Foundation supports cylinder project (01/03/93)

Foundation supports cylinder project

WASHINGTON - The Maria Yasinsky Murowany Foundation announced a $10,000 donation to the American Folklife Center of the Library of Congress during a reception here in early December. The grant will support a project to preserve and duplicate fragile wax cylinder recordings of musical traditions that once thrived in Ukraine - most notably, the tradition of blind village minstrels (kobzari). The activities of the blind minstrels of Ukraine were documented on wax cylinders, manuscripts, photographs, and film between 1903 and the early 1930s.

In a joint project between the Library's American Folklife Center and the Rylsky Institute of Art, Folklore and Ethnology (Academy of Sciences) in Kiev, 400 wax cylinder recordings are being brought to Washington to be restored and copied, then returned to Kiev. Another several hundred cylinders may be available from other institutions in the future.

At the December 8 reception, the American Folklife Center sponsored a lecture about the project: "Music, Life, and Death Among the Village Minstrels of Ukraine," by Dr. Valentyna Borysenko of the Rylsky Institute of Kiev and Dr. William Noll of the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute. At the program, Librarian of Congress James H. Billington spoke about the importance of the preservation work and acknowledged the support from the Murowany Foundation:

"In addition to institutional resources, cultural projects such as the Ukrainian cylinder project are materially assisted by the commitment of dedicated individuals from private life. It is a special honor to have with us today Maria Yasinsky Murowany, whose generous donation has made it possible for us to undertake this ambitious cooperative project. Her brother, Bohdan Yasinsky, has served the library well as a Ukrainian specialist in our European Division. Maria has dedicated herself to supporting a variety of Ukrainian cultural projects with not only financial assistance but unflagging energy and devotion."

But the wax cylinders that preserve such a unique legacy are themselves in need of preservation. Every collection, and sometimes every cylinder, is different in its chemical composition, the speed at which it was recorded, the cut and shape of its grooves; each cylinder thus requires skilled individual attention from specialized audio engineers. Many were repeatedly replayed in their early life for transcription or demonstration, and the wear and tear is often considerable. Furthermore, matching information is sometimes lost, and cylinders have found their way into the wrong boxes. Finally, many are decomposing, exhibiting a telltale oily film or encrustations of mold on the program surface.

The Ukrainian cylinder duplication project exemplifies the tradition of cooperative endeavors between the Library of Congress and other major research institutions around the world. As Mr. Billington said at the December program, "In an era of political uncertainty and cultural dislocation, institutions for the conservation of knowledge feel ever more strongly the urgency of banding together, even across national boundaries, to carry out their fundamental mission."

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