Alexey Tsereteli

Alexey Tsereteli (; 1864, Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire – 1942, Paris, France) was a Georgian prince and a Russian opera entrepreneur.

Alexey was born in St. Petersburg and received the same education as all the Russian aristocracy, and did not even know the Georgian language. He grew up a man of Russian culture. His father was Akaki Tsereteli (1840–1915), a Georgian prince, a prominent Georgian poet, and a national liberation movement figure. His mother was Natalia Petrovna Bazilevskaya (ru: Наталия Петровна Базилевская).

From childhood, he liked music and especially opera. He received the profession of engineer, but a passion for opera has won, and he decided to open an opera troupe. In 1896/1897, Alexey Tsereteli opened an opera enterprise in Kharkov.

In 1929, he joined his company with a troupe of Russian opera, including Maria Nikolaevna Kuznetsova and her husband Alfred Massenet (Jules Massenet's nephew). The new company was called the Russian Opera in Paris. Konstantin Korovin, Ivan Bilibin, Mstislav Dobuzhinsky; Michel Fokine, Bronislava Nijinska, opera singers: Feodor Chaliapin, Dmitriy Smirnov, Yelena Sadoven, Marya Davydova, Marianna Cherkasskaya, Natalia Ermolenko-Yuzhina, George Pozemkovskiy, Yakov Gorsky, Kapiton Zaporojets (Capiton D. Zaporozhetz, ru: Капитон Запорожец), Nina Koshetz, etc. Alexey Tsereteli invited Colonel W. de Basil’s ballet troupe. ).

However, the owners of the company quarreled and filed their claims in court, causing Private Company to eventually disband. After this happened, Tsereteli tried to work with other partners, but failed to rebuild his success.

Before his death, Tsereteli bequeathed all the props of his troupe to the "theater of the future of a free Georgia". But his will was not recognized as valid, and the property went to auction.

Prince Alexei Akakiyevich Tsereteli died in 1942 in German-occupied Paris.