Fyodor Komissarzhevsky

A Russian tenor who gave up the law for singing, training in Italy with Pietro Repetto and touring there, in Spain and Brazil as Teodoro di Pietro. He joined the Mariinsky in 1863 and was its leading tenor until 1880, creating Don Juan in Dargomyzhsky's The Stone Guest, the Pretender in Boris Godunov, Sinodal in Rubinstein's The Demon and the title role of Tchaikovsky's Vakula the Smith between 1872 and 1876. He taught singing and drama at the Moscow Conservatory from 1883; Stanislavsky was his pupil. His daughter Vera Komissarzhevskaya became a celebrated actress, his son Theodore a director.