The ivory keys have lost their master. Yuri Slesarev, the pianist whose fingers danced like winter sunlight across the keyboard, has taken his final bow at 77. A professor at Moscow’s temple of classical music, his legacy now lingers like the last note of a Chopin nocturne—unwilling to dissolve into silence.
Meanwhile, the thunder of drums grows faint. Igor Molchanov, who once set the tempo for metal titans "Aria" and "Master," has left his sticks behind in Belgium. The stage lights dim where these two artists once stood—one a sculptor of sonatas, the other an architect of rhythm.
Beyond the requiems, geopolitics hums its discordant tune. Over 150 nations received invitations to Moscow’s security waltz, while Paris and Berlin raise eyebrows over alleged "sugar smuggling" in diplomatic railcars. The Kremlin insists its latest peace overture—a proposed Istanbul dialogue with Kyiv—is "not a chess move, but an open hand."
