June 28

Sergei Vladimirovich Bodrov (born June 28, 1948) is a two-time Academy Award-nominated Russian-American film director, screenwriter, and producer.
Bodrov was born in Khabarovsk, Russian SFSR, USSR (now Russia). In the post-Soviet period he emigrated to the United States. His son, actor Sergei Bodrov, Jr. was killed in an avalanche in the mountains of the North Caucasus on September 20, 2002 while shooting his film which was tentatively titled The Messenger.
Bodrov's grandmother was ethnic Buryat which influenced his decision to film the movie Mongol.
Bodrov currently has an apartment in Los Angeles and a ranch in Arizona. He is married to American film consultant Carolyn Cavallaro.

June 27

Alsou

Alsou Ralifovna Abramova (born on June 27, 1983) is a popular Tatar singer from Russia. She competed in the Eurovision Song Contest 2000 in which she came in second place giving her recognition all over Europe as well. Alsou hosted the final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2009 held in Moscow.

In June 2004, Alsou performed in the British mystical thriller Spirit Trap with Billie Piper, Luke Mably, Emma Catherwood and Sam Troughton. The film premiered in August 2005. Alsou's powerful self-written ballad "Teardrops" plays over the credits. The film got basically poor reviews and small returns at the box office, and it was soon released on DVD. A release of her second motion picture is awaited in 2008 – earlier in 2006 she starred in Russian historical drama "Vivat, Anna!" from a cycle of films about Russian monarchy. She also recorded a song for the movie, a melody from which serves as 1st track (Intro) of "Samoe Glavnoe".

Alsou is currently selecting a single for her next Russian album of original songs she is working on. Currently she is also recording a double Russian album of lullabies and popular children songs. In the beginning of 2010, she started recording a jazz album with the help of George Benson. She has presented the final of the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest in Moscow. The hosts are normally required to translate monologue in French, to which she demonstrated quite fluently for the event.

Before Alsou turned 18, she had already achieved great success and was honored several times:

1. The Honourable and The Peoples' Singer of Tatarstan Republic

2. The Honourable citizen of Bugulma

3. The Best selling Russian artist ("World Music Awards 2001")

4. The Best Russian singer ("MTV Europe Music Awards 2001")

5. The Best selling single of 2000 (National Russian "Record" award for "You're My #1")

June 25

Mikhail Mikhailovich Youzhny 

(born June 25, 1982) is a professional Russian tennis player, noted for his consistency and all-court play style. He has been coached by Boris Sobkin for 17 years.
Youzhny's highest singles ranking is World No. 8, achieved initially in January 2008 and again in October 2010. He is one of the few active players to have reached the quarter-finals or better in all 4 Grand Slam tournaments.
Youzhny was a member of the winning Russia Davis Cup team in both 2002 and 2006, including a victory over Paul-Henri Mathieu from two sets down in the fifth and decisive rubber of the former 3–6, 2–6, 6–3, 7–5, 6–4.

Vladimir Borisovich Kramnik 

 ( born 25 June 1975) is a Russian chess grandmaster. He was the Classical World Chess Champion from 2000 to 2006, and the undisputed World Chess Champion from 2006 to 2007. He has also won the two strongest chess tournaments (by rating strength) in history: the 2009 Mikhail Tal Memorial and the 2010 Grand Slam Masters Final. He has won three team gold medals and three individual medals at Chess Olympiads. In October 2000, he defeated Garry Kasparov in a match played in London, and became the Classical World Chess Champion. In late 2004, Kramnik successfully defended his title against challenger Péter Lékó in a drawn match played in Brissago, Switzerland. In October 2006, Kramnik, the Classical World Champion, defeated reigning FIDE World Champion Veselin Topalov in a unification match, the World Chess Championship 2006. As a result Kramnik became the first undisputed World Champion, holding both the FIDE and Classical titles, since Kasparov split from FIDE in 1993. In 2007, Kramnik lost the title to Viswanathan Anand, who won the World Chess Championship tournament ahead of Kramnik. He challenged Anand at the World Chess Championship 2008 to regain his title, but lost.
Kramnik qualified for the Candidates Tournament which determined the challenger to face World Champion Anand in the World Chess Championship 2012. He advanced to the semifinals before losing to Alexander Grischuk.

June 24

Arseny Alexandrovich Tarkovsky ( June 25, 1907, Elisavetgrad – May 27, 1989, Moscow) was a prominent Soviet poet and translator. He is considered one of the great twentieth century Russian poets. He was also the father of influential film director Andrei Tarkovsky.

Biography

Family

Tarkovsky was born on June twenty-fifth N.S. 1907 in Elisavetgrad, Kherson Governorate, Russian Empire (now Kirovohrad, Ukraine) to the family of a bank clerk, Narodnik, and amateur actor of Polish origin Aleksandr Tarkovsky (Aleksander Tarkowski) and his Ukrainian wife Maria Rachkovska.

Youth

In 1921, Tarkovsky and his friends published a poem which contained an acrostic about Lenin. They were arrested, and sent to Nikolayev for execution. Tarkovsky was the only one that managed to escape.

Career

By 1924 Tarkovsky moved to Moscow, and from 1924-1925 he worked for a newspaper for railroad workers called "Gudok", where he managed an editorial section written in verse.

In 1925-1929 he studied literature at a university college in Moscow. At that time he translated poetry from Turkmen, Georgian, Armenian and Arabic.

During World War II he volunteered as a war-correspondent at the Army Newspaper Boevaya Trevoga (War Alarm). He was wounded in action in 1943. The leg wound he received caused gaseous gangrene, and Tarkovsky had to undergo six gradual amputations.

Arseny Tarkovsky was mainly known as a translator of Abu'l-Ala-Al-Ma'arri, Nizami, Magtymguly, Kemine, Sayat-Nova, Vazha-Pshavela, Adam Mickiewicz, Mollanepes, Grigol Orbeliani and many other poets.

Tarkovsky's first collection of poetry, Before snow, was published in 1962.

He lived mostly in Moscow and Peredelkino and died on May 27, 1989 in Moscow. In 1989 he was posthumously awarded the USSR State Prize.

Books

 Tarkovsky's grave in the Peredelkino cemetery

Перед снегом - Before snow (1962);

Земле земное - To Earth Its Own (1966);

Вестник - Messenger (1969);

Стихотворения - Poems (1974);

Зимний день - Winter Day (1980);

Избранное - Selected works (1982);

Стихи разных лет - Poems of different years (1983) - compilation of early verse;

От юности до старости - From Youth to Old Age(1987)

Благословенный Свет - The Blessed Light (1993 -posthumously).

June 22

Yury Petrovich Artyukhin (born on June 22, 1930 – August 4, 1998) was a Soviet Russian cosmonaut and engineer who made a single flight into space.

Artyukhin graduated from the Soviet Air Force Institute with a doctorate in engineering, specialising in military communication systems. He was selected for the space programme in 1963 and would have flown on the Voskhod 3 mission had it not been cancelled. He made his single flight on Soyuz 14 in 1974, where his area of expertise was presumably put to good use.

He left the space programme in 1982 and held various positions in space-related fields. Most notably, he was involved in the development of the Soviet space shuttle Buran and in cosmonaut training.

He died after a long battle with cancer.

He was awarded:

Hero of the Soviet Union

Pilot-Cosmonaut of the USSR

Order of Lenin

Order of the Red Star

Medal "For Distinction in Guarding the State Border of the USSR"

Ian Krasicki Cross (Poland)

June 21

Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov (18 March 1844 – 21 June 1908) was a Russian composer, and a member of the group of composers known as The Five. He was a master of orchestration. His best-known orchestral compositions—Capriccio Espagnol, the Russian Easter Festival Overture, and the symphonic suite Scheherazade—are staples of the classical music repertoire, along with suites and excerpts from some of his 15 operas. Scheherazade is an example of his frequent use of fairy tale and folk subjects.

Rimsky-Korsakov believed, as did fellow composer Mily Balakirev and critic Vladimir Stasov, in developing a nationalistic style of classical music. This style employed Russian folk song and lore along with exotic harmonic, melodic and rhythmic elements in a practice known as musical orientalism, and eschewed traditional Western compositional methods. However, Rimsky-Korsakov appreciated Western musical techniques after he became a professor of musical composition, harmony and orchestration at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory in 1871. He undertook a rigorous three-year program of self-education and became a master of Western methods, incorporating them alongside the influences of Mikhail Glinka and fellow members of The Five. His techniques of composition and orchestration were further enriched by his exposure to the works of Richard Wagner.

For much of his life, Rimsky-Korsakov combined his composition and teaching with a career in the Russian military—at first as an officer in the Imperial Russian Navy, then as the civilian Inspector of Naval Bands. He wrote that he developed a passion for the ocean in childhood from reading books and hearing of his older brother's exploits in the navy. This love of the sea might have influenced him to write two of his best-known orchestral works, the musical tableau Sadko (not his later opera of the same name) and Scheherazade. Through his service as Inspector of Naval Bands, Rimsky-Korsakov expanded his knowledge of woodwind and brass playing, which enhanced his abilities in orchestration. He passed this knowledge to his students, and also posthumously through a textbook on orchestration that was completed by his son-in-law, Maximilian Steinberg.

Rimsky-Korsakov left a considerable body of original Russian nationalist compositions. He prepared works by The Five for performance, which brought them into the active classical repertoire (although there is controversy over his editing of the works of Modest Mussorgsky), and shaped a generation of younger composers and musicians during his decades as an educator. Rimsky-Korsakov is therefore considered "the main architect" of what the classical music public considers the Russian style of composition. His influence on younger composers was especially important, as he served as a transitional figure between the autodidactism which exemplified Glinka and The Five and professionally trained composers which would become the norm in Russia by the closing years of the 19th century. While Rimsky-Korsakov's style was based on those of Glinka, Balakirev, Hector Berlioz, and Franz Liszt, he "transmitted this style directly to two generations of Russian composers" and influenced non-Russian composers including Maurice Ravel, Claude Debussy, Paul Dukas and Ottorino Respighi.

20 June

Aleksei Vladimirovich Berezutski (born 20 June 1982 in Moscow) is an association footballer who played defender. He began his professional career in 1999 at the age of 17 in Torpedo-ZIL. He is now playing for CSKA Moscow. He tends to play as a central defender but he can play as fullback, wingback, defensive midfielder or even as a winger. He is a defender who can join attacks from the wing. He scored CSKA Moscow's first goal as they came from behind to win the 2005 UEFA Cup Final.

Aleksei started to play football in sport school Smena in Moscow. He is married and has a daughter named Alyona. His identical twin brother, Vasili, is also a CSKA defender.

Berezutski's current contract with CSKA Moscow runs until 2011.

Berezutski is a Russia national football team regular, making 32 appearances since 2003.Aleksey took a big part in Russia's second goal against England in a vital euro 2008 qualification match which Russia won 2–1. He was on the attack and took a shot from just outside the box which Paul Robinson could only parry away. Roman Pavlyuchenko then quickly ran to it and touched it in to the net.

Aleksei was selected Russia's captain for the 0–3 friendly defeat against Romania, though it was speculated that Hiddink only gave him the captain's armband so he could differentiate between Aleksei and Vasili.

He was confirmed for the finalized UEFA Euro 2012 squad on 25 May 2012.

Following his side's Champions League match against Manchester United at Old Trafford on 3 November, Berezutski (along with colleague Sergei Ignashevich) tested positive for the banned substance sudafed. The two players were provisionally suspended until the case was heard by the European governing body's disciplinary committee on 17 December, according to a UEFA statement. It was later revealed that they had taken a cold medicine which had not been reported, and both players were suspended for 1 game, which was applied retroactively.