Google Cloud Speech-to-Text API (Chirp) + Gemini 2.5 Flash Non-Thinking. Treat it as a searchable index of what was broadcast, not a quotation record.
00:00:00I say, how dare you offer such a thing to me,
00:00:04to me, a beginner,
00:00:06that I don't even know how to walk,
00:00:10to me it was the stage,
00:00:13opera, it's the holiest place
00:00:17where only the chosen can
00:00:19go out, they say, well, what will we give her?
00:00:23Demon, no, we'll give
00:00:25her Pique Dame
00:00:30conducted by Gruodis, so I did it,
00:00:33I debuted, I think, in December with Pique
00:00:37Dame Polina,
00:00:39I trembled greatly, especially when I had to be
00:00:43a boy in the second act, what a number, my
00:00:47legs were trembling, I thought that if I had a needle,
00:00:50I would prick myself, maybe the trembling would stop,
00:00:53I was incredibly scared, but
00:00:56the performance ended
00:00:58and, well, and thank God I was accepted into
00:01:01the theater.
00:01:07Well, as they say, a successful first role opens up a lot.
00:01:10daug.
00:01:16The land she dreamed of and
00:01:19her
00:01:21non-starring
00:01:23neither prayers, nor words of protection, nor
00:01:27promises.
00:01:30with only
00:01:33tears flowing
00:01:35and
00:01:41what they value most is the whole, that there is not only
00:01:44a voice, but
00:01:47a performance,
00:01:50she moves beautifully, she dances beautifully, and these
00:01:5325 years become her beautiful, stable
00:01:57growth period, when she already has roles, when
00:02:00she spends mornings, lunches
00:02:04and evenings in this musical theater with colleagues,
00:02:07as we say, plenty of intrigues, but also friendships,
00:02:11Kipras Petrauskas protects her very much, she receives
00:02:15many good tips, useful tips for a young person
00:02:18from him.
00:02:21Carmen's role, Bizet's Carmen, she
00:02:25would make sure that no other soloist
00:02:28would get that role. Because this was already her
00:02:32and she probably sang it first in Kaunas, yes, yes, yes, I really
00:02:35remember that it made such an impression on me, that I thought,
00:02:39aha, this is like a real
00:02:40prima donna.
00:02:43What kind of Carmen did you create in your imagination before
00:02:47bringing her to the stage?
00:02:51Well, how to say it, I read that it's
00:02:54a natural, absolutely natural
00:02:57person, no compromise.
00:03:04But she saw a person and well, it means she can die with that
00:03:08person, but that is her nature, perhaps
00:03:11that's why I got such
00:03:15in '37, when I sang
00:03:18in the opera comique,
00:03:21it was written, I think, that for the first
00:03:26and it could have been some such, well, time we had a Carmen,
00:03:30who understood
00:03:34Bizet's and Mérimée's wishes,
00:03:37mhm, so I think that's one of the biggest criticisms I
00:03:41have received, mhm, for Carmen, I am proud
00:03:45and happy and was happy, no
00:03:47doubt.
00:03:54But I will die, I will love
00:03:56and you.
00:04:02Active in everything, in 25 years we
00:04:05can see her not only in the theater,
00:04:26see her in scout activities, we can, well, in short.
00:04:30also very much into folk art, she was, yes, but very
00:04:33correctly, but I am leading to the fact that, after all, the beginning and the end are
00:04:37connected with folk songs, it was said that no one
00:04:39knows how many songs her mother knew, at the end of her life,
00:04:43living in America, everything ended with Lithuanian folk
00:04:46songs. Despite the fact that she studied
00:04:50in Berlin, Rome, that later, already being the wife of the Minister of Foreign Affairs,
00:04:53she traveled the world, as a performer she traveled the
00:04:57world, but her understanding that... she is, that she is
00:05:01Lithuanian, allowed her to remain very much in the air, traveling, for example,
00:05:04in some international events, she would say, I
00:05:08always put on my white headscarf,
00:05:11my sunny, huge amber necklace,
00:05:14an incredibly beautiful patterned costume,
00:05:17and then everyone looks at me, I have to be beautiful,
00:05:20elegant, but then everyone thinks, where are they from,
00:05:24who are they, and then I can already talk about my
00:05:27country, so bearing in mind that she was a star, without
00:05:31exception, I would say, that without exception, she was very much
00:05:35respected, when she would come she was always seated in the first
00:05:39place, and at the table after concerts. invited
00:05:42and I say, her
00:05:45demeanor alone was like Maria
00:05:49Callas, people naturally respected her like that, because she walked like
00:05:52a queen, simply like a queen, and
00:05:56that demeanor of hers, that of a
00:05:59prima donna, somehow she was probably used to it
00:06:03in Kaunas, so very, very, but it suited her
00:06:06very well.
00:06:12"We come to the theater where an acquaintance with her husband could
00:06:15have happened, but the acquaintance happened elsewhere, when
00:06:18in '25 Vince became the
00:06:22star of this theater, she didn't even
00:06:24think about marriage and didn't think, because there was
00:06:28no time, because there were matters, well, but how, when love caught
00:06:32her unexpectedly, in '29, at
00:06:35Augustinas Voldemaras', she meets her
00:06:38future husband, meets him very coquettishly.
00:06:43She was a brave woman, a passionate woman,
00:06:46Carmen, well, just like her role, and by the way, she also
00:06:50said that all her roles, she lived through all of them and all
00:06:53of them are her own, well, in short, at that party
00:06:57they asked her to sing, no, no, she said, but I
00:07:01don't have the sheet music, well, who could bring me the sheet music,
00:07:05and Dovas Zaunius was sitting there, that is
00:07:08a man, a minor Lithuanian, and also
00:07:10an incredibly interesting family history, he
00:07:14quietly in a corner watched this beautiful prima donna
00:07:17and she says: if this gentleman brings
00:07:20me the sheet music, I will sing, but had
00:07:24she already noticed him or not?
00:07:27It seems like it was the first time, because he could have seen her
00:07:31or it was just still very new, because he was returning
00:07:35from abroad at that time, because he had not yet been appointed Minister
00:07:38of Foreign Affairs, at that time he had a
00:07:42wife, because Dovas Zaunius was married three times,
00:07:45his first wife died, she died very early,
00:07:49she died
00:07:49leaving,
00:07:55his first wife died leaving two children,
00:07:58whom Vince later raised very diligently, and
00:08:02cared for, but his second wife, very
00:08:05interestingly, according to the official version, was
00:08:08British, with whom he was divorcing at that time, according to another
00:08:12version, exactly Vince, that was Russian, and for Lithuanians to marry
00:08:16Russians, aren't there any of their own, right, in short, such
00:08:19a notion, by the way, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, which
00:08:23he soon becomes, could not also
00:08:26just get married, if he was not married at that time, he had to get
00:08:29permission from his superior, from the head of government,
00:08:33so he needed approval from the cabinet, Vince
00:08:36meets Dovas in '29 and everything
00:08:39develops very, very quickly, and
00:08:42Dovas is offered to become Minister of Foreign Affairs
00:08:46at the same time, and he refuses, because he can't,
00:08:49because these personal ties, well, relationships are developing,
00:08:52it's very complicated, but everything gets resolved very quickly
00:08:56in Königsberg, because they go to
00:08:58Königsberg and get married civilly, in Kaunas,
00:09:02there is no civil marriage in Lithuania, in short, everyone, when they
00:09:05needed to arrange matters, would go to Riga or, in this case, to
00:09:09Königsberg, two months they tell no one anything and..." later
00:09:12they celebrate such human weddings at the Petrauskas
00:09:16home, because she and Petrauskas's wife Elena were very good
00:09:19friends, well, it's joked that composer Jakūbėnas, as she
00:09:23writes, was getting married, well, but since she
00:09:27is a believer, it seems that living in a civil
00:09:30marriage is not very suitable, it has no
00:09:34meaning, so after all, there are third
00:09:37marriages already with a priest
00:09:41and two children are born, one after the other, Saulius
00:09:44Tomas or Sauliukas
00:09:46and Giedrė, by the way, also a completely newly created
00:09:50interwar name, well, and the children are baptized
00:09:53by the much-loved priest Tumas.
00:09:57Godparents, Merkys and Klimas, but all
00:10:01that company, that cream of the crop,
00:10:04and they live really beautifully, luxuriously,
00:10:08her husband becomes Minister of Foreign Affairs, he remains until
00:10:10'34. This is the longest-serving
00:10:14Minister of Foreign Affairs, he travels a lot,
00:10:17travels also as the Minister's
00:10:21wife, by the way, she herself says that I am the third
00:10:25lady in the state after the president's wife and the head
00:10:29of government's wife, she travels independently
00:10:32performing, she performs everywhere, in Rome, Berlin,
00:10:35Stockholm, Buenos Aires,
00:10:38Moscow, when she returns from Moscow, she gets a scolding
00:10:41in the newspapers, for performing where
00:10:45the Bolsheviks tormented Christ, then
00:10:48she gets offended, doesn't go somewhere else, well, in short, she lived a very
00:10:52colorful life, children grow up. She herself
00:10:55says that we both greatly enjoy
00:10:59our children, we love them very much, they live in a very beautiful place, Laisvės
00:11:03Avenue, in the "Milk Center" in that modern,
00:11:06beautiful house, one of the most modern, where
00:11:09apartments were rented only by foreign ministers,
00:11:12well, but in '34,
00:11:15Zaunius, due to political conjuncture, was replaced
00:11:19by Lozoraitis, that is, a more convenient person in Germany
00:11:23nothing ended. The fairy tale didn't end, because
00:11:27her husband works in a bank, through which we passed,
00:11:30and their beautiful and fulfilling life
00:11:34continues, a lot of public activity, the whole
00:11:37career ascent and 47
00:11:40roles and practically the majority
00:11:42are premieres, that is, a performance is staged and
00:11:46she, she
00:12:31I just have a question, I'm listening, she was generally such
00:12:35a restless person, always rushing around, an activist, and here and
00:12:38a public figure and and
00:12:41she shone on the opera stage, how did she manage to raise
00:12:45children? There was someone who helped, there were
00:12:48many maids, assistants, a kindergarten,
00:12:52she could certainly afford quite a lot. She would kiss
00:12:55them goodnight, just like a queen, or doesn't she
00:12:59write somewhere that she loved to sit in her
00:13:03living room on a white carpet, with her children on her lap,
00:13:06and read them fairy tales, truly
00:13:10like the Pelian's story, a rise, well,
00:13:13and everything has a beginning and an
00:13:17end, she herself didn't imagine how
00:13:20long that beautiful life would last, but she probably didn't think it would be
00:13:24so short. Because
00:13:261940 was an incredibly
00:13:30tragic year for Lithuania, and for her the tragedy began much
00:13:33earlier, that is, in February
00:13:36of 1940, her husband died in the hospital, who at that time was not even
00:13:4048 years old, he died of a heart attack,
00:13:44later, by the way, his son Saulius Tomas also dies at a very similar
00:13:47age, suddenly,
00:13:51inherited things, perhaps
00:13:53other things, perhaps. Our Minister of Foreign Affairs understood
00:13:57much more what awaited us, because
00:13:59in October of '39 we joyfully regained Vilnius, but at the same time we received
00:14:03a gift, mhm, the Soviet army
00:14:07and those who had at least some understanding, perfectly understood
00:14:10what it was, on the other hand, I think, I make
00:14:14this assumption, that the fact that he died and left her,
00:14:18by the way, the son was probably 10, and the daughter eight,
00:14:22plus two children from the first marriage. Well, whom
00:14:25she had to raise and somehow get on their feet, but the fact
00:14:29that he died, perhaps protected her a little
00:14:32from initial repressions, in February
00:14:35Dovas dies, and in June the occupation begins and already
00:14:39the first arrests are essentially in June, July,
00:14:43so who knows what
00:14:45would have
00:14:47happened.
00:14:59"Well, this little Church of St. Gertrude, hidden
00:15:03it seems, in the corner of the modern Laisvės alėja, but in
00:15:06fact it is probably a special place and was a special
00:15:10place for Vincė, because all the time,
00:15:14both when she started singing in the theater and when she got married,
00:15:18and especially in those 40s, she often
00:15:21came here.
00:15:24On June 13, 1941, Kaunas didn't even suspect
00:15:28what awaited it that night, that precisely that night
00:15:31the great deportations would begin, and
00:15:34she, knowing that it could end badly, was already
00:15:37hiding at Bražienienė's, and
00:15:41Bražienaitė, probably a well-known name, Daumantas Lukša's
00:15:44wife, so in her memoirs, it is often
00:15:47told that Vincė was with her children, there were 10
00:15:51people in that apartment, and
00:15:54next door, the deportations of neighbors began, and those neighbors
00:15:57were Raštikis, Ašvė, and their three daughters, and she says: we
00:16:01saw through the window how this family was taken away, because Raštikis
00:16:04was hiding, his wife was arrested and in prison, and his
00:16:08parents with the girls were taken to Siberia. She managed
00:16:11to avoid the 1941 deportations, and
00:16:14here, at this time, as I say, she is a
00:16:17guest in this church, she wrote that when
00:16:20she needed to pray, it was a special place, and there is such an episode
00:16:24recounted, where she comes to this
00:16:28church, and there is a descent
00:16:31down from the back of the church's subsidy,
00:16:34that she pulled her cap down, her hat, so that no one would
00:16:38see her, no one would recognize her, because you can't
00:16:41know who will tell what to whom,
00:16:45and she sees Father Krupavičius hurrying by, who
00:16:48also had his collar up so that no one would recognize him,
00:16:52so in such a terrible atmosphere, in such
00:16:54uncertainty, having just become a widow, with children,
00:16:58well, she survived those few years and finally,
00:17:02in '44, the decision to travel to the West,
00:17:05and when we talk about retreat. "You always have to keep in mind that
00:17:09people withdraw with the army, where you can be
00:17:12arrested, bombed and
00:17:15somewhere along the way during this war, her stepson
00:17:19dies, the one from the first marriage, also
00:17:22Dovas, later her grandson will also
00:17:25be named Dovas, so that name, because Dovas Zaunius's father was
00:17:29Dovas, Zaunius loses one child, but as she says, later everything
00:17:32appears again, anything that needs to be nurtured and cared
00:17:36for. Since she is an incredibly
00:17:39optimistic person, she doesn't
00:17:43write about the rest of the journey, she doesn't complain, she doesn't cry, although
00:17:45from those around her you can understand that it was incredibly difficult,
00:17:49so we will also pass Juozas Gruodis
00:17:52street, and here is the conservatory,
00:17:55I don't know what it's called now,
00:17:59yes, Juozas Gruodis Conservatory, by the way,
00:18:03the building was built just on the eve of the occupation
00:18:06in 1940, aha, what
00:18:10graduates from that school, yes, we have one or two,
00:18:35we move towards the main political
00:18:39building of interwar Lithuania, where Zaunienė,
00:18:42I believe, visited more than once, that is
00:18:51talk about what happens next in Zaunienė's life,
00:18:55so 1948 when
00:18:58the DPs already understand that there is no way home, Stalin
00:19:02begins the Berlin blockade and already the Cold War
00:19:05fully establishes itself and... it is clear to everyone that that part
00:19:09behind the Iron Curtain is sacrificed, and the DPs themselves
00:19:12feel very unsafe, because they are essentially all in
00:19:16camps, and if Stalin's army moves, everyone will
00:19:19be arrested, and everyone thinks about how to
00:19:23go further, and here Vince has
00:19:27a great opportunity, because her older sister
00:19:30lives in America, who once went to America with her
00:19:33father, she travels to where she will feel lonely.
00:19:37Aunt Barbara, because she just goes to her sister and no longer
00:19:41alone, as she says, I married a very good man,
00:19:45a man who impressed with his
00:19:47intellect, because I always liked educated people,
00:19:51a journalist and
00:19:54philosopher, also, I think, another very little known and
00:19:58lost, well, such a thinker, Stasys
00:20:02Leaskauskas, a man
00:20:04who became a friend, but never replaced Dovas,
00:20:08and later we will always know her precisely
00:20:11as Zaunienė, not as Leskauskienė.
00:20:15Very rarely does this surname surface. A large family
00:20:18is joined by Gaskauskas's daughter, whom, by the way,
00:20:21later fate decreed that she died in
00:20:25her arms. And finally, another loss, when
00:20:29after 20 years of living together, Stasys
00:20:33decides to take his own life. An
00:20:37awful trauma and yet another such
00:20:40loss, but returning to the motives, as she says, why
00:20:44did I marry Stasys? Because he is
00:20:47from Suvalkija, with incredibly beautiful blue eyes.
00:20:51And incredibly intelligent and by the way,
00:20:54he wrote critical articles about
00:20:56the theater and articles that by no means pleased
00:21:00everyone, but I don't know, maybe Vincė didn't
00:21:03criticize him too much.
00:21:08And in America, she remains alone again, the children grow up,
00:21:11her daughter Giedrė becomes a chemist, her stepdaughter Augusta becomes
00:21:15a doctor, her son Saulius Tomas also
00:21:18finishes his studies, but long before his mother's death, in the 80s,
00:21:22he dies completely unexpectedly, at around
00:21:2550, she in Santa Barbara, yes, in Santa
00:21:29Barbara, which is almost, almost two
00:21:32hours drive to the Lithuanian colony, and
00:21:35she had neither a car, nor anyone to
00:21:38drive her, so that's why it was very
00:21:41difficult for her, I truly believe personally that she was very
00:21:45sad that she could not participate as
00:21:48often as, well, at that time, when I was studying
00:21:52with her, our community was really very
00:21:56active, yes, very active
00:21:59was, and the drama
00:22:08that I can't go, because I don't have a way, who will drive
00:22:12two hours one way, then two again, then take
00:22:16her back, very, very. a sad
00:22:19fate,
00:22:27she sings, she sings, but she no longer
00:22:30sings operas, she said the Chicago Opera doesn't need me anymore, but she sings
00:22:34folk songs, which, I say, in emigration probably act like medicine,
00:22:37mhm, she participates in women's activities,
00:22:41she participates in international organizations, because our
00:22:44emigrants, what we probably don't understand enough, did a lot
00:22:47to make sure that Lithuania would not be... forgotten, knocking
00:22:51on all closed doors, reminding what happened,
00:22:55especially when relations with the Soviet Union were
00:22:57normalized, so she would then say that I then
00:23:01pull out my national costume, I go,
00:23:04I draw attention to myself, I represent, then I can
00:23:08express the nation's pains, the nation's expectations, by the way,
00:23:11and in emigration she is a star, just as she was a star
00:23:15in Kaunas, Lithuania, as she was known in Kaunas, so
00:23:18in emigration her name preceded her, and it is said that a very
00:23:21humble woman who lived truly very humbly and with difficulty,
00:23:25when she stepped onto the stage, she transformed into that
00:23:28true, true star, true
00:23:30queen, and, well, there was probably no Lithuanian who
00:23:34didn't know this name, in emigration, precisely
00:23:49yes, very
00:24:05that's why she had so many scores, which she gave me, but
00:24:08I gave them to the music academy, that is, what you have, what else
00:24:12I had in the music academy, so I don't need
00:24:16to keep anything anymore either.
00:24:20We come to the courtyard where Vince visited not only the
00:24:24presidency itself, but also this courtyard, and
00:24:27now the exhibition "The World
00:24:30about Lithuania". Indeed, what was important to Lithuanians
00:24:34is to tell the world who we are, that
00:24:37we exist at all, and here in the center you can see
00:24:41Vetienaitė, Magdalena Vetienaitė, with whom
00:24:44Vincė talked a lot about how to represent
00:24:48Lithuania, and if Vincė suggested folk songs, then
00:24:52folk dances were partly created by Vetienaitė, the famous
00:24:55"kepurinė" [cap dance], which is known,
00:24:59now it's created, because it was needed quickly, it seems, to present
00:25:02Lithuanian folk dances in England, and they say oops, we don't have them. So
00:25:05starting with the creation of an image, of which a very important
00:25:09part is, of course, the national costume, and by the way,
00:25:12already living in America, Vince had a
00:25:15huge collection of Lithuanian folk costumes,
00:25:19that is, real ones. not just later conceived ones, but real costumes
00:25:23from the late 19th and early 20th centuries from various
00:25:26regions, and these costumes have now returned to Lithuania to the Vytautas Magnus
00:25:30War Museum, well, and probably this whole
00:25:33exhibition, where everything is from artists, from
00:25:37folk art to athletes,
00:25:40and in all of that we can find at least a little bit of Vince,
00:25:44in art, yes, a prima donna,
00:25:47in politics, while her husband was the Minister
00:26:00she wasn't, but the main area is, after all,
00:26:03the theater, by the way, she sang in seven languages, she
00:26:07lived a long life, she died only in 1997,
00:26:11having learned that Lithuania had become independent,
00:26:14and her remains travel, return home, I think
00:26:18that what we are talking about today, what we did
00:26:22here, is probably so that we remember
00:26:25that there was such a Vince, she was divine, beautiful,
00:26:28cheerful, sincere, dear, well, a person
00:26:32who illuminated, who not only
00:26:35sang, it wasn't just
00:26:37music,
00:26:39you know, her life from when she became
00:26:43that so-called Prima Donna, as the Kaunasians
00:26:46called her, she was in the center of attention, which
00:26:50is very, very beautiful and very good for that
00:26:53person, all our local Lithuanians respected
00:26:56her very much where we lived, for example, she
00:27:00was behind closed doors. "mhm, she
00:27:03relaxed completely, like
00:27:06an athlete, we chose
00:27:09guides, both of us would sit like scouts
00:27:11in the fields on the ground with crossed
00:27:15legs, completely freely, it wasn't that she would sit
00:27:18here and maintain that posture, no, we would sit
00:27:22on the ground and choose, meaning,
00:27:25she really physically helped all
00:27:29the guides, choose, a simple one behind closed doors
00:27:33was simple, so maybe that is also a person's strength, very, really
00:27:36she had a strong character, a strong
00:27:39disposition, so such is Vince's story, such
00:27:43an extraordinary, long, but meaningful
00:27:47story of this woman, so thank you for traveling,
00:27:50thank you very much, thank you to you too, thank you, it was truly interesting and sometimes
00:27:54a little bit of goosebumps ran through my body, listening and thinking,
00:27:58that there are so many parallels with today, and some kind of
00:28:01threats and... other things and an impressive
00:28:03woman,
00:28:11after the tour, I asked Edgar and Gerūtas what surprised
00:28:14them, what new things they learned about Vinci Jonuškaitė
00:28:17Zaunienė and, what will they perhaps tell about them
00:28:21selves in 100 years. About Vinci
00:28:24Januškaitė Zaunienė I knew a little, because
00:28:28naturally, growing up in a musical environment, coming from that
00:28:30land. you can't not know, you can't not know about
00:28:34the singer's competition, you can't not know that there was such
00:28:37a personality, of course, I knew who
00:28:40Vinci was and how important a personality she
00:28:43was in the development of the Lithuanian National
00:28:46Opera, after all, there is even a vocalists' competition
00:28:50named after her organized
00:28:53at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theater,
00:28:56so I know what a wonderful Carmen she was, and it's very
00:29:00important that her... voice resonated not only on opera
00:29:04stages, but also on public issues, which
00:29:07I, frankly, at the moment miss
00:29:11from many artists and singers, let's say,
00:29:14but such details, such an
00:29:18interestingness, a narrative,
00:29:21let's say, and all those comical situations
00:29:24in concerts, and of course her complex,
00:29:27dramatic part of life, it just gave me
00:29:31goosebumps. in my head, everything was like a movie, like
00:29:35a drama, unfolding while listening, an extraordinary
00:29:39personality, of course, the story
00:29:42about that failed concert,
00:29:45maybe it resonated with some of my own
00:30:01a kind of connection with her as a colleague
00:30:04and and and and I know very well what it means to be
00:30:08on stage and and and and and to
00:30:11create roles, but of course
00:30:14the fact that a person who has experienced so much is still able
00:30:18to sing and continue her solo career, well, that is
00:30:21truly something I would not wish for myself or
00:30:25any of my colleagues to experience what
00:30:28Vince and the performers of her generation
00:30:30experienced. "Thank God that such
00:30:33women exist, that such women
00:30:37existed, and that we can look up to such women today, and sometimes
00:30:41it seems like we're moving mountains, but when you hear such
00:30:45stories, you realize how many more mountains still need
00:30:47to be moved, women, especially
00:30:50those pre-war personalities, they
00:30:54deserve a brighter spotlight
00:30:57and..."