Klavdiia Kuzminichna Kudriashova

Born Dec. 13,1925, on the Belyi farmstead, now in Leningrad Raion, Krasnodar Krai. Soviet Russian singer (mezzo-soprano); People’s Artist of the USSR (1970).

Kudriashova graduated from the Moscow Conservatory in 1952 and became a soloist at the Byelorussian Theater of Opera and Ballet; in 1960 she joined the Perm’ Theater. Her best parts include Joan of Arc and Solokha (Tchaikovsky’s Maid of Orleans and Cherevichki), Liubasha (The Tsar’s Bride by Rimsky-Korsakov), Azucena and Amneris (Verdi’s II Trovatore and Aida), Princess Turandot (Turandot by Puccini), Carmen (Carmen by Bizet), Alesia (The Girl From Poles’e by Tikotskii), and Aksin’ia (And Quiet Flows the Don by Dzerzhinskii). Kudriashova has been awarded two orders.