At the time of writing, December 2025, he is still in prison in Georgia, accused of organising violence against the ruling regime. Although his technique was a bit unfinished and his vocal production was somewhat idiosyncratic as a result, I have always found the instrument itself kind of jaw dropping in its incredible weighty darkness and size.

He was successful internationally and took on all the big roles while still in his 20s, something particularly unusual for his voice type, such was his incredible natural endowment. Big voices are hard to get in order and the early success arrived before he had really got on top of his, so perhaps unsurprisingly it wasn’t very many years before the rough edges came to predominate.

But on recordings from the 1980s, both live and studio, he is thrilling as a kind of vocal phenomenon and he was still effective in certain roles for many more roles, transitioning to cameos and comprimario parts and still scheduled in them through the 24/25 season. I shared a stage with him once when he appeared as soloist in Kashchey the Immortal with the LPO back in 1998. Mark Elder introduced him at the rehearsal by saying, “Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the biggest voice in the world” and he was really delightful.