borodin and others. He continued his work as a school teacher too
In order to improve his skills further he went to Milan in 1932. He met there famous signer Fernando Carpi who became his teacher, and his future friend, an acclaimed Imperial Russian operatic tenor Leonid Sobinov. Mikhail Zabeida-Sumitski successfully performed at the Milan opera, singing in 16 languages, and touring in Italy. At that period he performed tenor roles in such great operas, as “La Traviata", "Rigoletto", "Barber of Seville", and on the stage of "La Scala". He was predicted a big artistic future, but was informed that his mother was ill and asked him to come. Zabeida-Sumitski returned home in 1935. In 1935-1936, he performed at Belarusian cities (Ruzhany, Bialystok, Baranovichi, Brest, Grodno), in Poland (Warsaw, Poznan) and later in Lithuania, Latvia, Czechoslovakia.
He signed a contract with the Poznan Opera for 1935-1936. He sang only in Polish at that period, took part in such operas, as "The Abduction from the Seraglio" by Mozart, "Julius Caesar" by Gendle, "Boris Godunov" by Mussorgsky and others. He was loved by the audience, but his relationships with the opera director were not very good. The conflict arose on the basis of the national question: Mikhail Zabeida-Sumitski did not want to call himself a great Polish singer, he wanted to be called Belarusian instead. Due to this fact, he moved to Warsaw . In 1936, Zabeida-Sumitski took part in the presentation of the classical Belarusian repertoire in Vilnius, where he met Maksim Tank and Rygor Shyrma. He performed within the Vilnius tour in 1937. In the same year, he began to work as a soloist of the Warsaw radio, was actively engaged in different concert activities, toured the cities of Poland (including Western Belarus), Latvia, Estonia. Apart from the classical repertoire, Zabeida-Sumitski performed Belarusian folk songs.
In 1938, he took part in many radio concerts, toured a lot (Baranovichi, Bialystok, Brest, Grodno, Vilnius, Lida, Kamenetz, Sosnovka). The Belarusian part of the concert consisted of romances and songs by Moniuszko, Turenkov, Churkin, Aladov. Zabeida-Sumitski’s performances were broadcasted in Paris, Prague, New York, London and other cities. During this period, the singer managed to establish branch of the Odeon company in Poland and made first recordings of Belarusian folk songs "A young oak", "Flying magpie", "A horse runs, the earth trembles", "Lyavoniha" and many others. However, since the end of 1938, his national educational activities were restricted by the Polish authorities. In December, they banned the singer’s concert in Vilnius. On the eve of the World War II, Zabeida-Sumitski stopped his concerts on Polish territory.
In 1939, he planned a tour around Europe and America, but had to cancel it because of the war. He was wounded during the bombings of Warsaw by the Nazis. His cousin Iosif Urbanowicz tried to help him to escape from Warsaw, but Zabeida-Sumitski was very ill and stayed there until May 1940. He received an invitation from the Prague National Theater and moved there in spring. Mikhail Zabeida-Sumitski worked in the Prague National Theater till his death. The first concert took place on October 12, 1940. Later he also taught at the Musical Academy. He performed in classical operas at that time and sang in 16 languages. During the war, he received an invitation from Berlin to head Belarusian radio broadcasts, but he refused.
During his concert in Vilnius in 1944, he was captured by Gestapo and accused of being a Bolshevik spy. Zabeida-Sumitski was very ill and got into hospital. He was accused that he sang Belarusian songs. In 1945, he was released by the Red Army and accused by the Committee for State Security (KGB) of his cooperation with the Nazis. The charge was officially dropped only in 1950.
Famous singer lived in Czechoslovakia after the war. He took part in concerts, sang in studios, lectured. He was invited to the Soviet Belarus only once in 1963. He performed in Minsk, Grodno, Volkovysk, Slonim, Lida, Baranovichi, Vitebsk, Mogilev, Gomel.
Views
Mikhail Zabeida-Sumitski sang Belarusian folk songs and always called himself Belarusian singer.