Baby Pisetskaya at the Palace of Pioneers

This is a picture of me at a rehearsal of a string orchestra at the Palace of Pioneers. I?m the one in the center, standing. The photo was taken in Kursk in 1938. In 1935 my parents sold their house in Uman and we moved to Kursk. I studied in a secondary school. I studied German at school. We also passed our tests for GTO [ready for labor and defense] and 'Voroshylov rifle shooter' badges. I attended an artistic embroidery club and wrote poems. I was a pioneer and attended a club in the House of Pioneers. I sang with a string orchestra. I liked singing and got invitations to sing on the radio and in concerts. Our string orchestra gave concerts at kolkhozes and factories. I sang songs from the repertory of Claudia Shulzhenko. [Claudia Ivanovna Shulzhenko, 1906-1984, a Soviet pop singer, whose name is associated with the start of Soviet pop singing.] In 1939 I took part in the children's radio festival dedicated to the 22nd anniversary of the October Revolution where I was awarded the first prize. I still have this award. There were newspaper publications about me and I kept these articles. In 1939, when the Finnish campaign began, our school was transformed into a hospital and we moved to another school. We gave concerts in hospitals.