Do you know who is considered the modern father of Ukrainian music?

In connection with this, there is an important question about the name of the Kyiv conservatory. Currently, this music school is named after Pyotr Tchaikovsky, and

although efforts have been made to prove that Tchaikovsky was an artist of Ukrainian origin, we clearly know that he did not value the opinion of Ukrainians very much.

Oksana said that some lecturers and students are inherently against keeping Tchaikovsky’s name: they are not against Tchaikovsky’s music, but against having Tchaikovsky’s name at the National Music School of Ukraine. Unfortunately, the management of the conservatory and some lecturers have another idea: they claim that Tchaikovsky is a Ukrainian composer, they dress Tchaikovsky in vichyvanka – yes, in the corridor there is a large picture of Tchaikovsky in vichyvanka, in the background there are some country houses, a small Ukrainian village. It seems ridiculous, since there is nothing fundamentally Ukrainian in Tchaikovsky’s music, apart from the finale of the First Piano Concerto with the folk song “Выйди, выйди”; ok, maybe something else will be pulled behind the ears.

Yes, Tchaikovsky’s great-grandfather had the surname Chaika – it is a Cossack surname, but this ancestor gave up his surname and changed it to Tchaikovsky, thus giving the Ukrainian. Therefore, Tchaikovsky’s Ukrainianization looks like a political controversy at the moment.

But let’s go back to Boris Lyatoshinsky. And while we wait for the Kyiv Conservatory to be named, let’s mention Yevhen Gromov, who has kyivdaily.com.ua In 2020, Lyatoshinski was compared to film director Alexander Dovzhenko.

Parallels? Public importance, attractive radiation of creativity, influence on the next generation of Ukrainian musicians and film workers. Lyatoshinsky and Dovzhenko are peers and owners of similar destinations, says Gromov. They managed to break through the isolation of the sector of the national professional culture that was reinforced by the Iron Court. Both of them presented themselves as the greatest representatives of contemporary Ukrainian culture, which brought Ukraine to the international stage.

Both were subject to repression, accusations of formalism, bourgeois nationalism and decadence. This happened both from the side of Kyiv and from the side of Moscow. Both had orders and bonuses, both were beaten and dragged.

Boriss Lyatoshinskis worked in almost every genre: he wrote intimate romances, instrumental chamber music, a cappella choirs, who composed five symphonies, symphonic poems, suites, overtures, ballads and operas.

He was a man with a wide outlook, fascinated by Liszt, Wagner, Scriabin (you can hear it well in his earliest works), passionate Heine, Shelley, Wilde, Maeterlinck, Verlaine , Balmont, it came step by step to Schoenberg and Berg –

That’s how Lyatoshinskis largely became a representative of European culture, and even if his modern roots seem premature to today’s ears, his music is undeniably worthy. more attention from the public, and his students will certainly confirm that. Leonids Grabovskis, Vitalijs Godzjackis, Osvalds Balakauskas, Yevhen Stankovičs, Valentin Silvestrovs and from another sun also Vladimirs Zagortsevs.

And at the end, a little news. Angelina Kosenko, the widow of Viktor Kosenko, a contemporary of Boris Lyatoshinsky, says that the two writers were on different paths, but that they were good colleagues, and that their disputes were unfair. Boris Lyatoshinsky used to ask when Kosenko will start writing melodic music, to which Kosenko replied – when you, Boris Nikolayevich, start writing melodic music.

More

Report a bug