Composition of via flowers. "Flowers" group, Stas Namin's group

Brief information about the group Flowers is a Moscow rock band formed by guitarist and songwriter Stas Namin in 1969. The creative fate of the group evolved in different ways. "Flowers" in its forty-year history seemed to have lived several lives, and in the 2010s they began another, new one. From 1969 to 1979, as a student ensemble "Flowers", they became popular in Moscow and released a record at the Melodiya company. Due to their style, unlike the Soviet stage, the group falls under the complete ban of the central Soviet media and it manages to release only rare compromise records, which, despite strict censorship, for the first time introduce an element of rock music into the mass musical culture of the country. In 1974, "Flowers" began professional tours and, after a conflict with the Philharmonic and the name was banned by the USSR Ministry of Culture, they were restored in 1977 as the Stas Namin Group. Still banned from the media, they write new hits and regain popularity with a new name.

Since 1980, in the wake of the "Olympic thaw", Stas Namin's group "Flowers" begins to appear sporadically in the media, releases the first author's album "Hymn to the Sun" and manages to record two more custom albums - "Reggae, Disco, Rock" and "Surprise for Monsieur Legrand. Then the conflict between the group and the regime escalates again and they again fall under the ban, and the new repertoire of the Flowers is also banned on Melodiya. Even Namin's "innocent" song "We wish you happiness", written in 1982, first appears only at the end of 1984.

In 1986, along with perestroika, the group suddenly begins a new life. "Flowers" travel to the West for the first time and in four years make a world tour, almost without working in the USSR. In the 90s, the group stops its activities for 10 years.

In 1999, Namin again gathers the group. "Flowers" celebrate their 30th anniversary with a big concert, in which musicians who previously worked in the group, as well as friends - stars of Russian rock music, take part. But even after this concert, the group does not return to public life. "Flowers" work in the Moscow Theater of Music and Drama, created by Stas Namin, participating in the creation of the musical "Hair", the rock opera "Jesus Christ Superstar" and other performances.

Being a kind of author's project of Namin, "Flowers" in the 1970s and 80s did not have a permanent composition, and all songs were recorded and performed by different soloists. The creative face of the group was, above all, its original, unlike any other style. In the first 20 years, more than fifty musicians played in the group, many of whom subsequently created their own ensembles, became famous composers and performers.
The group "Flowers" had a permanent line-up only in 2000, and, according to Namin, this is the strongest line-up in the entire history of the group: Oleg Predtechensky - vocals and guitar; Valery Diorditsa - vocals and keyboards; Alexander Gretsinin - vocals and bass guitar; Yuri Vilnin - guitar; Alan Aslamazov - keyboards, vocals and saxophone.

In 2009, in the year of its 40th anniversary, in fact, after a 30-year hiatus, "Flowers" decided to once again intensify their creative public life.

In the summer of 2009, the band recorded at the legendary Abbey Road Studios in London all their famous hits created between 1969 and 1982. The double album "Back to the USSR" becomes a kind of result of the first period of their work.

In 2010, again at Abbey Road Studios, Flowers recorded a new album, which included banned songs of the group, written in the eighties, but never published, and three new songs: "Hymn to the heroes of our time", "Light and Joy" and " Open your window." The latter gave the name to the album. The Society of Sound created by Peter Gabriel has exclusively chosen this album for its VIP clients as the most interesting work of the year and included it in their catalogue.

In the same 2010, the group played their anniversary concert "Flowers-40" (in the Crocus City Hall) and released a DVD and CD. In this concert, the group managed to do what, for various reasons, did not work out in previous years. The concert summed up the band's forty years of work, presenting all the famous songs of the "Flowers" in the standard performance, as fans used to listen to them on recordings in the 1970s. It also featured musicians from the band's early lineups, friends and guests. For the musicians themselves, the concert "Flowers-40" in a certain sense summed up the classic restrained style established by the early Beatles, and the image in which they were accustomed to perceive all these years.

In 2012 "Flowers" played the second concert in the Crocus City Hall, where they presented their new modern repertoire. These were no longer the “Flowers” ​​that everyone was used to. As if liberated from their image of the 1970s, they immediately jumped to the present day. Their new songs and style differ from the early songs of the 70s as much as the first songs of the Beatles differ from their latest albums.
The DVD, Blu-ray and CD of the three-hour concert consists of two parts, released on different discs as different albums:
– the album HOMO SAPIENS (“A reasonable man”) included an instrumental intro and 12 new songs, presented as a rock performance with its own internal dramaturgy, backed up by a video installation.

The program of these albums, in fact, for the first time in a live concert, presented to the public today's Stas Namin's Group "Flowers", which, having retained all its musical principles that developed in the 70s and 80s, developed them and transposed them into modern rock of the 2010s.

Early years (1969-1972)

The rock group "Flowers" was created in Moscow in 1969 by the lead guitarist, at that time a first-year student at the Institute of Foreign Languages. M. Torez, Stas Namin.

Early acquainted with rock music, already in 1964 at the Suvorov School, Stas created his first group, the Charodei, and at the same time played rock and roll with his cousin Alexander, friend and housemate Grigory Ordzhonikidze and other friends, in 1967 year they were already called - "Politburo" and performed in the Palace of Culture Energetikov. In 1969, having entered the Institute of Foreign Languages. Maurice Torez, becomes the leader-guitarist of the famous Inyazovsky group "Bliki" among the students.

In the late 60s, Namin was fascinated by the Flower Children hippie movement, and in 1969, inspired by the legendary Woodstock hippie rock festival, he created a new group, calling it Flowers.

The first composition of Flowers. The first musician whom Stas invited to the group was Vladimir Chugreev, a self-taught drummer fanatically in love with rock music, he had extraordinary physical strength and played a powerful rock sound. Vladimir Solovyov played keyboards in the first line-up of "Tsvetov", in the past he was a musician of the "Red Devils" group at the Bauman Institute. Even then he had his own electric organ, which gave the group solidity and a "signature" sound. There was no permanent bass player, and the bassist from Blikov A. Malashenkov alternately played in the group, then from Vagabundos, another Inyazov group. Elena Kovalevskaya, a student of the French faculty of foreign language, became the vocalist of the group. She possessed a performance drive that was unexpected for that time and a very beautiful soulful voice; the public took it with a bang. Stas Namin played the lead guitar. Such was the first composition of the Flowers group. The repertoire at that time was mainly the most fashionable hits from the repertoire of Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin and others.

In parallel with his studies in Inyaz, Stas with "Flowers" performs at school parties, in clubs and institutions in Moscow (Inyaz, MGIMO, Moscow State University, Bauman Institute, etc.). After some time, at a party at MIREA, Namin saw Sasha Losev performing Nikitin's song "Horses Can Swim" with a guitar. He liked Sasha's vocal abilities and musicality, and he invited him to try himself in Flowers. Despite the fact that Losev sang pop songs and was not fond of rock, Stas suggested that he master the bass guitar and learn a few songs in English from the repertoire of "Flowers". Then it was the songs of Jimi Hendrix, Deep Purple and others. So Losev got into Flowers.

In the 70s, Elena Kovalevskaya left the group, graduating from Inyaz, and also Solovyov left the group, and Alexander Losev came to the bass guitar instead of Malashenkov. Thus, the second composition of the group "Flowers" consisted of three people: Namin - solo guitar, Losev - bass guitar, Chugreev - drums.

At that time, rock parties were often held in Inyaz, where the most fashionable groups in Moscow played - Scythians, Vagabundes, Second Wind, Atlantes, Mirages and many others. As another experiment, Namin, in addition to the already popular among the students "Flowers", created another group - "Village Boys and a Strange Creature", which played oriental ethnic music based on rock with bright guitar solos, vocals and lasted about a year.

In 1970, Namin went to study at Moscow State University and, of course, his group went along with him. Flowers began to rehearse at the Energetik Palace of Culture on Raushskaya Embankment. Where Namin went to listen to Sokolov, Melomanov and other first Russian rock bands. In the same place, even before the "Flowers" Namin performed with the "Politburo" - A. Sikorsky and other musicians. In the same place, in the Palace of Culture Energetikov, on the initiative of Namin, “Time Machine” began to rehearse. It was very convenient for both Namin and Makarevich geographically, because they lived and studied in the same area, and rehearsed before the House of Energetics in the House on the Embankment, where some musicians from both groups lived.

Once, during a performance of "Flowers" at the Moscow State University club on Herzen Street (now Bolshaya Nikitskaya), traffic had to be blocked due to a huge crowd of fans. Then for the first time the name "Flowers" appeared in the "black" list of the Ministry of Culture of the USSR, which reached this scandalous case.

Experiment with a brass group (with wind instruments). Already at Moscow State University, when Alexander Losev, Stas Namin and Vladimir Chugreev only remained in the group, and Alik Mikoyan, Stas's brother, who used to play in the Politburo, sometimes joined them. Stas invited pianist Igor Saulsky to the keyboards, who had previously played in the Skomorokh group and then in Time Machine and Flowers.

In 1971, Stas decided to try to include a "copper section" in the "Flowers". He invited his friend from the Suvorov Musical School, trumpeter Alexander Chinenkov, trombonist Vladimir Nilov, and saxophonist Vladimir Okolzdaev. So the group performed in the 8th dining room of Moscow State University and at other rock evenings. It was the third composition of the group.

Then Igor Saulsky suggested to Stas that he take on another saxophonist, jazz musician Alexei Kozlov. Stas did not like jazz then, but Igor told him that Kozlov dreams of playing rock and will help arrange a brass band, and Stas agreed. Kozlov began to rehearse with "Flowers" in the Energetikov Palace of Culture. Then the younger Zasedatelev came to the drums (his older brother was also a famous drummer). In the repertoire of the "Flowers" then there were songs from the bands Blood, Sweat & Tears and Chicago. So the group performed for some time at jam sessions. The last performance of the group in this line-up was at the House of Architects, after which Namin decided to leave Flowers in a small composition and play classic rock as a threesome. Then he invited Yuri Fokin to drums, and Kozlov decided to make his own ensemble. Kozlov at first thought to name the ensemble - "Elite", and then the name "Arsenal" appeared, where the remaining musicians of that composition of "Flowers" went to work.

Stas Namin was an adherent of the music of Hendrix, the Rolling Stones, Losev gravitated more to the stage like Tom Jones and the Carpenders, and under the influence of Namin began to listen to Deep Purple, Chicago, Pink Floyd and other rock music, and the arrival of Fokine, an ardent fan of Led Zeppelin, made the group even more fatal.

Student competition in Luzhniki. Once, speaking on behalf of the University at the Moscow Student Festival at the Luzhniki Sports Palace, Flowers performed a composition by Jimi Hendrix, presenting it as a song of the struggle of the Negro people for freedom. And the title of the song "Let Me Stand Next To Your Fire" was translated by Stas into Russian as "Let me stand next to the fire of your struggle." During the performance, there was such a stir in the public that the band's equipment was turned off. “We saw this for the first time and just got scared,” the director of the Luzhniki Sports Palace, Sinilkina, later recalled. Nevertheless, "Flowers" became one of the winners of the festival and received the right, together with the trio "Linnik" (MSU) and the ensemble "Lingva" (Inyaz), to release small flexible records at the Melodiya company.

Recording the first disc. Namin took this unique opportunity very seriously and, especially for these recordings, invited his friend, a pianist and composer Sergei Dyachkov, who has a musical education, and, on his advice, Vladimir Semenov, who helped prepare professional arrangements for recording. Stas said that, like the Beatles, they should have their own George Martin. For the first disc, Namin selected three songs that, in his opinion, for all their traditional character, allowed the group to arrange and perform them, demonstrating that school of rock music that was not familiar to the official stage. These were the songs “My Clear Star”, “Flowers Have Eyes” and “Don't”. The recording featured Stas Namin (lead guitar), Alexander Losev (bass guitar, vocals), Yuri Fokin (drums), Sergey Dyachkov (keyboards, vocals), Vladimir Semyonov (acoustic guitar), Alexander Slizunov (keyboards), female trio Mira Korobkova and A. Aleshin (backing vocals). The Symphony Orchestra conducted by Yuri Silantiev also participated in the recordings, among the musicians recruited for this recording in the orchestra was the still unknown violist Yuri Bashmet. As he recalls today, at that time he had just arrived from Lviv, in the past he himself was a rock guitarist.

1979 A. Fedorov, A. Sapunov, S. Namin, M. Fainzilberg, V. Zhivetiev, V. Vasiliev

The recording took place at the Melodiya studio on a four-channel tape recorder, on stereo, with almost one sound overlay and internal information. First, the entire instrumental part was recorded on two channels without the possibility of any balance corrections - simultaneously drums, bass, solo guitar, acoustic guitar, all strings, back vocals, etc., and then solo vocals were recorded overdubbed on this already finished phonogram . It was possible to record a lot of doubles in the vocals, and this saved the song “My Clear Star”, as I had to make many options, from which they then glued together by individual words and sometimes even by sounds what went on the disc as a result. Losev did not understand how important it was for the group to release a record on Melodiya: it was on the evening of the recording that he got tickets for the USSR-Canada hockey match, and he called Stas and said that he could not come to the studio. Only under pressure and persuasion from Namin, he appeared, assuming that he would quickly get off and leave, but having no experience in studio recording and thinking only about the hockey he missed, he could not record a single complete phrase, cried and asked to be let go to the match. Dyachkov gave him brandy to drink, warming his throat and forcing him to sing as many options as possible, from which something worthy could then be assembled. As a result, more than 50 vocal doubles were recorded, from which the original was literally glued together syllable by syllable. Losev then could not even imagine that "Star" would become not only a super hit, but also the main song in his life, and, perhaps, his main achievement. In concerts, Losev could not sing "Asterisk" in the original - recorded key, and it was always lowered for him by a tone.

When the instrumental soundtrack of the song “Don't” was recorded for the first disc, sound engineer Alexander Shtilman unexpectedly, when the solo guitar began to play, stopped the recording of the entire orchestra and asked to remove the sound distortion on the guitar. Stas did not even understand what kind of distortions he was talking about, since he had been preparing this sound of his homemade guitar fuzz for several months and was very proud of it. "Distortions" managed to be defended, and they can still be heard in old recordings. It was a historical fact when for the first time at the Melodiya company a guitar with the Fuzz effect was recorded. It also took a long time to persuade the sound engineer to put a separate microphone on the kick drum, since no one had ever written rhythmic accompaniment with snare drum and kick drum patterns in the Led Zeppelin style at Melodiya.
In the summer of 1972, immediately after recording, "Flowers" went to rest in the Crimea at the student camp of Moscow State University, where "Time Machine", Alexander Gradsky, Sergey Grachev, a group from Moscow State University "Mosaic" and other then popular student groups also arrived. There, everyone drank a lot of young home-made Crimean wine, walked and played dances. In September of the same 1972, the first flexible disc "Flowers" was released, and Namin and Fokin, returning from the sea, went straight to the record factory at the "River Station" in order to pick it up as soon as possible. It was already difficult to imagine that the group had their own record, and even more so with such a design - there should have been a photo on the cover where Yura and Stas had hair below their shoulders! Imagine their surprise when, having asked for a record from the workers of the plant, they saw that their hair was "cut" by a retoucher. But happiness still knew no bounds. When the record appeared in stores, it unexpectedly sold 7 million copies and sounded from almost all the windows of the country. Nevertheless, "Flowers" continued to lead a semi-underground existence of a student amateur group. Having already become popular, her style and manner of performance were still not recognized by the media, and she performed, as before, only at student parties.

The first tour, the ban of the name and the collapse of the group

In 1974, Namin decided to try professional concert activity at the Moscow Regional Philharmonic. In this regard, he additionally invited the pianist Alexander Slizunov, who participated in the first recordings of the group, and the guitarist Konstantin Nikolsky, his friend from the institute's rock parties, to the group. Nikolsky not only played the guitar very musically, but also wrote songs. His talent was very close to the style that Namin cultivated in Flowers, and he and Losev, being the same height, not only looked good, but sang together. Alexander Slizunov, the only professionally literate in music, graduated from the Moscow State Conservatory. He also wrote songs and arrangements. The forced compromise in the manner of performance, which the group made in the recordings, was more than compensated by the real rock and roll drive in the “live” concerts of the “Flowers”.

The Philharmonic made a lot of money on the Flowers, organizing tours of three concerts a day at stadiums and sports palaces. In these tours, the soloists of the Flowers, in addition to Alexander Losev, were also Sergei Grachev, Konstantin Nikolsky and Alexander Slizunov. Due to overwork, which made any creativity impossible, a conflict began between the musicians and the administration of the Philharmonic. Losev agreed with the administrator Mark Krasovitsky and at the general meeting unexpectedly spoke out against the whole group on the side of the Philharmonic. As a result, Namin, Nikolsky and Slizunov were fired, and the Philharmonic, using state status, tried to keep its name and for some time, using Losev as a soloist and recruiting new musicians, exploited the promoted name and continued the tour schedule for 3-4 concerts in day. But the innovation and free spirit of the first recordings of "Flowers" were not long in coming. The Ministry of Culture banned both the group and the very name "Flowers" as "propaganda of Western ideology and hippie ideas." After the breakup of the group, the musicians of the "Flowers" were depressed by what had happened. It was then that Konstantin Nikolsky wrote his songs “I myself am one of those who hid behind the door” and “Musician”. Alexander Slizunov was taken to serve in the army, and Stas Namin concentrated on his studies at Moscow State University.

Restoration of the group under a new name (1976-1980)
Recordings and tours of the Stas Namin Group
First appearance in the media and solo album "Hymn to the Sun"

After some time, Stas Namin tried to start a new project with his friends - the group "Successful Acquisition": bass guitar - Vladimir Matetsky; solo guitar - Alexey Belov (White); drums - Mikhail Sokolov; rhythm guitar and harmonica - Alexander Mikoyan. Under the name "Stas Namin Group" in 1975 and 1976 they performed at rock festivals in Tallinn and Gorky. In parallel, Namin tried to organize the recording of the group with a new name. In 1977, the song "Old Piano" became the first recorded song of the new group, which was organized in the studio of the Recording House on Kachalova Street. The song was recorded by the combined composition together: the musicians of "Tsvetov" - Konstantin Nikolsky, Alexander Slizunov and Stas Namin, and the musicians of "Successful Acquisition".

Only in 1977 did Namin manage to fully restore the group and, not having the right to the name "Flowers", they began to work under the name "Stas Namin Group" as an amateur group, as if starting everything from scratch. The group included In 1978, from the former composition of the "Flowers": Stas Namin (solo guitar), Alexander Slizunov (piano, vocals), Konstantin Nikolsky (guitar, vocals), Yuri Fokin (drums), joined them at the invitation of Namin Vladimir Sakharov (bass guitar, vocals), who in the 60s played in the Music Lovers - the former Sokol and has since been friends with Stas, and Alexander Mikoyan (guitar, vocals) - Stas's cousin, who since the beginning of the 60s -x with him began to play rock and roll. The band began touring professionally. Losev, after what happened, of course, was not taken into the group. By hook or by crook, with the help of Namin's co-author - the famous poet Vladimir Kharitonov, who was a member of the artistic council of the Melodiya company, the Stas Namin Group, already under a new name, manages to release several hits ("Old Piano" and "Ah, Mom" ​​- in 1977 year, "It's too early to say goodbye" and "The wheels are knocking" - in 1978, "Summer Evening" - in 1979) and she again gained her former popularity.

Group "FLOWERS", 1999

At that time, in addition to the main line-up, many session musicians went on tour with the group, who could replace each other. In addition, magnificent jazz musicians invited by Namin to the group constantly took part in the recordings and concerts of those years: Vladimir Vasilkov (drums) - a unique Russian drummer, Alexander Pishchikov - then the best in the country, and one of the best saxophonists in the world, Arzu Huseynov - one of the best trumpeters of the country, as well as: Valery Zhivetiev (vocals), Kamil Bekselyov (vocals), Vladislav Petrovsky (keyboardist and arranger from St. Petersburg) and the trio of Mira Korobkova and others. After 1978, Yuri Fokin, Vladimir Sakharov, Sergei Dyachkov (who was always with the group, although he did not play in it), emigrated and Namin invited new musicians to the group: a young vocalist and guitarist Igor Sarukhanov, a St. Petersburg vocalist and bass player Vladimir Vasiliev and drummer Mikhail Fainzilberg.

2001 30th anniversary of "Flowers" V. Meladze, S. Namin, A. Losev, O. Predtechensky. "My clear star"

2001 Concert of the 30th anniversary of "Flowers" S. Namin, N. Noskov, A. Gradsky, A. Romanov. "I only love rock and roll"

2001 Concert of the 30th anniversary of "Flowers" A. Abdulov, A. Romanov, S. Namin, S. Solovyov. "We wish you happiness"

2003 Germany, Formula Ethno project

2004 NY. Club Knitting Factory

After a 10-year ban, the official doors and the media seem to have begun to open slightly for the "Flowers", and, under the pressure of their already international popularity and many invitations from different countries, the authorities even agreed to release them to Poland for the Sopot festival, but only as an accompaniment little-known Baltic singer Mirza Zivere. In 1980, the Stas Namin Group "Flowers" managed to release their first solo album "Hymn to the Sun", which included the hits "After the Rain", "Tell Me Yes", "Heroic Power", "Rush Hour", "Dedication to the Beatles", "Bach creates" and others. The following took part in the recording: Stas Namin, Alexander Slizunov, Igor Sarukhanov, Vladimir Vasiliev, Mikhail Fainzilberg, Alexander Fedorov (vocals), Alexander Pishchikov (saxophone). At the same time, the group participated in the filming of the feature film "Fantasy on the theme of love" and in the cultural program of the 1980 Olympics, thanks to which it was shown on television for the first time.

Taking advantage of the “warming”, immediately after the disc “Hymn to the Sun”, the group recorded two more albums at the Melodiya company - as an experiment in other genres that were not similar to the style of “Flowers”. The first is the dance "Reggae, Disco, Rock", for which Namin wrote all the music in just a week, and the recording took only two weeks. Texts and arrangements were finalized and invented right in the studio. The second is “Surprise for Monsieur Legrand” in French in the style of symphonic jazz, arranged by Vladimir Belousov at the invitation of Namin. At the same time, Namin gradually began to restore the name "Flowers", putting it in small print next to the already promoted name "Stas Namin Group".

In 1980, after Losev's apologies and requests, Namin agrees to take him back to the group for a trial period. At first, in concerts, Losev enters the stage only for 2-3 songs. For 5 years, while he did not work in the ensemble, "Flowers" recorded many new hits that other soloists of the group sang: "Old piano", "Early to say goodbye", "Summer evening", "After the rain", "Bogatyrskaya power", "Hymn to the Sun", etc. Losev's arrival fell just at the time of the "thaw", and "Flowers" for the first time began to be shown on TV. Namin put Losev in the frame in the foreground, as a soloist, although he was filmed, opening his mouth to phonograms recorded by other soloists: Vladimir Vasiliev, Alexander Fedorov, Igor Sarukhanov, Konstantin Nikolsky, Alexander Slizunov, and others. Therefore, the audience was given a false impression that the main soloist of "Flowers" was Losev. This was one of the myths so often found in show business.

New problems with the authorities (1981-1985)

In 1981, the composition changed again. Vasiliev, Sarukhanov, Slizunov and Fainzilberg created their own group "Circle". And in the Stas Namin Group, Vladislav Petrovsky (keys), Yuri Gorkov (bass guitar), Nikita Zaitsev (guitar and violin), Sergey Dyuzhikov (guitar, vocals) and Alexander Kryukov (drums) played. Also, Namin again took Alexander Losev (bass guitar, vocals) into the composition. Stas Namin's group "Flowers" performed at the festival in Yerevan and at the end of the concert turned the audience on. Time magazine published a good article about the "Flowers", and the group was again officially accused of "undermining the ideological foundations of the country." Both the festival and the performance of the "Flowers" became another target of the authorities. During this period, the pressure especially intensified, the group was again forbidden to give concerts in big cities; and the prosecutor's office of the RSFSR began to follow her every step, investigating where the "Flowers" get equipment and tools, and not hiding the goal of starting a criminal case. These were difficult times for the musicians, and therefore the composition of the group often changed.
In 1974, after the second single, sold by Melodiya in an even larger circulation, Flowers, having confirmed their unique style, consolidated their already legendary popularity.

The first recordings of the Flowers in the 1970s, including the album Hymn to the Sun, both in style and performance compared to the music they loved and played, were, of course, a compromise that the group was forced to make in order to The recordings were censored by the artistic council. At that time, the style of patriotic Soviet song dominated the Soviet stage. Therefore, even those, in today's opinion, innocent romantic songs of the "Flowers" sounded then as an innovation. They were so different from the Soviet standard that existed in those years that they were immediately banned in all central Soviet media. But then, in the early 1970s, even two small records released by the Melodiya company were enough for Flowers to gain immense popularity throughout the country without any additional advertising. They were called "Soviet Beatles", legends were made about them, and their songs were heard everywhere.

"Flowers" became one of the first groups that introduced an element of rock music to the Soviet stage, and it was with them that the entire domestic non-format in the country's mass pop culture began. It can be said that their songs became the forerunner of Russian pop and rock music. They brought up several generations of fans and future musicians.

After another problem with the authorities in the early 80s, having lost all hope for a normal life and work, Namin decided not to look for compromises anymore, and new songs written by him then with serious social verses appeared in the group's repertoire: "Nostalgia for the Real" (A. Voznesensky), "Idol" and "I do not give up" (E. Yevtushenko), "Empty Nut" (Yu. Kuznetsov), "One Night" (D. Samoilov) and others. These were no longer naive romantic songs with a soft sound, as before, and in 1983 the media and even the Melodiya company again closed for Flowers.

2005 St. Petersburg, Sports Palace SKK

2006 Tours in China. Han Zhou

2006 South Korea. The main square of Seoul. With the Moscow Symphony Orchestra

2007 Festival "Legends of Russian Rock" "Scythians", "Falcon", "Flowers", "Time Machine".

In 1983, Flowers filmed the first video clip in the USSR for the song "Old New Year" (to lyrics by A. Voznesensky) with openly political overtones. The clip did not even reach the artistic council and first hit the air only in 1986 in the USA on MTV.

Even Namin's unequivocally positive song "We wish you happiness", written in 1982 and, as it were, completing the romantic period of the seventies, was banned in the media until 1984-1985. Only with the help of Alexandra Pakhmutova did she appear on television. In the early 80s, the Stas Namin Group "Flowers" once again replenished with musicians: Yuri Gorkov, Alexander Malinin, Yan Yanenkov, Alexander Marshal, Sergey Grigoryan, Alexander Kryukov and others. And also episodically many other musicians played in "Flowers". During the Festival of Youth and Students, despite the ban of the Ministry of Culture, the Stas Namin Group managed to perform several times and illegally, under the guise of songs by Soviet composers, record their new double album with the participation of friends from the festival - foreign musicians. The reaction of the authorities was the decision of the collegium of the Ministry of Culture, in which the "Flowers" were accused of "Pentagon propaganda" and "unauthorized contacts with foreigners." The album was banned in the USSR and only in 1986 was published in a limited edition exclusively for export by order of the UN.

The beginning of a free life (1986-1989)
World tour and 10 year stop

Apart from several trips to the socialist countries with performances for the Soviet troops, when in fact the musicians were not allowed to leave the military garrisons, then we can say that for the first time the group "Flowers" went abroad in 1985. It was a five-day trip to West Germany, which happened by chance through the Friendship Society (SOD) at a time when the leadership of the Ministry of Culture was away.

But the real foreign tour of the Flowers began in 1986. It was the very beginning of perestroika. The Stas Namin Group became the first Soviet rock band that, after a six-month scandal with the Ministry of Culture and the Central Committee of the party, and only thanks to the trends of the new time associated with the rise of Mikhail Gorbachev to power, was able to go on a 45-day tour of the USA and Canada. Advertising of the concerts of the Stas Namin group in the USA was organized at a serious national level in the largest media, and the scandal with the cancellation of the tour could have had a bad effect on the image of the beginning perestroika.

In addition to participating in the musical "Child of the World", the group gave a series of solo concerts for the American audience in the most prestigious rock audiences in New York, Boston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Minneapolis, Seattle, Washington and other cities in America and Canada. There were also jam sessions and meetings with Yoko Ono, Peter Gabriel, Kenny Logins, Paul Stanley and many other legendary musicians.

This trip opened a new life for the Stas Namin Group. The band was able to fly to Japan right after the USA at the invitation of Peter Gabriel to the Japan Aid 1st rock festival. Then for several years the group toured Eastern and Western Europe, Africa, Australia, South and North America and many other countries.

2009 London. At the gates of Abbey Road Studios. O. Predtechensky, V. Diorditsa, A. Gretsinin, A. Aslamazov, Y. Vilnin, S. Namin

In 1989, after the end of his world tour, Stas Namin officially stopped the activities of the Flowers group. The musicians of the "Flowers" began to work on their own solo projects. Sergey Voronov founded the Crossroads group, Alexander Solich became one of the founders of the Moral Code, Nikolai Arutyunov - the Blues League, and Malinin assembled his ensemble and became a soloist. Losev could not create his own ensemble and repertoire on his own, as other musicians did, and, leaving music, went to work in a car repair shop. In 1993, Namin decided to help Losev make his own ensemble, invited the pianist and arranger Vladislav Petrovsky, who had previously played in Tsvety, as the musical director, and he and Losev invited various session musicians to the group. Namin gave Losev the opportunity to rehearse and record with his ensemble at his Center. He also made it possible for Losev and Petrovsky to use at first the name "Flowers" and the well-known repertoire. Namin also advertised the Losev ensemble in the media, presenting it as "Flowers", because. it was the only way for Losev to stay in the profession and earn money. But he did not deal with the creative issues of the ensemble and did not produce it, as his ensemble "Flowers". Later, Losev began performing under the name "Alexander Losev and the old composition of the Tsvety group", although only he and Vladislav Petrovsky were from the composition of the "Flowers". Despite this, Namina did not forbid Losev from using the name "Flowers" and even encouraged it, knowing his difficult situation and poor health.

In 1987, on the basis of musicians who also worked in the Flowers (A. Yanenkov, A. Marshal, A. Belov, A. Lvov), Stas Namin created and by 1989 the Gorky Park group was promoted to the whole world.
The Flowers group did not actually exist for ten years (from 1989 to 1999), except for a few projects for which Namin collected some of the Flowers musicians and supplemented them with session ones. One of these projects was the Vote or Lose campaign in 1996, in which only three musicians from the former Flowers took part: Alexander Losev, Vladislav Petrovsky and Sergey Latyntsov, and the rest were session musicians from the Losev ensemble.

After a ten-year break (1999-2009)

In 1999, Stas Namin gathered the group again. Given that the group had never had a permanent line-up before, this time, on the new branch of the life of the Flowers, Namin decided to immediately assemble a line-up that would no longer change and could create a repertoire, arrangements and develop together. First, Stas invited Valery Diordits, a vocalist, keyboardist and arranger, who played in the Formula group, to the group. Valery's unique voice and musicality delighted everyone who heard him. Then guitarist Yuri Vilnin joined the group. This is a rare musician who, in addition to high technique, has a rare ability not to play unnecessary notes. Knowing different musical directions, he was especially distinguished by a special sound, playing modern rock. Bass player Alexander Gretsinin was the third person invited by Namin to the team. As a professional musician of the highest class, Gretsinin knows how to play any music, but his style in rock exactly suited the Flowers. In addition, Sasha sang well. While Diordica was the undisputed lead vocalist, Namin wanted the band to have another lead vocalist that would be more in line with the early Flowers. Once a friend of Stas - Platon Lebedev, having arrived from Samara, said that he had seen an amazing vocalist there. But Stas did not believe him, and said that he, as a non-professional, was under an emotional impression. Then Plato suggested that he himself bring him to Moscow to show Stas, and a week later Oleg Predtechensky appeared at the Stas Namin Theater. It turned out that Plato was right and Predtechensky immediately surprised everyone with his unique vocal abilities and at the same time with human qualities - good breeding and nobility, which are undoubtedly important for a soloist. "Flowers" "Flowers" worked in the Moscow Theater of Music and Drama, created by Stas Namin in the same 1999, participated in the creation of the musical "Hair", the rock opera "Jesus Christ Superstar" and other performances. Both Predtechensky and Diorditsa not only played in the group, but also sang lead vocals. The last to join the group was Alan Aslamazov, a great pianist, saxophonist and arranger. Thus, in Flowers, as in the Beatles, there were three lead vocalists - Oleg Predtechensky, Valery Diorditsa and Alexander Gretsinin, and Alan and Yura helped them with backing vocals. "Flowers" celebrated their thirtieth anniversary with a big concert, which was attended by many musicians who previously worked in the group and friends - stars of Russian rock music. But even after this concert, they did not return to show business. In Russia, the group gave only rare exclusive concerts, mainly touring abroad: Sweden, Israel, Great Britain, USA, Germany, China, South Korea, etc.

Flowers - anniversary concert of the group and recordings on the 40th anniversary of the group (2009-2010)

In the summer of 2009, for their 40th anniversary, Flowers recorded all of their famous songs created between 1969 and 1982 at the legendary Abbey Road Studios in London. If in the 70s, being under pressure from the authorities, "Flowers" were forced to record episodically in different studios, at different times, with different lineups, today the group, as if restoring historical justice, recorded all their hits at the same time with one lineup on one , and at the same time the best studio in the world. The recordings also featured musicians who participated in the original recordings of the 70s.

The double album "Back to the USSR" included 24 songs that really bring the band's fans back to their youth, to the 70s and 80s.

In 2010, a new album "Open Your Window" was recorded - the first serious author's work of the group in 30 years after the album "Hymn to the Sun" released in 1980. The new album includes 17 songs, most of which were created in the 80s and, due to prohibitions, remained unrecorded and unreleased. Based on these songs, one can imagine what Flowers would have been like in the 80s, if not for the censorship of the Soviet regime. The album also contains two previously unreleased songs by Sergei Dyachkov, the author of "Honestly Speaking", "Don't", and others, and a Russian folk song from the repertoire of Fyodor Chaliapin "The Sun Rises and Sets". The album also includes two completely new compositions of the group: "Hymn to the Heroes of Our Time" and the song "Open Your Window", which gave the name to the album.

The lyrical basis of the album is the poems of the poets of the sixties Yevgeny Yevtushenko, David Samoilov, Nikolai Rubtsov, Bulat Okudzhava, Andrey Bitov and others, and the musical basis is classic melodic rock, which "Flowers" have been practicing for over 40 years.

If the album "Back to the USSR" summed up the first period of the group's work, collecting all the known and unreleased songs written in the 70s, or rather from 1969 to 1982, then "Open Your Window" is the next period, which started in the mid 1980s and continues to this day. The repertoire of today's "Flowers" includes lyrical songs, both social and philosophical, recorded with the sound of modern world rock and roll of the 21st century, and with a drive that was not previously censored, and which few people expect from "Flowers", knowing them only from early, censored recordings.

In the album "Open Your Window" "Flowers" do not change their chosen style from the very beginning - bright melodies, poetic texts, complex polyphonic arrangements and high professionalism of performance. The Society of Sound created by Peter Gabriel has exclusively chosen this album for its VIP clients as the most interesting work of the year and included it in their catalogue.

In the same year, 2010, on March 6 in Moscow, in the new 6,000-seat Crocus City Hall, a big anniversary concert was held in honor of the 40th anniversary of the group, which was traditionally attended by musicians who previously worked in the group, as well as guests - famous rock and pop stars such as: Y. Shevchuk, A. Makarevich, G. Sukachev, N. Noskov, L. Gurchenko, A. Marshal, D. Revyakin, Y. Chicherina, E. Khavtan and others. DVD and CD were released concert.

In this concert, the group managed to do what, for various reasons, did not work out in previous years. The concert, as it were, summed up the band's forty years of work, presenting all the famous songs of the Flowers in a standard performance, as fans were used to listening to them on recordings in the 1970s. For the musicians themselves, the concert "Flowers-40" in a certain sense drew a line under the classic restrained style established by the early Beatles, and under the image in which they were accustomed to perceive all these years.

The first in forty years joint concert of the groups "Flowers" and "Time Machine" in the Green Theater of the Central Park of Culture and Culture named after. Gorky

Creative evening of Stas Namin in the House of Music. The group "Flowers" and the actors of the troupe of the Moscow Theater of Music and Drama Stas Namin

Finale of the anniversary concert 40th anniversary of the group. The Flowers group, the Moscow Soloists chamber orchestra conducted by Yuri Bashmet, the choir of the Children's Variety Theater, the ensemble of soloists of the Moscow Theater of Music and Drama Stas Namin and the stars of Russian pop and rock music

Flowers today

In 2012 "Flowers" played the second concert in the Crocus City Hall, where they presented their new modern repertoire. These were no longer the “Flowers” ​​that everyone was used to. As if liberated from their image of the 1970s, they immediately jumped to the present day. Their new songs and style differ from the early songs of the 70s as much as the first Beatles songs differ from their latest albums.
The DVD, Blu-ray and CD of the three-hour concert consists of two parts, released on different discs as different concerts:
– the album HOMO SAPIENS (“The Homo sapiens”) included an instrumental intro and 12 new songs, presented as a rock performance with its own internal dramaturgy, supported by a video installation.
– the album FLOWER POWER (“Power of Flowers”) included 13 songs – modern remakes of the group’s famous hits and new songs that “Flowers” ​​performed together with their friends and guests - the best musicians in the country.

In 2014, on its 45th anniversary, the Tsvety group played a concert in the Moscow Arena Hall for 4,000 seats, where, in addition to the already well-known repertoire, they performed the Politinformatsia song cycle related to the outbreak of war in Ukraine.

In the spring of 2016, Stas Namin with the Flowers group began recording a double album of 20 songs. Stars of world rock music take part in the recording of the album: Kenny Aronoff (drums), Marco Mendoza (bass guitar, vocals), etc. This is the rare case when Western musicians perform Russian songs. The album is planned to be released in time for the band's 50th anniversary (late 2018/early 2019).

On April 28, 2017, the Flowers were invited as special guests after the premiere of the film "Free to Rock" and performed at the legendary Grammy Museum in Los Angeles. Kenny Aronoff, Marco Mendoza took part in the concert together with "Flowers".

FLOWER POWER program poster.

Flowers band concert at Grammy Museum, LA

The Flowers group at the premiere of the film Free to Rock. Grammy Museum, LA

"Flowers" is a Moscow rock band, created by guitarist and songwriter Stas Namin back in 1969. Among other amateur groups, the group stood out for its "live" sound, interesting arrangements, searches for expressive means from the big-beat arsenal, suitable for synthesis with the traditions of Russian melos. Stas Namin defined the style of "Flowers" as "lyrical rock".

The group "Flowers" was created in Moscow in 1969 by the lead guitarist, at that time a first-year student at the Institute of Foreign Languages. M. Torez, Stas Namin (Anastas Alekseevich Mikoyan). Namin was fascinated by the Flower Children hippie movement, and in 1969, under the influence of the legendary Woodstock hippie rock festival, he created a group, calling it Flowers ...

The first musician whom Stas invited to the group was Vladimir Chugreev, a self-taught drummer fanatically in love with rock music, he had extraordinary physical strength and played a powerful rock sound. Vladimir Solovyov played keyboards in the first line-up of "Tsvetov", in the past he was a musician of the "Red Devils" group at the Bauman Institute.

Elena Kovalevskaya, a student of the French faculty of foreign language, became the vocalist of the group. She possessed a performance drive that was unexpected for that time and a very beautiful soulful voice; the public took it with a bang. Stas Namin played the lead guitar. Such was the first composition of the Flowers group. The repertoire at that time was mainly the most fashionable hits from the repertoire of Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin and others.

After some time, at a party at MIREA, Namin saw Sasha Losev performing Nikitin's song "Horses Can Swim" with a guitar. He liked Sasha's vocal abilities and musicality, and he invited him to try himself in Flowers. Despite the fact that Losev sang pop songs and was not fond of rock, Stas suggested that he master the bass guitar and learn a few songs in English from the repertoire of "Flowers". Then it was the songs of Jimi Hendrix, Deep Purple and others. So Losev got into Flowers.

In the 70s, Elena Kovalevskaya left the group, graduating from Inyaz, and also left the Solovyov groups, and Alexander Losev came to the bass guitar instead of Malashenkov. Thus, the second composition of the group "Flowers" consisted of three people: Namin - solo guitar, Losev - bass guitar, Chugreev - drums.

Once, during a performance of "Flowers" at the Moscow State University club on Herzen Street (now Bolshaya Nikitskaya), traffic had to be blocked due to a huge crowd of fans. Then for the first time the name "Flowers" appeared in the "black" list of the Ministry of Culture of the USSR, which reached this scandalous case.

Stas Namin was an adherent of the music of Hendrix, the Rolling Stones, Losev gravitated more to the stage like Tom Jones and the Carpenters, and under the influence of Namin began to listen to Deep Purple, Chicago, Pink Floyd and other rock music, and the arrival of Fokine, an ardent fan of Led Zeppelin, made the group even more fatal.

Once, speaking on behalf of the University at the Moscow Student Festival at the Luzhniki Sports Palace, Flowers performed a composition by Jimi Hendrix, presenting it as a song of the struggle of the Negro people for freedom. And the title of the song "Let Me Stand Next To Your Fire" was translated by Stas into Russian as "Let me stand next to the fire of your struggle."

During the performance, there was such a stir in the public that the band's equipment was turned off. “We saw this for the first time and just got scared,” the director of the Luzhniki Sports Palace, Sinilkina, later recalled. Nevertheless, "Flowers" became one of the winners of the festival and received the right, together with the trio "Linnik" (MSU) and the ensemble "Lingva" (Inyaz), to release small flexible records at the Melodiya company.

Namin took this unique opportunity very seriously and, especially for these recordings, invited his friend, a pianist and composer Sergei Dyachkov, who has a musical education, and, on his advice, Vladimir Semenov, who helped prepare professional arrangements for recording. Stas said that, like the Beatles, they should have their own George Martin.

For the first disc, Namin selected three songs that, in his opinion, for all their traditional character, allowed the group to arrange and perform them, demonstrating that school of rock music that was not familiar to the official stage. These were the songs “My Clear Star”, “Flowers Have Eyes” and “Don't”.

The recording featured Stas Namin (lead guitar), Alexander Losev (bass guitar, vocals), Yuri Fokin (drums), Sergey Dyachkov (keyboards, vocals), Vladimir Semyonov (acoustic guitar), Alexander Slizunov (keyboards), female trio Mira Korobkova and A. Aleshin (backing vocals).

The recording took place at the Melodiya studio on a four-channel tape recorder, on stereo, with almost one sound overlay and internal information. First, the entire instrumental part was recorded on two channels without the possibility of any balance corrections - simultaneously drums, bass, solo guitar, acoustic guitar, all strings, back vocals, etc., and then solo vocals were recorded overdubbed on this already finished phonogram .

It was possible to record a lot of doubles in the vocals, and this saved the song “My Clear Star”, as I had to make many options, from which they then glued together by individual words and sometimes even by sounds what went on the disc as a result. More than 50 vocal doubles were recorded, from which the original was literally glued together syllable by syllable. Losev then could not even imagine that "Asterisk" would become not only a super hit, but also the main song in his life.

When the instrumental soundtrack of the song “Don't” was recorded for the first disc, sound engineer Alexander Shtilman unexpectedly, when the solo guitar began to play, stopped the recording of the entire orchestra and asked to remove the sound distortion on the guitar. Stas did not even understand what kind of distortions he was talking about, since he had been preparing this sound of his homemade guitar fuzz for several months and was very proud of it.

"Distortions" managed to be defended, and they can still be heard in old recordings. It was a historical fact when for the first time at the Melodiya company a guitar with the Fuzz effect was recorded. It also took a long time to persuade the sound engineer to put a separate microphone on the kick drum, since no one had ever written rhythmic accompaniment with snare drum and kick drum patterns in the Led Zeppelin style at Melodiya.

In the summer of 1972, immediately after recording, "Flowers" went to rest in the Crimea at the student camp of Moscow State University, where "Time Machine", Alexander Gradsky, Sergey Grachev, a group from Moscow State University "Mosaic" and other then popular student groups also arrived. There, everyone drank a lot of young home-made Crimean wine, walked and played dances.

In September of the same 1972, the first flexible disc "Flowers" was released, and Namin and Fokin, returning from the sea, went straight to the record factory at the "River Station" in order to pick it up as soon as possible. It was already difficult to imagine that the group had their own record, and even more so with such a design - there should have been a photo on the cover where Yura and Stas had hair below their shoulders! Imagine their surprise when, having asked for a record from the workers of the plant, they saw that their hair was "cut" by a retoucher.

But happiness still knew no bounds. When the record appeared in stores, it unexpectedly sold 7 million copies and sounded from almost all the windows of the country. Nevertheless, "Flowers" continued to lead a semi-underground existence of a student amateur group. Having already become popular, her style and manner of performance were still not recognized by the media, and she performed, as before, only at student parties.

In 1974, Namin decided to try professional concert activity at the Moscow Regional Philharmonic. In this regard, he additionally invited the pianist Alexander Slizunov, who participated in the first recordings of the group, and the guitarist Konstantin Nikolsky, his friend from the institute's rock parties, to the group. Nikolsky not only played the guitar very musically, but also wrote songs.

His talent was very close to the style that Namin cultivated in Flowers, and he and Losev, being the same height, not only looked good, but sang together. Alexander Slizunov, the only professionally literate in music, graduated from the Moscow State Conservatory. He also wrote songs and arrangements. The forced compromise in the manner of performance, which the group made in the recordings, was more than compensated by the real rock and roll drive in the “live” concerts of the “Flowers”.

The Philharmonic made a lot of money on the Flowers, organizing tours of three concerts a day at stadiums and sports palaces. In these tours, the soloists of the Flowers, in addition to Alexander Losev, were also Sergei Grachev, Konstantin Nikolsky and Alexander Slizunov.

Due to overwork, which made any creativity impossible, a conflict began between the musicians and the administration of the Philharmonic. Losev agreed with the administrator Mark Krasovitsky and at the general meeting unexpectedly spoke out against the whole group on the side of the Philharmonic.

As a result, Namin, Nikolsky and Slizunov were fired, and the Philharmonic, using state status, tried to keep its name and for some time, using Losev as a soloist and recruiting new musicians, exploited the promoted name and continued the tour schedule for 3-4 concerts in day.

But the innovation and free spirit of the first recordings of "Flowers" were not long in coming. The Ministry of Culture banned both the group and the very name "Flowers" as "propaganda of Western ideology and hippie ideas."

After the breakup of the group, the musicians of the "Flowers" were depressed by what had happened. It was then that Konstantin Nikolsky wrote his songs “I myself am one of those who hid behind the door” and “Musician”. Alexander Slizunov was taken to serve in the army, and Stas Namin concentrated on his studies at Moscow State University. The group's journey does not end there, but that's another story...

I am already over 50 - but even today, listening to this music and song, I return to my youth. It seems that life has stopped - and there is no world today, but there is only one when friends were friends, when pain was common ... and when everyone had the same salary - everyone was equal. I don't know if it was good or not - but we were honest with each other - we could call each other - "... this is my Friend", or "... this is my Friend". Now who dares to call someone sincerely a Friend?

"Lullaby"
Sasha Losev was persuaded to sing this song for a long time, but he still refused. In the end, he did sleep.
And how I slept!

Alexander Losev and the group "Flowers". Lullaby. 1993

I read in the news feed and ... my heart stops.

"On Sunday, Alexander Losev, who was undergoing treatment for cancer, died suddenly, the former soloist of the Flowers group, which was led by Stas Namin ..."

Sasha was one of the most intelligent, beautiful and at the same time painful voices of our stage. At least the last quarter of the last century.

Start

70-80s years, the group "Flowers" (or, as indicated on the posters, the group of Stas Namin) was one of the most popular VIA of the country. I was then in a pioneer camp. In the same place I heard for the first time the famous "Asterisk". During the camp shift, literally all the words of the songs of "Flowers" were learned. The record itself was beaten to the point that by the end of the shift it both hissed and the needle jumped from one track to another, but oddly enough, this gave a special charm to the songs. And what happened in the evenings on the dance floor! I have no doubt that all the quivering feelings and memories of first love are still associated with the songs of "Flowers" and, of course, with the unique voice of Sasha Losev.

Alexander GRADSKY:

I often had tours with the Flowers group. She was incredibly popular in the 70s and 80s, but few associated her success with the name of Sasha Losev. Rather, few people knew that the soulful voice of the "Flowers" bears this name. It's a shame, but the group often depersonalizes individual talent. Perhaps that is why I myself have been working alone for a long time. Losev was too modest a man.
In 1983, I invited Sasha to sing one of the main roles in my Stadium. Because when the question arose of who to call, it turned out that there were no singers. With a real, clear voice, and even singing live.
After the death of his son, Sasha often repeated that he did not want to live.

Sasha was born in 1949 in the family of the secretary of the Moscow City Party Committee.
From his school years, Sasha became interested in music, learned to play the guitar, participated as a soloist in school, and then in student amateur ensembles. With a unique voice, he could perform songs of any genre.

After school, while studying at the Moscow Institute of Radio Engineering, he met the young and ambitious, full of creative ideas, grandson of AI Mikoyan Stas Namin, a student at the Institute of Foreign Languages. Then the period of their joint creative activity began.
Actually the group "Flowers" created by Stas Namin, this is as a result of his passion for the movement in those days, and especially, which left an indelible impression on him

In the basement of the recreation center "Energetik" there was a rehearsal base, where rock musicians from all over Moscow liked to gather, including the future "Flowers" Stas Namin and Alexander Losev.
At first, everything was like many others - the usual imitation: "... they played and sang from the Beatles, the Rolling Stones."

Alexander Losev
"... they invited me to play in some clubs for 10 rubles, and they even carried the equipment on themselves.
There were persistent rumors that at that time my phone number for fans cost 25 rubles on Gorky Street. The guys told me that they themselves sometimes earned money for beer."

One of the interesting stages in their work was participation in 1971 in the ensemble of Alexei Kozlov. They played jazz with elements of rock from the repertoire of the American groups Chicago, Blood, Sweat and Tears. All songs were performed by A. Losev.

Alexander Losev

"... Stas had a dream to record a small disc, publish it with a circulation of a hundred pieces and give it to friends. At this time, we get to know Volodya Semenov and Serezha Dyachkov - two great musicians.
It was they who dissuaded us from recording with English songs. We decided to record "Asterisk" and Dyachkov's song "Don't". At the same time, Oscar Feltsman offers to sing the song "Flowers Have Eyes", having learned that the group is called "Flowers". Magomayev sang it two years before. These three songs were combined into a forty-five disc. It sold immediately with a circulation of about seven million.

Alexander Losev and the group "Flowers". Photo for the first disc

Success

Many viewers did not even doubt that the tall, thin, handsome man was Stas Namin. They even shouted to him at concerts: "Stasik, come on!"

Alexander Losev

"... We were practically not shown on the "box". Soon we will release the second disc with the songs "Honestly", "More Life" and "Lullaby". For two years we continued to play as an amateur band."

Alexander Losev and the group "Flowers". First concerts

The asset of Alexander Losev was not only working together with Stas Namin, but also cooperation with the "Red Poppies" and other groups. He was one of the few vocalists of the Soviet VIA who were able to approach the singing standards of Western hard rock bands. Alexander Losev himself told in an interview how, having decided at all costs to include the Deep Purple song "Black Night" in the repertoire of his group, he convinced the artistic council that "progressive Western musicians" wrote it under the impression of the Soviet film "Two Soldiers" and songs "Dark Night" performed by Mark Bernes.

Sergey DYACHKOV, composer:

“It was easy to work with young Sasha, he respected me as an elder and obeyed. And only once he made a demarche, it is not clear why he categorically refused to sing "Asterisk", his main future hit. Did you feel that this song would predetermine his entire future fate? Maybe I shouldn't have insisted on my own ... "

Of course, the VIA movement was a product of the semi-official Soviet stage, but, nevertheless, Alexander Losev was an innovator in his business. Released by Melodiya in 1972, the disc with the songs "My Clear Star", "Flowers Have Eyes" and "Don't" sold 7 million copies! It was his voice that sounded on the radios. In such hits as "Our Heroic Strength", "Jurmala" and "Honestly".
In 1971, Stas Namin and Alexander Losev met Sergei Dyachkov, who worked at the Vysotnik recreation center as the musical director of the Mlada amateur ensemble. The acquaintance was the beginning of creative work with Vladimir Semyonov and Sergey Dyachkov and the creation of VIA "Flowers". The result of this creative work was the recording in 1972-1973. on the firm "Melody" two records.

In 1973, the Melodiya company released the first disc of VIA “Flowers” ​​with the songs: “Don’t” (S. Dyachkov - O. Gadzhikasimov), “Flowers have eyes” (O. Feltsman - R. Gamzatov, translated by I Kozlovsky) and “My clear star” (V. Semyonov - O. Fokina).
All songs were performed by Alexander Losev. VIA "Flowers" are becoming popular.

In 1974, the second disc was released with the songs: "Honestly" (S. Dyachkov - M. Nozhkin), "You and Me" (A. Losev - S. Namin), "More Life" (V. Semenov -L. Derbenev) and "Lullaby" (O. Feltsman - R. Gamzatov, translated by Y. Kozlovsky). All songs were performed by Losev, except for “Honestly speaking”, which was performed by S. Dyachkov. In the same year, VIA "Flowers" begins professional work in the Moscow Regional Philharmonic.

In 1974, Alexander Losev marries. In 1977, a joyful event happened in the Losev family - the son of Kolya was born.
At the end of the year, the first concert of the VIA "Flowers" took place in the city of Elektrostal, Moscow Region, at the Sports Palace "Kristall".

Alexander Losev and the group "Flowers" on tour in the USA

After the termination of the professional activities of the VIA "Flowers" in 1978, the musicians move to the newly created "Vocal-Instrumental Group" under the leadership of Stas Namin at the Moscow Regional Philharmonic.

A. Losev gets a job at the Tula Regional Philharmonic Society as a soloist of the VIA "Red Poppies". In the VIA "Red Poppies" A. Losev recorded "How can I stop loving you", "All that was", "Mirror", "Kiss for the beloved", "Insomnia".

Legend

During a meeting on tour in 1980, Stas Namin persuaded Alexander Losev to become a soloist with the Stas Namin Group.

In 1985, Alexander Losev participated in the recording of Alexander Gradsky's opera Stadium.

By 1986, according to the calculations of the Melodiya company, the total circulation of the records of the Flowers group amounted to more than 50 million!
It was he who sang the main vocal part in the song "We wish you happiness" recorded for the Festival of Youth and Students in 1985 in Moscow, which in the early years of perestroika literally became a musical symbol of the warming relations between the USSR and the USA. Thanks to his interest in the USSR and the active production activities of Stas Namin with the group, he traveled all over the world. Played with Eddie Munny in Alaska, with Peter Gabriel and Lou Reed in Japan, with Mick Jagger's band in Australia.

In the late 80s, the group suspended its work. Later, Mr. Namin founded his own Theater of Music and Drama, and Alexander Losev recruited a new line-up of young musicians. He sang mostly old hits, prepared new material.

Stas NAMIN:

“There are people who know how to combine business, creativity, family life ... But Losev could only sing, and it was impossible to stop him. Only one "Asterisk" is enough to say that his life was not in vain.
By the way, as for "Asterisk" - on the day of the recording, Sasha's father got him a ticket for USSR hockey - Canada and Sasha said that he could not come to the recording. But it was impossible to postpone the recording - I forced him into the studio. The song didn't work. He cried and left. We did 30 takes. Sculpted according to the word.
At concerts, he sang this song worse than on the record. And he sang it better than on the record, only after the death of his son Kolya.

Since 2000, after disagreements with Stas Namin, Alexander Losev has been working as a soloist and bass player in the Alexander Losev and the old composition of the Flowers group.

In 2001, Alexander Losev was invited to an anniversary concert dedicated to the 30th anniversary of the Tsvety group, in which musicians of past years took part. Stas Namin allowed Alexander Losev to perform only the last verse "My clear star"

The last time Alexander performed his famous hits was on January 23 - 25, 2004 in Haifa and Tel Aviv (Israel).

Alexander Losev

"Every person is lonely. And divorced, like me, and married. Although, of course, there are a lot of friends and buddies. With age, there is a reassessment of values, which means that attitudes towards life and songs change ..." from the last interview for " Nezavisimaya Gazeta"

The last years of Alexander Losev's life were haunted by misfortunes: - the death of his son and, as a consequence, a divorce from his wife, who soon remarried. After the death of his son, Sasha, according to friends, has changed a lot: he got older, lost weight, smoked a lot - two packs a day.

Shortly before the New Year, Alexander Losev was diagnosed with a serious oncological disease - lung cancer of the 3rd degree. He had part of a lung and two ribs removed. After that, Losev underwent intensive chemotherapy at the oncology center.
The treatment went quite well, and Losev, although he did not feel well, already toured Israel at the end of January, and nothing foreshadowed trouble.

Alexander Losev and the group Flowers Asterisk my clear 1996

On February 1, at a friend's birthday party, the singer, who was undergoing chemotherapy, allowed himself some alcohol ... In a matter of minutes, death occurred.

« Flowers"- a popular legendary Moscow pop-rock band, was created by a young musician Stas Namin in October 1969. Stas Namin (Anastas Alekseevich Mikoyan) was born on November 8, 1951 in Moscow - guitarist, composer, producer, manager. In his youth, when our country was shaken by the Beatlemania boom, Stas studied at the Suvorov Military School (1961-1969), took classical guitar and piano lessons. Before creating his offspring - VIA "Flowers", he played in amateur youth groups: the rock trio "Magician" (1964), the "Politburo" group (1967) and the student group "Bliki" (1969).

At the end of 1969, Stas gathers a new group of musicians consisting of: Stas Namin - solo guitar, Alexander Losev - bass guitar, vocals, Vladimir Chugreev - percussion instruments, Elena Kovalevskaya - soloist of the group. Earlier, musician A.Malashenkov worked in the group - bass guitar. In parallel with this, Stas studies at the Maurice Thorez Moscow Institute of Foreign Languages, later at the Lomonosov Moscow State University at the Faculty of Philology. The musicians are working on their repertoire, actively rehearsing, playing on the dance floors on professional instruments of one of the first Moscow ensembles - VIA Moskvichi. December 29, 1969 the musicians give their first concert.

At the beginning of 1970, the group was replenished by the musician of the ex-group "Red Devils" Alexander Solovyov - keyboard instruments. In fact, since that time, the foundation has been laid for the creation and creation of a professional team on the national stage. The musicians play guitar improvisations from the repertoire of Jimi Hendrix and other foreign authors, then work in the jazz-rock style.

In the autumn of 1971, the group, instead of the departed musicians, was temporarily replenished with musicians: Igor Saulsky - keyboards, Alexei Kozlov - alto saxophone, Vladimir Okolzdaev - tenor saxophone, Alexander Chinenkov - trumpet, percussion, Vladimir Nilov - trombone, Vladimir Zasedatelev - drums tools. The base and numerous rehearsals of the group took place in the Palace of Culture Energetikov. The legendary group with its own repertoire performs a lot for Moscow youth at evenings of rest in educational institutions and Palaces of Culture. Over time, almost all musicians leave the group and create the Arsenal Jazz Ensemble. At this time, the group consists of musicians: Stas Namin - solo guitar, Alexander Losev - bass guitar, vocals, Yuri Fokin - (ex-group "Skomorokhi") - percussion instruments.

In 1972, the musicians successfully performed on behalf of the Moscow State University named after M. Lomonosov at the festival of student amateur performances on the stage of the Moscow Luzhniki Sports Palace. At this time, Stas Namin met the popular Moscow composer Sergei Dyachkov, whose songs: “Alyoshkin’s Love”, “School Ball”, “Words” are sung by our whole country and invites him to write a number of songs for his group. To implement this project, Sergey Dyachkov invites his friend, one of the first leading guitarists of our country, a member of the VIA "Korobeiniki" Vladimir Semyonov. Sergey Dyachkov recalled: “We sat down with Volodya, wrote something, tried. It seems to have worked out. Although half of what we wrote in the scores is not heard on the recording. Firstly, the equipment then was not as good as it is now, and secondly, not everyone played. Recording time was limited."

So, thanks to their cooperation and organizational activities of Stas Namin, in the spring of 1972 hit songs appeared both on the national stage and in the history of the vocal and instrumental movement in our country. Two musicians-composers Sergey Dyachkov and Vladimir Semyonov, together with the musicians of the Flowers group, created truly brilliant masterpieces of the Soviet stage! Artists also took part in the recording of these songs: Vladimir Sakharov - bass guitar, Alexander Slizunov - harpsichord, singer Anatoly Alyoshin - backing vocals, later soloist of VIA Vesyolye Rebyata, the rock group Araks and others, as well as vocal group of Mira Korobkova singer: Olga Danilovich, Tatyana Vorontsova and Nina Palitsyna. The symphony orchestra conducted by Yuri Silantiev and the orchestra of the Bolshoi Theater also took part in the recording of these songs.

Sergei Dyachkov recalled his collaboration with Vladimir Semyonov when recording songs at the studio of the All-Union Recording Company Melodiya: “We did a lot of songs with him. We sat, looking for some kind of image. We didn't do it for the money. The money still came. And we did it from the heart. Purely creative work." These songs, preserving the traditions of urban romance, included elements of lyrical rock, which was an innovation on our stage. Truly, the bouquet of all these songs has become the hallmark of Stas Namin's group "Flowers" for all time.

At the end of 1972, the first flexible LPs with these songs were released at the Melodiya All-Union Recording Company and sold in millions of copies. Songs were recorded on the minions: “Don’t” (S. Dyachkov - O. Gadzhikasimov), “Flowers have eyes” (Oscar Feltsman - Rasul Gamzatov, translated by Y. Kozlovsky), “My clear star” (V. Semyonov - O Fokina). "I bought this record in the summer of 1973 in the Soyuzpechat stall in the city of Popasnaya, Voroshilovgrad, now the Lugansk region in Ukraine, along with a record of the already well-known Moscow VIA. After listening to the songs, I, of course, gave preference to VIA" Flowers ", as well as my childhood friends. We were very struck by the words of the songs with a philosophical meaning and the arrangement of the songs, this has never happened in our country. VIA "Flowers" became one of my favorite ensembles for all time. And I was very happy and glad, after many years receive as a gift autographs of the masters of the Soviet stage, composers Sergei Dyachkov and Vladimir Semyonov!

In 1974, another star minion was released with the songs: “To be honest” (S. Dyachkov - M. Nozhkin), “You and I” (A. Losev - S. Namin), “More Life” (V. Semenov - L. Derbenev), "Lullaby" (O. Feltsman - R. Gamzatov, translated by Y. Kozlovsky). Basically, all the songs were recorded by the singer Alexander Losev, and the song "To be honest" was performed by Sergey Dyachkov. The classical female vocalization sounds very beautiful against the background of rock music in the song “You and I” (A. Losev - S. Namin). The Lviv violist Yuri Bashmet also took part in the recording of these songs, later a world-famous musician. I was also lucky to get this record in a store in the city of Kommunarsk, now Alchevsk. Songs from this minion only consolidated my good attitude towards the work of the "Flowers" ensemble. Only on the eve of their arrival with a concert in the city of Kadievka, now Stakhanov, I did not manage to get to their concert because of my conscription for military service in the USSR Armed Forces.

The songs of the “Flowers” ​​ensemble are sung by our whole country, they sound everywhere from the windows of houses, as well as at evenings of rest. Many musical groups and performers take these songs into their repertoire. The era of VIA "Flowers" is coming to our country. Numerous philharmonic societies give applications - invitations to concerts of the popular ensemble "Flowers". In fact, these songs were recorded in the studio conditions of the Melodiya company by many musicians of other groups, so Vladimir Semyonov and Sergey Dyachkov gather a group of professional musicians and begin their successful tour of our country from the Moscow Regional Philharmonic. VIA "Flowers" tour with: Vladimir Semyonov - solo guitar, 12-string guitar, Alexander Losev - bass guitar, vocals, Sergey Dyachkov - keyboards, vocals, Yuri Fokin - percussion instruments. At this time, the composer People's Artist of the USSR Arno Babadzhanyan noted about the work of VIA "Flowers": "It is too early to talk about the great popularity of the ensemble, since, according to the participants themselves, it is only beginning to" find itself ".

But the most important thing, in my opinion, is that the guys understand very well that the secret of any success lies in painstaking and thoughtful work. Frequent and long rehearsals, improvement of individual skills and, of course, the sincerity of creativity - that's what drives the ensemble. The songs of "Flowers" are originally arranged, expressively instrumental performance, vocals touch with their lyricism.

In the same 1974, musicians also took part in Stas Namin's tour: guitarist Konstantin Nikolsky, Vladimir Polissky - bass guitar, keyboardist Alexander Slizunov, singer Sergei Grachev and the female vocal trio of Mira Korobkova. Later, musicians join the ensemble: Vladimir Sakharov - bass guitar, vocals, Sergey Dyuzhikov - guitar, vocals, Vladislav Petrovsky - keyboards. They perform in joint concerts with Vladimir Vysotsky, the ensembles "Festival", "Magistral", working on the stage for more than 60 concerts a month. In each city, the ensemble "Flowers" collected entire stadiums and Sports Palaces. The name "Soviet Beatles" was assigned to him. During 1974–1975, VIA “Flowers” ​​traveled virtually all over our country, visited many cities of my native Voroshilovgrad, now Luhansk region. Stas Namin at this time also pays his attention to his studies at Moscow State University named after M. Lomonosov.

In 1975, the Stas Namin group takes part and gets 1st place at the All-Union Rock Festival "Silver Strings" in the city of Gorky, and the musicians are also awarded 1st place at the All-Union Soviet Song Competition in the city of Tallinn. In 1975, the main soloist of the ensemble, Alexander Losev, left the band and worked at the VIA " Red Poppies from the Tula Philharmonic. At this time, Stas is taking a course in composition and playing the piano with the popular composer, master of the Soviet stage Arno Babajanyan.

After graduating from Moscow State University, Stas Namin pays close attention to his offspring. In addition to the main line-up, Stas Namin always has a backup group. New musicians come to work in the group: Andrei Sapunov, Valery Zhivetiev - soloists, Vladimir Vasilkov - percussion instruments. At this time, the group begins to work in the style of "lyrical rock". At the Melodiya company, the group in this vein releases two regular minions. For comparison, how it sounded in a new way in their performance, you can listen to the song "It's early to say goodbye" (S. Namin - V. Kharitonov), which they covered and re-recorded at the Melodiya All-Union Recording Company.

Since 1977, the Stas Namin group has been collaborating and recording songs at the Melodiya company with pop singers: Sofia Rotaru, Larisa Dolina, Galina Uletova, Lyudmila Senchina, Tatyana Antsiferova, sisters Tatyana and Elena Zaitsev, the master of the Soviet stage Valery Obodzinsky, Jaak Yoala, Arno Babajanyan and others. In the same year, at the Mosconcert, VIA "Flowers" are reformed into " Group of Stas Namin". Since 1978, the group has been closely collaborating with the poet Vladimir Kharitonov, recording songs on his author's disc - giants: "White Wings" (1978) - "Through a dream", "It's too early to say goodbye" music by Stas Namin, "Photographs of loved ones" (1980 .) - “Something is in you” music by David Tukhmanov, “You wait for an answer” soloist Valery Obodzinsky, “Wheels are knocking”, “Summer evening”, “If you are not there” music by Stas Namin.

In 1979, Stas Namin's group took part in the International Festival in the Polish city of Sopot, as an accompaniment to the Riga singer Mirdze Zivera. Strong vocalists come to the group, who went through the school of pop art in the ensemble of Anatoly Vasiliev "Singing Guitars" - Vladimir Vasiliev, not much later Alexander Fedorov and Olga Levitskaya. At this time, after serving in the USSR Armed Forces with Alexander Slizunov, Igor Sarukhanov, who previously worked in the popular Blue Bird VIA, joined the group instead of Konstantin Nikolsky.

At this time, the group begins to work on recording their first album " Hymn to the Sun", and by 1980, in fact, the release of the album on a giant disk, the group consists of musicians: Igor Sarukhanov - lead guitar, 12-string guitar, vocals, Vladimir Vasilyev - bass guitar, vocals, Alexander Pishchikov - saxophone -tenor, string group, Alexander Slizunov - keyboards, vocals, Alexander Fedorov, Valery Zhivetiev, Vadim Malikov - vocals, Mikhail Fainzilberg - percussion instruments.

The musicians successfully showed their new concert program "Hymn to the Sun" in the Lensoviet Palace of Culture in the city of Leningrad, where songs from the album "Hymn to the Sun" were performed in the first part, and songs by foreign authors and potpourri on the group's early hit songs were performed in the second part. Alexander Fedorov, in his interview about the role of the group leader, noted: “Stas is a creative person. He was always looking for ways to build a concert, feeling the need of the public.” Stas Namin's group successfully performs at youth festivals in the city of Tbilisi, "Kiev Spring", "Moscow Stars", in the cultural and musical program "Olympics-80", performing the song "Heroic Strength" (A. Pakhmutova - N. Dobronravov). WITH

Tas Namin and Alexander Slizunov write music for the films "Fantasy on the theme of love" by Aida Manasarova and "Hourglass" by S. Voronsky. Stas Namin's group becomes the laureate of the television contest "Song of the Year - 80", performing the song "After the Rain" (O. Feltsman - M. Ryabinin) and the song "Heroic Strength" (A. Pakhmutova - N. Dobronravov) from the film "Ballad of Sports ". At this time, Stas Namin puts his programs on Leningrad singers - Valery Zhivetyev, who mainly performed hit songs of the 70s, instead of Alexander Losev, Alexander Fedorov and Vladimir Vasilyev, whose voices are mainly heard in the songs in the album "Hymn to the Sun" and in the movie "Fantasy on the theme of love." This year the group is collaborating with composer Alexander Dvoskin and recording songs on his author’s giant disc: “I won’t say about love” to the words of V. Malkov - soloist Igor Sarukhanov, “Everything will be ground” to the words of V. Tatarinov, “Lyrical Tango” to the words of B. Rakhmanin - soloist Galina Uletova. At this time, Stas Namin begins to work on his new solo project in "Arm-Concert".

In 1981, the group took part in a pop-rock festival in the city of Yerevan, where they successfully performed in front of the audience, performing an encore of Stas Namin's song "Jurmala" to the words of the poet Vladimir Kharitonov. The all-Union record company "Melody", annually, until 1982, releases minions with new songs of the group. In 1982, after leaving the group of many musicians who organized the rock group Krug, musicians work with Stas Namin: Sergey Dyuzhikov - solo guitar, vocals, Yuri Gorkov - bass guitar, vocals, Nikita Zaitsev - guitar , violin, Vladislav Petrovsky - keyboards, Alexander Kryukov - percussion instruments, Alexander Losev - vocals.

Alexander Fedorov and Olga Levitskaya are returning to the city of Leningrad. At the end of the 90s of the last century, they were invited by Grigory Kleymits to revive the work of the legendary VIA "Singing Guitars", where they successfully worked again. As a pleasant memory of those years of work in the Stas Namin group, Alexander Fedorov, before his departure to Canada, included in his repertoire the song “You just listen” (A. Slizunov - S. Namin) from the disc “Hymn to the Sun”.

In 1982, the All-Union Recording Company Melodiya recorded another disc - the giant of the Stas Namin group - “ Reggae Disco Rock”(or“ Discoclub - 7 ”). "This disc," says Stas Namin, "was created specifically for the Disco Club series. It includes eight songs written in different dance rhythms, reflecting the trends of modern dance music. So, the reggae style is represented by the song" I will find. views represent the style of "disco": in the style of "modern disco" the song "Transparent Wall" was written, in the style of "classic disco" - "But you don't know", and in the style of "disco-funky" - the song "Carousel". the program also included four songs in the style of "rock". "Modern rock and roll" is represented by the song "Oh, these dances", "classic rock" (rockabilly) - by the song "Our secret", here the rock ballad "Everything , as before", performed in the style of "soul". The disc ends with the song "Let me know", created in the style of "lyrical rock".

The group also records a minion with songs performed by the wife of Stas, popular singer Lyudmila Senchina: “My joy” (L. Quint - I. Reznik), “I am spring today” (O. Feltsman - V. Kharitonov), “Monologue” (L. Quint - N. Denisov). Over time, musicians work in the group: Alexander Minkov - bass guitar, Timur Mardaleishvili - solo guitar, Vladimir Belousov - keyboards, Anatoly Abramov - percussion instruments. In parallel with working in a group, Stas Namin creates his own project-group "Jazz-Attack" playing classical jazz, jazz-rock, avant-garde music, consisting of: Boris Andreasyan - guitar, Alexander Pishchikov - tenor - saxophone, Arzu Huseynov - trumpet, David Azaryan - keyboard instruments, arranger, Vladimir Vasilkov - percussion instruments. Sometimes Stas Namin practiced merging his two groups to enhance the development of domestic rock and jazz groups.

In 1983, the All-Union Recording Company "Melody" released another giant disc of the group called " Surprise for Monsieur Legrand to the music of the composer Michel Legrand. All songs on the album are in French. Earlier, at the MIDEM-81 festival in Cannes, the band's musicians showed a fragment of the band's future record. As critics noted at the time: "If the film "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg" was filmed now, a better performance by Legrand could hardly be desired." Interpretations of the world-famous Legrand songs performed by Stas Namin's group turned out to be so unexpected, fresh and modern that this work by Soviet musicians was a pleasant surprise for many music lovers and, above all, for the composer himself. At this time, Stas Namin is recording his hit "We wish you happiness" to the words of the poet Igor Shaferan, which has become another hallmark of the Stas Namin group "Flowers" for all time. The group collaborates with the composer Polad Bul-Bul ogly in the recording of his songs "A Lesson in Wrestling", "The Ballad of Childhood" to the words of A. Didurov for the film "Do not be afraid, I'm with you", which are also released on records by the Melodiya company.

Stas Namin shoots the first video clip of the song "Old New Year" in our country. performed by their group to the words of the poet Andrei Voznesensky. In 1984, as an honored guest, Stas Namin's group took part in the Golden Orpheus Pop Song Festival in Bulgaria.

In 1985, Stas Namin's group took part in the World Festival of Youth and Students in Moscow, where the song "We wish you happiness" performed by the American choir "Child of the World" culminated. In 1986, at the Melodiya company, Stas Namin's group recorded their double giant disc called " We wish you happiness!” with the participation of many foreign performers and leaves in the fall for a 45-day tour of the United States and Canada. In the USA, the group takes part in a musical performance together with an American children's choir, where the Soviet singer Lyudmila Senchina performed in the title role. Also, many popular rock artists from around the world perform in joint concerts with Stas Namin's group. At this time, musicians work in the group: Sergey Voronov - guitar, vocals, Yuri Gorkov - bass guitar, vocals, Alexander Solich - guitar, bass guitar, keyboards, Alexander Malinin - acoustic guitar, vocals, Alexander Kryukov - percussion instruments, Alexander Losev is the soloist-vocalist of the group. After touring America, the group takes part in the Hurricane Arena rock festival in Japan.

In January 1986, Stas Namin created the S-N-C Music Center, which includes many aspiring musicians. Since 1987, the Stas Namin group, in addition to performing on the domestic stage, begins its long-term round-the-world tour abroad as part of the Rock for Peace movement. In 1988, in parallel with his group, Stas Namin organized the Gorky Park group, which played Americanized hard rock, sang in English, consisting of: Alexei Belov - guitar, Alexander Yanenkov - guitar, Alexander Minkov (Marshall) - bass guitar, Alexander Lvov - percussion instruments, Nikolai Noskov - soloist of the group.

Many young musicians and groups, such as "Brigada S", "Rondo", "Cross", "Center", "Alexander Nevsky", "Nochnoi Prospekt", "Nicholas Copernicus" and others, passed through the Stas Namin Music Center and received support. .

In 1989, after their successful world tours, the Stas Namin group temporarily stops its activities. The musicians of the group are working on their solo projects. In 1990, the following musicians worked as part of the group: Igor Prokofiev, Sergey Grigoryan, Vladislav Petrovsky, Sergey Markin, Alexander Losev and others. In 1992, the Stas Namin group resumed its creative activity with: Stas Namin - solo guitar, Alexander Losev - bass guitar, vocals, Vladimir Dolgov - guitar, Vladislav Petrovsky - keyboards, Vladimir Rozdin - percussion instruments, Alexander Lukyanov - sound engineer. Members of many members of the group came and went, changing each other, but the artistic credo of the creator and leader Stas Namin never changed.

In 1993, as a great gift to fans of VIA "Flowers", a giant disk appeared on the shelves of record stores. Flowers"(SNC Records) with the best songs of the band members, which were previously released on the minions of the Melodiya company in 1973–1977 and truly entered the Golden Fund of Soviet pop songs. Since 1994, the band's albums with the best songs of the past have been released in our country years, "We wish you happiness", "Summer Evening" - songs to the words of the poet Vladimir Kharitonov recorded on CDs. In 1996, Stas Namin's group "Flowers" performs on a two-week tour "For the Future of Free Russia".

In 1997, the singer and guitarist Alexander Losev created his own project “Former vocalist of the Flowers group - Alexander Losev”, toured a lot.

In 1999, the group of Stas Namin "Flowers" gathers again, and in 2001 performs an anniversary concert at the State Central Concert Hall "Russia", dedicated to the 30th anniversary of the group, to which almost all members of the group from different years of creativity were invited. I note that thanks to this date, the legendary composer and member of the first star cast Sergei Dyachkov returned to Russia from exile. This concert Nostalgia for the real”was released on CD and DVD only in 2005!

In 2003, the Stas Namin group "Flowers" created its new program based on Russian folk songs - "Formula Ethno", a long-term dream of the group leader Stas Namin. On February 1, 2004, after numerous tours, the unique legendary leader, vocalist Alexander Losev, passes away, whose voice brought the unique success and popularity of VIA "Flowers", at all times the sound of the band was associated with his voice.

Currently, Stas Namin's group "Flowers" mainly works at the Stas Namin Music and Drama Theater, occasionally giving concerts. The theater's repertoire included musicals: "Hair" by Gault McDermot, James Rado and Jerome Ragni with the participation of domestic and American actors, the legendary rock opera "Jesus Christ Superstar" by Andrew Lloyd Weber and Tim Rice in English, "dramatic suite" - "Little Tragedies" by Alexander Pushkin, the comedy "The Creation of the World and Other Things" by Arthur Miller, for children "The Teacher of the 21st Century" by Viktor Olshansky and many others. Stas Namin's group "Flowers" includes musicians: Yuri Vilnin - solo guitar, Alexander Gretsinin - bass guitar, vocals, Oleg Predtechensky - guitar, vocals, Alan Sosiev - keyboards, vocals, Oleg Luzhetsky - percussion instruments, Oleg Litskevich and Natalia Shateeva - soloists-vocalists. A little earlier, musicians worked in the group: Valery Diorditsa - keyboard instruments, vocals and Igor Ivankovich - percussion instruments and many, many others.

“The ensemble “Flowers” ​​works, searches, tries, and this speaks of its members as inquisitive and enthusiastic people,” these words, spoken many years ago by composer Arno Babajanyan to the musicians of the group of the 70s, are still relevant today. The musicians of Stas Namin's group "Flowers" are actively working on a new concert repertoire, perform in group concerts with many groups and ensembles. We wish them to continue the legacy of all members of the legendary ensemble "Flowers", Stas Namin's group, new songs and success in all their creative endeavors!