A new sculpture was inaugurated in Deribasovskaya Street, opposite the monument to the singer Leonid Utyosov. It is a bronze gramophone called the "Voice of Odessa".

The attraction appeared in the city center on the initiative of Andrey Levchenko from Odessa. He admits that because of work, he rarely visits his hometown, notwithstanding his love for the City.

If someone points the phone at the QR code placed on the sculpture, he can hear the works of 13 famous Odessa authors: Utyosov, Zhvanetsky, Oistrakh, Nezhdanova, Gilels, Richter, Feltsman, Obodzinsky, Dolina, Stoyanov, Kartsev, Coralli and Vodyanoy. And he can sound he Odessa flavour: announcements at the station, the anthem of Odessa, issued by the chimes at the city council, the chime of the tram and much more.

I remember Odessa not with my eyes, but with my ears. I remember waves, a howler, a tram and those who sound like Odessa. After all, even those who have not seen Odessa know how it sounds thanks to Odessa musicians, satirists and artists. This, in my opinion, is the first interactive sculpture in Ukraine. I donate this to the city, it was shob to listen to it.

Andrey Levchenko

The composition was created by sculptor Viktor Tiblevich. It took nine months to realize the idea in bronze. The sides of the gramophone are made in the form of facades of Odessa houses with many details. Here are the famous Odessa cats, a child playing the violin, a languid lady with cigarettes, a sailor and a well. By the way, the prototype of the latter was a real marble well from the courtyard on Malaya Arnautskaya, where Andrey Levchenko grew up.

Initially, it was planned to install the composition near the Mother-in-law Bridge, but the Odessa sculptor Mikhail Reva suggested a more successful location: the City Garden. Andrey Levchenko calls this place ideal, because the gramophone together with the monument to Leonid Utyosov formed a single, semantic composition, as if Utyosov was listening to a record.

Recall that in the early 2000s, a similar object already stood at this place - a jukebox in the form of an old telephone booth. Inside it was possible to choose and listen to the most popular songs of Leonid Utyosov. Unfortunately, the art object was damaged by vandals and had to be dismantled.