"In all arenas of world sports,
On all the seas native speech is heard.
We drove the whole world from all resorts,
He, in kind, has nowhere to lie down ... "
A. Rosenbaum (November 8, 2008, Dubai)
The editors thank Total Concepts for their help in organizing the interview
He sang, and as always, something in these songs made him return home with his thoughts, remember his old friends, his house and yard, his parents and neighbors. For many, his concert was another unscheduled meeting with his homeland, about which his slightly husky voice spoke, sometimes with pain, then with irony. Alexander Rosenbaum performed in Dubai with the Waltz Boston program, in which he recited his poems, where he spoke with the audience from the stage and danced, and in which the audience, together with the artist and his musicians, sang their favorite and well-known songs. The audience met the new compositions a little cautiously, carefully listening to each of the stories told by the poet, composer, singer. And after the concert, having met with Alexander Yakovlevich in his dressing room, we talked about the laws of resort towns, music and the science of genetics, which cannot be deceived ...
- Alexander Yakovlevich, you gave a concert in Dubai 15 years ago. Tell me, is the current concert different from what it was in the early 1990s?
- Every year I visit here, however, I come to rest. But with a concert, yes, for the second time. There were fewer Arabs at today's concert compared to the past. Then there were 50 of them. Today, almost no one as far as I saw.
- Is it a plus or minus?
“To be honest, it makes no difference to me.” Simply, either the advertisement didn’t reach them, or there were less of those who are interested in Russian culture. Or there were fewer Arab wives, because those Arabs who came were either young people or husbands of our compatriots.
- Do you think that people going to your concerts come mostly to listen to the lyrics? Think?
- I have a poem "Music or Poems" about this. It is included in the collections, and if you read it, it will tell you absolutely everything. I do not distinguish, more importantly, poetry or music. If I sing “Waltz Boston” to “The Tune of the Yard,” you won’t take it. If I perform "On Marata Street" in jazz music, you will not understand it either. Therefore, music and poetry should be interconnected, should logically support each other. The song has its own laws. It is not just poetry and not just music, it is always a song.
- Please tell me why the album "Fellow travelers" appeared after such a long break after "Strange Life"?
- And now the pause is already very large. After the "fellow travelers" a couple of years passed. There is no time, because you need to seriously deal with the disk. I don’t need to print albums like pancakes, but to do well I need time. And I just do not have it. Although I have collected material for the entire disk, and not even one. I think that by winter we will record an album, and by spring we will release. The fact that we play at concerts today is already a record. The program of songs is ten to fifteen brand new songs. By the way, I removed a lot from the program today, because I don’t have time, and the audience here is such ...
- What?
- Resort. Such an audience needs a few other songs. She will gladly listen to some difficult philosophy, but still people at the resorts are more relaxed, or something. They are not bad, no. There are no bad public, there are bad artists. This is an old axiom for me. But in any case, the resort town always has its own laws. And I'm not just talking about Dubai. This is Odessa, for example. This is Yalta, Sochi, Netanya in Israel, Miami in America. Everywhere in the resorts the exact same laws apply. People on vacation. They relax. They more want to listen to "Ducks", "Capercaillie", "Gopstop" and the like. Of course, they will be happy to listen to Black Tulip, but by God, their mood is not for this composition today, right?
- But not all holidaymakers, many people and your audience today live and work in Dubai. And here they are, just going to the concert with a completely different message. Is not it?
- I understand. Of course. But in the front rows I had VIP guests who only wanted a holiday ....
- Not in the ranks, in the row.
- Yes, in a row. But in the first. And he is the closest to the stage ...
- Well, if you digress a bit from adults, how do you think, why do young people today listen to completely different music? And does she listen to your songs?
- You know, in my native country over the past five years, and every year more and more, up to two thirds of the “heavy youth” hall is at concerts. Not the youth that was before, and came to me from the faculty of physics, physical education, and the faculty of journalism ... You understand what I'm talking about. Girls from discos did not come to me for concerts, but today they crawled. Here, and "emo", and "Goths", and what else ... And that's right, I think. I always knew that this time would come, because genetics cannot be deceived. All these "tntsntnts" ... I knew that children would get tired of this, sooner or later. Music, even the most fashionable, it comes and goes, but genes and everything native inside remain. As if all sorts of "star factories" did not distract the young guys from this. Today I have a lot of young people at concerts, a lot. And they are drawn to my work, it pleases me as an artist. I am already changing the third generation of listeners. But more to me it is pleasant as a citizen.
As a father, as a grandfather, I really like it. Everyone is saying now, that, they say, the youth didn’t go wrong. Nothing like this. The main thing for young people is not to lie, you cannot flirt with her, you cannot "go to bed" under young growth. If I go out today and start to rap them, they will never come to me. Now, if you are not lying, then she will reach out to you, she will trust you, she will begin to believe you. What is happening today.
- It turns out that it is no coincidence that when you get together today, young guys sing your songs to the guitar ...
- It turns out that it is no coincidence. See how many Barbie dolls were in the hall today. You are completely different. But how many "dolls" were there. And that’s good. They don’t need to know the words of the songs either. They will recognize them later. They came, I saw how they listened. They were interested. And when they want, they will take records, and they will listen to them, and maybe even learn words and cry ... Because everyone has mothers, fathers, brothers, loved ones, and a homeland. Even the "Barbie dolls" have a homeland. Because, I’ll say it again, there were Mendel, Morgan and Weisman - three such cool dudes who came up with genetics, and you will never deceive her, with all your will.
- Alexander Yakovlevich, and you are not offended that the resort public sets a completely different tone for the concerts ...
“Absolutely not.” I'm an artist. And I absolutely do not want to offend the local audience. Just, I repeat, there is a pattern that is characteristic of all the world's resorts - Sochi, Miami, Dubai. The audience here is very complicated. Of course, in these cities there are those who live, work and raise children. But most of those who say: "Well, what are we going to do today, will we go sushi or eat at a Rosenbaum concert? Or maybe we won’t go" at Rosenbaum ", but we met friends from Voronezh and go to a club somewhere."
- But doesn’t it seem to you that with your songs or poems, such as "Macho", can you offend any of the listeners?
- And this is their problem. If someone has one crinkle in his head, and he thinks he's a macho, then I sincerely feel sorry for him. It’s like in a joke about two warrant officers, in which one boasts to the other that his wife all the time calls macho and asks if he looks like a macho, and the second says: “You are not like a macho, but a schmuck.” A person must be able to think. If this is a problem, alas.
- Tell me, why on our television (I'm talking about those Russian channels that we get here via satellite), most of the concerts you are not?
- Why not me? And I rarely agree to participate in such concerts, because I think about how the audience feels in this one and the same 15-year-old agony. I imagine myself as a spectator, and I think: "Oh my god, again these fifteen people! Again the same people who are already tired of death." I only agree to concerts that meet my inner state. Now there will be a concert for the Police Day, in it I will sing. Required.
- 
Do you continue to write books?
- Yes, now my new book, “Pegasus’s Wings,” six and a half centimeters thick, has been released. It included almost everything, including small quatrains, which I like to write, as you might notice today.
- You also manage to act in films ...
- I work little by little.
- Tell me, please, what did the four-year work in the State Duma give you?
- She gave a lot. This is a tremendous experience. I did not sell myself an iota, and I did not betray myself. I did a lot of good for people, because the work of a deputy is work with people and for people.
- Was it difficult for you?
- Of course, it’s difficult. Sometimes I had to fly away from the tour for one day to a meeting of the State Duma, and immediately return back.
- Did you manage to write poetry and songs during this period?
- It was possible, but not enough.
- Aversion to politics did not arise? After all, they say that politics is a lie, dirt, intrigue ...
- It didn’t. The main thing is to come clean into politics, and try to get out of it the same way. You just need to have a conscience, and not compromise with your principles. I came on the scene at the age of 30, and not from the circus school, but from death, pain and tears. I am a doctor and have seen a lot of grief. It’s unrealistic to break me.
- You have been many times in the zones of military conflicts - Afghanistan, Chechnya ...
- I have three touring trips to Chechnya, four to Afghanistan. I am "at war" from 1987 to the present day. And I don’t know where it is more difficult - in real "hot spots" or on today's streets, squares or markets. Our present is hot spots, this is a daily battle.
- What do you think, as a poet, as a citizen, as a former deputy of the State Duma, what can the Russian people lead to all the changes taking place in the world today, including financial upheavals? What is he - the Russian spirit?
- There are a lot of Russian folk sayings and fairy tales, but there is science - genetics and all the same Mendel, Morgan and Weismann. Then think for yourself. I didn’t come up with the proverb “The law that draws wherever you turn, that’s what happened.” I didn’t come up with “My hut from the edge”, and I didn’t come up with - “Let my cow die, if only my neighbor wouldn’t get hotels”. In my opinion, there is nothing worse than human envy. As a doctor, I can only compare this defect with a cancerous tumor. Envy gives metastases and destroys a person from the inside. There is nothing worse than human laziness. I didn’t come up with Ilya Muromets, who did nothing, didn’t go to the gym, did not carry weights. Some cripples walked along, gave him freebies for free, and he heaped all the Nightingale robbers and lay down again on the stove. I didn’t invent Ivan the Fool. He had two brothers hunchbacked in the field all his life, and this - for no reason, and the kingdom, and his wife Vasilisa the Wise, and everything in the world. This does not happen. Until we get rid of our tales of ours, freebies, that everything will fall from the sky to fools, that everything will be “by the pike”, nothing will happen. Cinderella, in order to just try on a crystal slipper, washed the mountains of dishes, cleaned the boilers and rubbed tons of linen. First of all, we need to stop drinking and stealing. It's complicated. But I’m sure that if tomorrow we stop drinking and stealing, the day after tomorrow we will have everything.
- A couple of years ago in your interview with our magazine you said that this will happen in thirty years ....
“I think it will be so.” Let's meet and talk about a quarter century later.
- Maybe it will work out earlier?
“Maybe before.” If the audience comes to my performances, I will come to Dubai more than once, and with pleasure. You look, and the people will learn the words, and bring new spectators with them to the concert. His grown children.
- Thank you very much, Alexander Yakovlevich. We hope to say goodbye to you in Dubai for a while.
“And thank you, girls.” See you.
