Gott, Karel

Karel Gott was born on July 14, 1939 in Pilsen . In his youth, he was educated as an electrician for tram systems, and began to participate in amateur performances by singers during his studies.

In the late 1950s , Gott performed in Prague cafes and dance clubs, combining concert activities with work at the factory, and in 1958 received his first prize in the competition of amateur singers. In 1960, Gott left work at a tram factory, deciding to devote his life to singing, and entered the Prague Conservatory specializing in opera singing. However, only with the advent in the early 1960s . in Czechoslovakia, the fashion for a twist began the ascent of Karel Gott to musical fame.

In 1962, he received an engagement at the famous Prague Semaphore Theater, and in the same year, the duet of Karel Gott and Vlasta Prukhova won the Czech Radio charts. Already in 1963, the song “Oči sněhem zaváté” from the performance of the Semaphore Theater, performed by Gott, became the most popular song in Czechoslovakia, with this song he won for the first time in the nationwide singing contest “The Golden Nightingale ”.

In 1965, Karel Gott left the Semaphore Theater and founded his own Apollo Theater, becoming its main star. After the dissolution of this theater in 1967, he went on tour in Las Vegas ( USA ).

From America, Karel Gott returned as a professional who relied on the mainstream pop music . Thanks to his vocal talents, he was able to gain success on the pop scene of Western and Eastern Europe and to release the first album, which immediately became "gold". On the European stage, Gott became known as the "golden voice from Prague." At the 1968 Eurovision Song Contest , he represented Austria and took the thirteenth place with the song “Tausend Fenster”. His popularity sharply increased in his homeland. A series of hits such as “Lady Carneval”, “Když jsem já byl tenkrát kluk”, “Stokrát chválím čas”, “Jdi za štěstím” and others, provided him with national fame.

From 1970 to 1990 he performed with the Ladislav Steidl Orchestra, now has its own music group Karel Gott Bund (KGB). During his creative life he recorded 150 albums, 180 singles, starred in thirteen films. Thirty million records of the singer were sold. Karel Gott - People's Artist of Czechoslovakia.

The “Golden Era” of Karel Gott occurred in the 1970s and 1980s, when he rightfully took first place in Czechoslovakia’s pop music, regularly won first places at national music competitions and released one after another gold and platinum discs. He often toured Europe, Asia and America, and his repertoire included compositions of a whole range of genres - from pop music to folk and classical. In the USSR, where the singer was also a frequent visitor (which gave Vladimir Vinokur a reason to joke: “Every year a singer from Prague Karel Gott comes to us ^[1] ), the albums“ I open the doors ”and“ Meet the Spring ”were released (in Russian language) with five million copies. The artist successfully performed the songs of Soviet composers, in 1978 he took part in the popular festival " Song-1978 ", singing a duet with Sofia Rotaru , one of the leading Soviet singers. By and large, only Karel Gott managed to achieve great popularity in the USSR, other Czech artists were almost unknown in the Soviet Union (with the possible exception of Helena Vondrachkova , but her popularity could not be compared with the popularity of Karel Gott). Gott led his own music program on television, starred in several feature films and documentaries. In the late 1980s, competition in the Czechoslovak music scene intensified sharply, many young performers appeared, but the celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of Karel Gott in 1989 confirmed his role as the number one singer in the country. The performance on Wenceslas Square during the 1989 Velvet Revolution in support of the overthrow of the communist regime also had a great resonance. At the same time, according to the singer himself, Karel Gott was always far from politics. The singer even refused the presidency at the time, turning the proposal as a joke, believing that everyone should do their own thing (the documentary "The Secret of His Youth", 2008).

In the 1960s and 1980s, Karel Gott was a favorite of the Soviet public. He not only often came to Moscow, but also traveled to the most remote regions of the USSR. The audience really liked the way he sang old Russian romances and Soviet songs: “I loved you,” “Oh, dear,” “I met you,” “ Nightingales, nightingales, don't disturb the soldiers ” - in Russian and without an accent! If fan clubs existed at that time, Gott would be one of the most active and numerous. Other times came and they forgot about Karel Gott. In 1987, he came to Moscow, helped by his fans and enthusiastic listeners Mikhail Sergeyevich and Raisa Maximovna Gorbachev. And then he disappeared for a long time ...

On the contrary, in Germany, the glory of Gott bloomed in the last decade even more, where he spends a significant part of his foreign tours. When he arrives in Prague, his West European admirers, and especially admirers, tend to stay at the Mevenpik Hotel, and even on its specific side, from whose windows a view of the nearby Villa Karela Gotta opens: “What if a acquaintance flickers near the house figure of a singer ?! ”

In 1980, Karel Gott starred in the concert film Karel Gott Sings.

In 1990, Gott announced his retirement, but the noisy success of his final performances in the concert halls in Czechoslovakia and Germany forced the singer to change his mind. Already in 1992, his album “Když muž se ženou snídá” became the best-selling album of the year, and this achievement was repeated by Gott in 1995 and 1997. Until now, Karel Gott remains the main star of Czech pop music, regularly releases new songs and albums, and in 2015 won the Golden Nightingale annual national music competition. At the same time, Karel Gott was awarded the Absolute Nightingale Prizes and "Platinum nightingale." From the beginning of his career, the singer sang and recorded more than 2,500 songs.

In 2001, Prague hosted the anniversary concert of Karel Gott.

On June 12, 2011, a solo concert of Karel Gott in Moscow took place. In the hall named after P.I. Tchaikovsky sounded songs that made the "Czech nightingale" the main pop star on this side of the "Iron Curtain."

October 4, 2013 at the anniversary concert of the Academic Song and Dance Ensemble of the Russian Army named after A.V. Alexandrova “With a Song to Victory”, dedicated to the 85th anniversary of its founding, was performed by the famous Czech singer Karel Gott.

At the end of 2013, Karel Gott came to Russia and performed for New Year's Eve on Channel One .

In the 2010s, he was one of the most popular people in the Czech Republic. He lives alone in a luxurious villa on a hill, overlooking the whole of Prague. Karel Gott's days are painted literally by the minute: interviews, concerts, recordings in the studio, work on paintings in the studio. The artist goes in for sports, is an ardent opponent of smoking and promotes a healthy lifestyle.

Illness and treatment

On October 27, 2015, 76-year-old Karel Gott was hospitalized and operated on in Prague with suspected cancer of the lymph nodes ^[2] . He was briefly discharged from the hospital after the first course of chemotherapy and the Golden Nightingale, Absolute Nightingale, and Platinum Nightingale awards he personally received.

In May 2016, Karel Gott was operated on for the second time.

On September 7, 2016, he announced that he had defeated cancer and was returning to the scene.

• Until recently, Karel Gott was not married. Karel Gott has four daughters. The eldest daughter is Dominica, the youngest is Lucia. The two youngest - Charlotte Ella and Nelly Sofia - were born in 2006 and in 2008. Their mother, Ivan Makhachkova, who is 38 years younger than the singer, Karel Gott recently married in Las Vegas . A young family lives in Prague.
• The villa in Jevany, in the east of Prague, where Gott lived from 1969 to 2005, now has the Gottland Museum open to the public. Here you can see the details of the life and personal life of the singer.

• Order of Friendship of Peoples ( September 19, 1989 ) - for active work to develop and strengthen friendship and cooperation between the peoples of the Soviet Union and the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic ^[3]

• 1964 - " Lemonade Joe " - offscreen songs.
• 1964 - “ Old Men on Hop Harvesting ” - offscreen songs.
• 1965 - “If there were a thousand clarinets” / Kdyby tisíc klarinetů (dir. Jan Rohac , Vladimir Svitachek / Vladimír Svitáček ) - anti-war musical comedy, songs performed by: Karel Gott, Valdemar Matushka , .
• 1966 - “Martyrs of Love” / Mučedníci lásky (dir. Jan German ) - singer in a nightclub.
• 1972 - the cartoon "Dorotka and singer" / Dorotka a zpěvák , in which the song performed by Gott.
• 1973 - off-screen song for the film “ Three peanuts for Cinderella ” / Tři oříšky pro Popelku (song “ Kdepak, ty ptáčku, hnízdo máš? ”).
• 1974 - “The Star Falls Up” / Hvězda padá vzhůru (dir. ) - Švanda, the main character of the modernized film version of the play of the fairy tale by J.K. a provincial pop singer (originally a musician), who made a dizzying career in high society and almost forgot his first love.
• 1975 - “Romance for the Crown” ( cs: Romance za korunu ) - a musical film with the participation of Czechoslovak pop stars Karel Gott and Helena Vondrachkova.
• 1975 - the animated series " The Adventures of the Maya Bee " - performs the title song in the Czech, Slovak and German versions.
• 1982 - cartoon "The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, a sailor from York" / Dobrodružství Robinsona Crusoe, námořníka z Yorku (song " Zdrav bud, Robinsone ").
• 1993 - “Inheritance, or Damn, guys, gutentag” / Dědictví aneb Kurvahošigutntag - cameo .
• 2010 - “Life changes you” / Zeiten ändern dich - cameo.
• 2018 - “When the Dragon Hurts His Head” / Když draka bolí hlava (directed by Dusan Rapos) - the role of the grandfather in the children's musical feature film, offscreen songs

• 2008 - “Karel Gott. The secret of his youth ”( documentary with songs and interviews at home and at the villa-museum“ Gottland ”, script by Lyudmila Romanenko, director Andrei Grechikha, 44 min.)
• 2014 - Karel Gott and All-All-All

• Kirov, Beads
• Freedom, Karel

• www.karelgott.com - Official site
• www.karelgott.net - Fan Club
• Gott, Karel on the Internet Movie Database
• www.karel-gott.ru - fan club of Russia
• Discography of Karel Gott on Discogs
• GOLDEN NIGHTBRAWN, WHICH SANG AT ANY WEATHER