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THE WORLD-FAMOUS ORIGINAL
Don Cossack Chorus Serge Jaroff

Viktor Cumakov
(Baritone voice, he was only in the choir for a few months in the mid-1920s)

Viktor Alexandrovitch Cumakov (Виктор Александрович Чумаков) was born at 8th April 1898 in Kazan, the capital of Tatarstan, a city on the river Volga. When he finished the gymnasium, the revolution broke out and he went to the voluntary army under General Koltchak to fight against the bolsheviks.

In 1922 Viktor moved from Vladivostok by ship to Paris, from where he arrived in Czechoslovakia. He studied at the University of Brno and finished the faculty of agronomy. In those years, Brno had a good Russian choir, whose conductor was Boris Evtushenko. Viktor sang in the baritone voice register of this choir. Viktor and Boris became good friends.

In the twenties, when Serge Jaroff travelled the first time to Czechoslovakia, some singers entered his Don Cossacks. Viktor had married Ludmila, who was born in Czechoslovakia, and did not want to leave her alone. But for several months he was on tour with the Don Cossacks in Czechoslovakia. Boris Evtushenko later on emigrated to America and became a member of Serge Jaroff's choir for the 1948 / 49 season.

Viktor Alexandrovitch retired at 1958 and died 1961 in Trnava (Slovakia). His and Ludmila's 1932 born son, Alexander, lives in Bratislava (Slovakia). As child he used to serve in the orthodox church and after graduating at the University he began to sing in the church choir of Bratislava. As chemist and doctor of agronomy he worked 40 years in science, some years he was director of the Institute of sugar industries and later on as consultant in agrochmistry and environmentalist. As his father he used to sing in various choirs and even the Philharmonic Society. Still working int the Slovakian academy of science, today he also is conductor of the choir of the Russian orthodox church of Bratislava.