Nurgisa Tlendiev – is not just a name in the history of Kazakh music, it is an era sounding in dombra, orchestra and the hearts of the people. Composer, conductor, dombra player, People's Hero of Kazakhstan and People's Artist of the USSR – he was a man who knew how to speak to the Universe through music.

Born in 1925 in the village of Shilikemer and from childhood his fate was sealed – his father taught him to play the dombra, and the great Akhmet Zhubanov took him under his wing. Already at the age of 12, Tlendiev was an accompanist, and at 14, a conductor of an orchestra of folk instruments.

The war did not spare him either - he went to the front as a volunteer. But, having gone through fire and trials, he returned to devote himself to music again. He studied at the Kazakh Conservatory, then in Moscow, trained at the Bolshoi Theater.

His work spans more than 500 works – from cues to operas, from cantatas to symphonies. His music is heard in films that every Kazakh knows: “Kyz Zhibek”, “My name is Kozha”, “Batyr Bayan”.

In 1981 he founded the legendary orchestra "Otrar Sazy", returning ancient Kazakh instruments to the world, reviving the sounds of the steppe and nomads ancestors. He brought Kazakh music to a new level, creating a bridge between the past and the future.

On October 15, 1998, he passed away, but his dombra continues to sound in orchestras, in the voices of folk singers, in the memory of everyone who has ever heard his works.