SOUNDS AND VIEWS: Premieres to remember (10/13/96)

SOUNDS AND VIEWS

Premieres to remember

CONCLUSION

Unlike a violin, the piano feels old age just like some of us do. It is the Ukrainian pianists themselves that get better and better. Renowned Lubka Kolessa, referred to as "the primadonna of the century," set the standard over 75 years ago. Other ladies followed as well as gentlemen.

Duo pianists

Luba and Ireneus Zuk (born 1930 and 1943, respectively) studied with Mme. Kolessa and, in time, became the distinguished duo of sister and brother. Their first performances included works by such Ukrainians as George Fiala, Marian Kouzan, Ihor Bilohrud and Halyna Ovcharenko. The high regard Canadian composers likewise hold for the Zuk Duo is obvious from a string of their premieres.

David Keane wrote the "Fantasy for Two Pianos" commissioned by the Zuks for a premiere performance in Ottawa on March 25, 1982. The composer's own program notes prefacing the score point to the core of the "Fantasy" - the remarkably simple Ukrainian folk tune "Dezh My Budem Nochuvaty?" (Where Will We Spend the Night? - No. 801 in Z. Lysko's anthology "Ukrainian Folk Melodies"). He writes: "I have sought to create the illusion that both the simple Ukrainian tune and the pianos themselves undergo the gentle but somewhat magical transformations that befit a fantasy."

Graham George's "Variations and Fugue" and Clermont Pepin's (born 1926) "Ronde Villageoise," both composed during the International Year of Canadian Music (1986), were premiered in Montreal on March 3, 1986. (The Pepin is an orchestral work transcribed for two pianos by the composer and filled with temperament and happiness.)

"Vortex" (1986) by Bengt Hambraens, commissioned by the Zuks, was first heard March 3, 1987, on CBS Montreal.

Donald Patriquin's two versions of "Earth-Peace," commemorating the Chornobyl tragedy and written for the Zuk Duo, were first heard in Montreal on March 23 and September 20, 1987. Shortly thereafter two works commissioned by the Zuks were presented - Clifford Crawley's "Three Shades of Dark" (March 24, 1988) and Ann Southam's "In a Measure of Time" (February 12, 1989).

Still another original cycle for two pianos took form, this time under the pen of Wolfgang Bottenberg. "Elements of Nature," composed for the Zuks - a complicated and experimental score utilizing minimalism, premiered in Montreal on February 19, 1992.

Most recently the Zuks presented "Sonic Shadows" written for them by John Burge. The world premiere took place March 15, 1995, in the Grant Hall Performing Arts Series at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario. Most of the above performances were recorded by CBC Radio.

Pianist-poet

Christina Petrowska-Bregent (born 1948) is not only a poetess of the piano but also writes verse and works as a graphic artists. The recipient of nine grants from the Canadian and French governments, she is an extraordinary specialist in virtually unplayable modern music.

Ms. Petrowska's premieres include Luis de Pablo's "Affettuoso," Michael Vinet's "Aleph," Micheline Coulombe Saint-Marcourx's "Assemblages" and Paul Huebner's "Ocotillo," a work dedicated to her. Young Canadian composer Alexina Louie likewise wrote especially for Petrowska resulting in a world premiere (New York City, May 4, 1989). The title of Louie's piece could not be traced, otherwise the source for the above data is the 1981 edition of "Encyclopedia of Music in Canada" (p. 751).

Lydia Artymiw (born 1954) and Juliana Osinchuk (born 1953) learned rudiments of piano playing at the Ukrainian Music Institute in Philadelphia and New York, respectively. Perhaps each one is a part of a string of pearls once started by the brilliance of Lubka Kolessa.

Ms. Artymiw's husband is a musicologist able to procure holographs, i.e., original composer's manuscripts, resulting in unusually authentic performances by his wife. She has to her credit the first complete recording of unknown music by Johannes Brahms, namely, Two Gavottes from his Suite in A Minor (Chandos label, 1984). Ms. Artymiw also recorded a series of other compositions for Chandos now available on cassette or CD.

Currently concertizing throughout the world (also as soloist with the finest symphony orchestras), Ms. Artymiw's repertoire includes Mykola Lysenko and Vasyl Barvinsky.

Juliana Osinchuk's world and American premieres include Ukrainian works by Borys Liatoshynsky and Virko Baley. The contemporary American composer Donald Lybbert's Second Piano Sonata sounded for the first time on April 22, 1980, at New York's Hunter College Auditorium in Dr. Osinchuk's interpretation.

Her string of world premieres (excluding chamber music) continued February 24, 1991, at Mamaroneck, N.Y., with "Circles" by Alvin Brehm, dean of music at State University of New York at Purchase. She also played the European premiere of Lowell Liebermann's Second Piano Concerto at Kyiv's Contemporary Music Fest, October 9, 1992.

Dr. Osinchuk's Alaskan debut at Anchorage (September 24, 1993) included the premiere of a work composed for the pianist, namely "The Fragile Vessel'' Op. 36 by Philip Munger (born 1946). This distinguished Alaskan composer was in turn inspired by noted artist Karen Stahlecker, resulting in a work compared to Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition."

The pianist's recent recital on October 27, 1995, at the Kennedy Center's Terrace Theater included works by three contemporary Alaskan composers: the Washington premiere of Craig Coray's (born 1948) "Silam Inua" and the world premieres of John Luther Adams' (born 1953) "Five Yupik Dances" and Philip Munger's "Semichi Toccata" Op. 43. Mr. Coray's composition uses traditional hunting calls, while Adams' work was inspired by songs of the Eskimos. The controversial pieces by Mr. Munger stem in part from his work with environmental artists. These three premieres in Washington (subsequently, in New York) were made possible by a National Endowment grant won by the pianist.

Reviewing the recital in the Washington Post, Judy Gruber noted that Dr. Osinchuk "made it clear to her audience that she had real affinity for this music, with a deep intellectual understanding of the pieces and the technical ability to interpret them." Another reviewer commended Ms. Osinchuk for "trying to put the 49th state on the musical map by showcasing music by Alaskan composers."

Critic Gruber also underlined that "nowhere was Osinchuk's affinity more evident than in her performance of Ukrainian composer Viktor Kosenko." A world-premiere CD of Kosenko's neo-classical music is anticipated by Dr. Osinchuk, a champion of the Ukrainian piano repertoire. It should be mentioned at this point, that she graduated from Juilliard School in New York with a doctoral dissertation on Kosenko - another first for this music school and for Ukrainian musicology.

Keyboard kings

Winning the first prize (with gold medal) at the International Liszt-Bartok Competition (Budapest, 1971) established the reputation of Mykola Suk, specializing in 20th century literature and performing works penned just for him. One of them - the Concerto for Piano and Strings by Alfred Schnittke, contemporary keeper of the Russian avant-garde - was played by Mr. Suk for the first time in America in Chicago in 1992.

Mr. Suk bears the title of Ukraine's Outstanding Artist and lives in New York City, where he is also artistic director at the Ukrainian Institute of America.

One of the most convincing recreators of the sweeping romantic style, both sonically and visually, is pianist Volodymyr Vynnytsky (born 1955), laureate of the Marguerite Long-Jacques Thibaud International Piano Competition (Paris, 1983). A critic once described his skill of "spinning the threads of musical nuance into a web that captures the very fantastical source of a composition." While still in Moscow, Mr. Vynnytsky captured the essence of Boris Tchaikovsky (1925-1996) in a premiere of the latter's recent effort for keyboard. The late composer was not related to Peter Tchaikovsky who was of Ukrainian ancestry.

Also unrelated, apparently, is Alexander Tchaikovsky (born 1946), regarded as a leading figure and outstanding representative of the 1980s generation. His style is marked by lyricism, delicate humor and by a powerful gift for dramatic representation. Mr. Tchaikovsky's Ritornello (quasi sonata) Op. 58 was first presented by Mr. Vynnytsky at Carnegie Hall on November 13, 1994.

As soon as Alexander Slobodyanik (born 1941) conquered America with strikingly handsome features and romantically longish hair, he was dubbed the "Ukrainian Liszt" by another pianist (and fan), Daria Hordynska-Karanowycz. This tall maverick of a musician literally towers over most pianists and needs no elaborate compliments.

Mr. Slobodyanik is probably without parallel in monumental romantic music but his premiere performances have focused on modern literature. The pianist took part in the world premiere of a chamber work by Boris Tishchenko (born 1939) at the Leningrad Conservatory in 1971. The music idiom of this composer is greatly advanced without overstepping the bounds of tonality.

The piano virtuoso also premiered three works by Alfred Schnittke. These included "Preludes after Joseph Brodsky" with text read by Mr. Brodsky himself, a Nobel Prize laureate. Schnittke composed this expressly for Mr. Slobodyanik, with the world premiere filling Carnegie Hall (New York, October 21, 1990). Two months later, in December, 1990, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Maxim Shostakovich conducted the Brooklyn Philharmonic in the American premiere of Schnittke's Concerto for Piano and Orchestra, with Mr. Slobodyanik as soloist.

The third score by Schnittke was his Concerto Grosso No. 5, with the piano part conjured especially for Slobodyanik. Premiered in May, 1991 during the Carnegie Hall Centennial with the Cleveland Orchestra under Christopher von Dohnanyi, the concerto also featured violinist Gidon Kremer.

A different type of focus first had occurred once Mr. Slobodyanik recorded the complete Chopin Études Op. 10 and Op. 25 for the Melodiya label released in the USSR in 1971. Critics hailed this issue not only for its profound musicianship, but also because the cycle was recorded very successfully from a live performance. "His technique is extraordinarily clean," conceded one critic when writing about these unedited releases of Chopin. Not even Horowitz himself dared to do that!

According to Mr. Slobodyanik the rarely performed "Requiem" by Franz Liszt was first sung not in Weimar or Vienna but in Lviv, Ukraine. The year was 1861; the piece was performed as a grand "panakhyda" (requiem service) mourning the passing of Ukraine's national poet, Taras Shevchenko, (1814-1861).

Celebrated conductors

The conductor's baton commands respect, even instills fear. Such was the reputation of Arturo Toscanini as well as of the Ukrainian conductor Mykola (Nicolai) Malko (1883-1961). Trained at a very early age by Mykola Lysenko, Mr. Malko's baton later led the world's greatest orchestras, also in a long list of treasured recordings.

He conducted the world premiere of Nikolai Myaskovsky's (1881-1950) Fifth Symphony (Moscow, July 18, 1920) - a score based on melodies from western Ukraine. Mr. Malko even introduced the first two symphonies of young Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975) - both in Leningrad (May 12, 1926 and November 6, 1927, respectively).

By the time he wrote his Symphony No. 11 Shostakovich was long a master of orchestration much in demand by American conductors. The honor this time, however, went to Nathan Rachlin (born 1906), who has long been associated with Kyiv. The Ukrainian conductor was cheered in Moscow, however, on the day of the first performance (October 30, 1957) of this symphony.

Conductor and music scholar Ihor Blazhkov (born 1936) has specialized in modern and avant-garde scores including American works. He premiered "Five Fragments for Orchestra" Op. 42 by Shostakovich (Moscow, April 26, 1965) and "The Lament of Shaza" for soprano and small orchestra by Andrei Volkonsky (Moscow, May 12, 1965). Mr. Blazhkov also led the first reading of Boris Tishchenko's Concerto for Cello, Woodwinds and Percussion (Leningrad, February 5, 1966) with Mstyslav Rostropovich as featured soloist. World premieres of Ukrainian orchestral music followed with equal success.

American-based conductor and violinist Adrian Bryttan (born 1948) unveiled the opera "Sibol" by the Czech composer Ludmila Ulehla (New York, April 1, 1993). The contemporary production had to be repeated three days later. Since that time Mr. Bryttan has been much in demand at Lviv Philharmonic concerts of Ukrainian and Western music.

Finished at last

Even great composers have been known to get distracted by some projects, leaving others unfinished. Simply notorious in this regard were the Russians, especially Mussorgsky, who amassed a veritable catalogue of abandoned works. Tchaikovsky was much more systematic, but even he left his Symphony No. 7 unfinished.

Reconstructed from fragments of manuscripts this symphony was not premiered until 1957 in... Philadelphia. Yes, it was the Philadelphia Orchestra under Eugene Ormandy that first performed, and later recorded what proved to be a rewarding experience.

The man who finally crowned Tchaikovsky's efforts and made the Philadelphia festivities possible was the Ukrainian composer and educator Semen Bohatyriov (1890-1960). By the way, he was the teacher of the late Mykola Fomenko and the contemporary conductor and musicologist George Oransky - two familiar names in the Ukrainian American community.

The founder of modern Ukrainian music, Boris Liatoshynsky, finished and orchestrated the Concerto for Violin and Orchestra, Op. 100, by his Belgian-Russian teacher Rheingold Gliere of Kyiv. The sumptuous score, completely in character with the much more traditional Gliere, received its first performance in 1959.

Conclusion

We have seen Ukrainian musicians leave their mark on the worlds of Beethoven, Brahms, Richard Strauss, Rossini, Donizetti, Paganini, Bizet, Saint-Saëns, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, Myaskovsky, Shostakovich and Schnittke, among others. In several cases Ukrainian performers put composers of the West "on the map" in a matter of days. Such memorable premieres should make us realize the true, sometimes untapped, potential of our performing artists - past, present and, by logical extension, future.

This writer's efforts can likewise be considered a world premiere, albeit a lengthy one. Or shall we call this ... a mini-series to remember?

CONCLUSION

Premieres to remember: an addendum