A Little Song About Bears
Soviet song

"A Little Song About Bears" (Russian: Песенка о медведях) is a song written by Leonid Derbenyov and composed by Aleksandr Zatsepin for the 1966 Soviet film Kidnapping, Caucasian Style, in which it was sung by the main heroine (played by Natalya Varley and dubbed for the song by Aida Vedishcheva).
In Russia, "Pesenka o medvedyakh" is considered one of the most popular songs of the 20th century.
Composition
The song states that the Earth is being rotated by bears (supposedly polar bears) rubbing their backs against its axis. And that the bears work very diligently in order to help future lovers meet each other sooner ("so that someone says 'I love you' to someone earlier by a year or two").
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “A Little Song About Bears” as soviet song. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the arts & letters register because the source frames it as soviet song. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 27, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q42456090. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1966.
Titles can refer to several editions, objects or performances, making precise identification essential before interpretation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
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Three-step research path
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Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “A Little Song About Bears” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.