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https://doi.org/10.29013/EJA-20-2-48-51
Kokhan Liudmyla Yosypivna, Postgraduate student of the Department of Music Theory Kharkiv National University of Arts named after I. P. Kotlyarevsky Teacher, B. M. Liatoshynsky Kharkiv Music College E-mail: kokhan.luda@gmail.com
INFLUENCE OF M. LYSENKO'S FOLKLORE ACTIVITY ON THE ESTABLISHMENT OF UKRAINIAN PROFESSIONAL MUSICAL AND DRAMA THEATER
Abstract. The article analyzes the folklore activity of M. Lysenko. It is proved that the study of folk music significantly influenced the composer's creativity. It has been found out that M. Lysenko's folklore activity had a positive effect on the establishment of Ukrainian professional theater as a musical and dramatic one.
Keywords: Ukrainian folk song, folklore, musical and drama theater, M. Lysenko, composer, M. Staritsky.
Formulation of the problem. The leading place place in Ukraine, where the figure of one of the most
in the formation of Ukrainian musical culture belongs to M. Lysenko - the founder and the most prominent composer of Ukrainian opera, the creator of a large vocal and instrumental form of cantata and artistic solo song, the founder of Ukrainian instrumental music. M. Lysenko deliberately researched folk music and based on the peculiarities of its melody, rhythmics and harmonics, wrote most of his works, starting a national trend in our music on the basis of Ukrainian musical tradition and folk song. The folklore activity of the artist has been the subject of study by scholars [2], but there is still no thorough elaboration on the influence of M. Lysenko's folklore activity on the formation of the Ukrainian professional music and drama theater, which determined the relevance and choice of the research topic.
Analysis of recent research and publications. The last decades have been marked by the increasing attention of the public and researchers to the life, creative work and social activity of Mykola Lysenko. During 1992-2012, more than 40 scientific-practical and scientific-theoretical conferences took
prominent figures of Ukrainian culture of the late XIX - early XX centuries, was covered not only from the traditional and musicological point of view, but also in the broad general cultural, historical, literary, theatrical and even political aspects [5, 10]. Important material for the characterization of M. Lysenko's personality is his musical creativity, multifaceted activities, as well as correspondence arranged by R. Skorul's'ka [4], memoirs about him in the ordering of R. Pylypchuk [6] and historical documents.
The purpose of the article is to find out how M. Lysenko's folklore activity affected the formation of the Ukrainian Musical and Drama Theater.
Materials and methods. The materials of the study were mainly the memories of M. Lysenko himself, people close to him, in particular M. Starytsky, the director of musical and dramatic performances production.
The study used general scientific methods of cognition: analysis, synthesis, generalization, which allowed to process a considerable amount of material, to draw theoretical conclusions. The use of an inter-
disciplinary approach made it possible to attract the results of scientific research on the history of music, the history of theater, art.
Results and Discussion. In the context of becoming a professional Ukrainian music and drama theater, M. Lysenko is first mentioned as a composer - author of music to 21 performances of the so-called "luminary theater" and 10 operetta and operas, covering virtually all the stage music genres known at that time. However, his merit is to bring the folk song to the professional stage and elevate it to the level of high art.
M. Lysenko was an expert and connoisseur of Ukrainian song, because he came from an ancient Cossack family, which honored folk traditions, ceremonies, native words and native melody. His father, Vitaliy Romanovych Lysenko, a colonel of the Kirassyr Regiment, was engaged in ethnographic research at the advanced age; sang Ukrainian songs well, skillfully picking up the accompaniment for the piano. The future composer heard folk songs in the house of his grandmother Maria and grandfather Mykola Buliubashiv, in his uncles' Andrii Romanovych and Alexandr Zakharovych Lysenkiv (the latter played well on the bandura, and was fond of Cossack antiquity and Ukrainian history) [4]. "... It is safe to say," Starytsky writes, "that the first sprouts of national feeling were born in Lysenko under the influence of his granny and in the rapprochement with the performing with the people, and then they appeared poetically when they met Olexandr Zakharovych. Since then people's mood began to penetrate into the musical talent of Lysenko: firstly, he began to record tunes of ancient songs and pick up their accompaniment, and secondly, he began to create "cos-sachky" and perform them on the piano with such brilliance and chic, in front of which the dulcimers and the violin with the tambourine faded" [2, P. 61]. So, since then, Ukrainian folk motifs have become the leading in M. Lysenko's composing work.
In the person of M. Starytskyi, a second cousin, M. Lysenko got a faithful fellow for whole life. It
is known that after the death of his mother, M. Starytskyi went to education in the Lysenko family. Although the second cousins studied in different cities (M. Starytskyi - in the Poltava Gymnasium, M. Lysenko - in the Kyiv boarding house), they spent their summer holidays together in the family village of Lysenkiv, which, like every Ukrainian village, was rich in folklore phenomena. "... We,-remembers M. Starytskyi, - listened to folk songs. <.> I remember that some of the motifs which we particularly liked Mykola notated and showed to his granny who loved songs very much, and especially native, folk ones" [2, P. 60].
M. Lysenko's final national self-determination took place at the age of 14, when they were staying with Taras Shevchenko's uncle Andriy Romanovych together with M. Starytsky. The future composer was fascinated by the musical sonority and power of a simple folk word.
Since then, returning to study at the gymnasium, M. Lysenko began to record folk songs not only for the sake of aesthetic pleasure, but also because of the awareness ofthe artistic and public value of such work. The thought of studying and preserving Ukrainian folklore was strengthened by P. Kulish's work "Notes on Southern Rus", which he read together with M. Starytskyi, and later mentioned: "Ethnographic material and the call for collecting folk treasures so ignited Mykola that he started collecting and recording folk songs. The case began, of course, from the Ukrainian romances he drew from acquaintances of ladies, ladies and clergymen's wives, maidens or even maids, <.> but among them there were also purely folk ones -"Oy, misiatsiu, misiatchn'ku" ("Oh, moon"), "Voly re-vut', vody ne p'iut" ("The oxen are roaring, they aren't drinking water"). The accompaniments to these songs which were chosen by Lysenko were very beautiful and virtuoso, though they may have sinned about the rules of strict folk harmony, which he mastered after the Conservatory" [2, P. 61].
And further, throughout his life M. Lysenko was tirelessly engaged in folklore activities - searching,
recording and musical processing of Ukrainian folk songs. Undoubtedly, he did a tremendous amount of work in collecting and publishing musical folklore, promoting and studying folk art: he collected, edited and processed a large number of Ukrainian folk writing material (more than 600 songs), and performed a number of theoretical studies in the field of folk music. So, having met with the famous Ukrainian kobzar Ostap Veresay and having studied his repertoire, M. Lysenko wrote a scientific exploration "Characteristics of musical features of Ukrainian ballads and songs performed by O. Veresay".
It should be noted that the composer was not only interested in Ukrainian folklore. In 1873 M. Lysenko made a trip to the Slavic lands (Galicia, Hutsul, Serbia), during which he recorded Polish, Serbian, Croatian, Moravian, Czech songs, which he then included in his repertoire of choral concerts. So, later, organizing performances of amateur choirs led by him, M. Lysenko "has actively promoted the collected folklore material, has revealed to listeners the artistic riches of folk songs, has instilled love for it" [7, P. 49].
In the course of many years of folklore work M. Lysenko developed a whole program of selection and processing of folk works. In his letters to F. Kolessa, to the editorial board of the newspaper "Zoria", he called to record only "truly folk songs devoid of anti-artistic elements" [1, P. 27]. These letters testify to the composer's wide awareness of the state of folklore at that time and his professionalism in working with folk songs. Thus, F. Kolessa devoted his article "Folk direction in the works of Mykola Lysenko", read at the evening in memory of M. Lysenko in Lviv in 1912, "He devoted himself to the collecting of folklore and collections of arrangements of folk songs, only mentioning at the end of the publication other areas of creative activity of the artist. Here is one ofhis conclusions: "Even ifLysenko did
not write anything more, with the same collections and harmonizations of folk songs he completed the work, which is simply epochal significance for the development of Ukrainian music" (emphasis added.- N. K.)" [3, P. 106].
Finally, aware of the extraordinary artistic power and beauty of folk art, his important role in the development of professional music, M. Lysenko devoted his life to his study, and then, based on deep knowledge of Ukrainian song, managed to elevate it to a new qualitative level and make it indispensable part of not only professional musical, but also theatrical art. In general, in the socio-cultural conditions that prevailed in Ukraine in the second half of the nineteenth century - in the early twentieth century, the theater became almost the only possible place to convey the Ukrainian word and music to the audience and listener. "Constant struggle for national identity, cultural work, the desire to awaken the spirit of the nation in the conditions of blockade and historical memory prompted M. Lysenko to focus on theatrical and choral genres" [9, P. 28]. And the song became the basis for the formation of the repertoire of professional Ukrainian musical and dramatic theater, in which the prominent place was occupied by works of various genres, based on folk poetic sources: operas, operettas, vaudeville, musical dramas, musical comedies and others. [8, p. 50-51]. And in this great merit belongs to M. Lysenko.
Conclusions. M. Lysenko's musical work unfolded in close connection with the development of the national theater. Thanks to the composer's folklore activity - collecting, studying and creative use of the huge treasures of national folk music, folklore, dating back to his childhood - folk music became an important component of the Ukrainian musical-dramatic theater: it complemented the psychological characters, provided plays with national color.
References:
1. Bulat T. P. Heroic-patriotic theme in the works of M. V. Lysenko / T. P. Bulat,- Kyiv, 1965.
2. Vasylenko Z. I. Folklore activity of M. V. Lysenko / Z. I. Vasylenko; Academy of Science of Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic; M. T. Rylsky Institute of Art Studies, Folklore and Ethnography,- Kyiv, Naukova Dumka, 1972.
3. Kobryn N. Lifetime press publications about Mykola Lysenko in Galicia / N. Kobryn // Proceedings of the Research Institute of Press Studies.- Kyiv: National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, 2017.- Issue. 7.- P. 94-119.
4. Lysenko M. V. Lettes / ordered substantive commented annotated name index R. M. Skorulska.- Kyiv, Muzychna Ukraina, 2004.
5. Mykola Lysenko: bibliography: scientific-auxiliary bibliographic index. / Ministry of culture and turism of Ukraine, National parliamentary library of Ukraine, Memorial museum of M. V. Lysenko, compiler: I. O. Nehreychuk and others, - Kharkiv, Folio, 2009.
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9. Taranchenko O. G. Theatricality in the work of M. Lysenko / O. G. Taranchenko // Journal of the National Music Academy of Ukraine named after P. I. Tchaikovsky. Series: Art History: [Coll. Science. work].- Kyiv: PI Tchaikovsky NMAU Publishing House, 2017.- Issue. 4 (37).- P. 27-35.
10. Shulgina V. D. Days and years of life of M. V. Lysenko, collected in one edition / Shulgina V. D., Antonova K. A. // Bulletin of the National Academy of Management of Culture and Arts. 2016.-No. 4.- P. 66-69.
