Hanna Havrylets. A Bukovyna Chrystmas

About the Album

Hanna Havrylets “A Bukovyna Christmas”. A Christmas oratorio for choir, soloists and percussion. Percussion arrangements – Heorhii Chernenko

“As in a small droplet of water we find encoded a model of the whole oceanic world, so also the traditions of one village mirror the greatness and beauty of the culture of a whole nation.
This phenomenon we observe exemplified in a Bukovinian village, where we find a powerful creative energy whose recuperative power can sustain the soulsof millions of people”.
(Hanna Havrylets)

Hanna Havrylets is a renowned Ukrainian composer, teacher, musical-community activist, one of the leaders of today’s pleiade of creative artists. She wholeheartedly immerses herself into the world of music, impressing her listeners with her distinctive musical intonations, innovative rhythms, and unusual harmonies. In her output we find symphonic, instrumental and vocal works, but most notably Hanna has established herself in our oldest genre – choral music. In this genre the composer is at her most diverse: works for mixed, men’s, women’s and children’s choirs, musical settings of Psalms, settings of texts of Ukrainian and international poets, and folklore. But in her work with folklore Hanna has achieved success unparalleled elsewhere, both in arrangements and in original compositions regarding folk texts, which are acknowledged and recognized as folk songs themselves.

Hanna Havrylets was born in 1958 in a picturesque sub-Carpathian village, Vydyniv, in the Ivano-Frankivsk region (Western Ukraine). With special gratitude Hanna remembers her first
teacher, Vasyl Kufliuk (a graduate of the Warsaw Conservatory), who introduced her to the world of music. She graduated from the Lviv State Conservatory in composition from the class of Prof. Volodymyr Flis, followed by an assistantship in the class of the renowned composer Myroslav Skoryk. Today Hanna Havrylets is the head of the Kyiv branch of the National Union of Ukrainian composers, a professor at the National Academy of Music of Ukraine. Not many contemporary composers have become an organic part of contemporary musicocultural society. The works of Hanna Havrylets are heard consistently in performances by national and regional ensembles on the stages of Hanna Havrylets is a renowned Ukrainian composer, teacher, musical-community activist, one of the leaders of today’s pleiade of creative artists. She wholeheartedly immerses herself into the world of music, impressing her listeners with her distinctive musical intonations, innovative rhythms, and unusual harmonies. In her output we find symphonic, instrumental and vocal works, but most notably Hanna has established herself in our oldest genre – choral music. In this genre the composer is at her most diverse: works for mixed, men’s, women’s and children’s choirs, musical settings of Psalms, settings of texts of Ukrainian and international poets, and folklore. But in her work with folklore Hanna has achieved success unparalleled elsewhere, both in arrangements and in original compositions regarding folk texts, which are acknowledged and recognized as folk songs themselves.

The Christmas oratorio “Bukovyna Christmas” was composed in 2010 (originally titled “A Barbivtsi Carol”). The name “Bukovyna” means “land of beech trees” and was officially
adopted at the end of the 14 th century. Nature has been generous with this colorful corner of Ukraine: the Carpathian Mountains are carpeted with green forests of beeches and pines, and the plains with exquisite and bountiful orchards, nourished by the rivers Cheremosh, Prut and Dniester. Bukovyna’s history reaches back into ancient times: the latest archaeological discoveries claim that people settled the shores of its rivers even before the dawning of history, and have flourished from this time on. Bukovyna became part of various states: Kyivan Rus’, Galicia-Volynia, later Moldavian monarchies and Hungary, Romania, Russia and Austria. As a result, its ethnic composition consists of Ukrainians, Romanians, Moldavians, Polish, Russians, Jews, Germans – altogether some 60 nationalities. Each village of Bukovyna has its own history and culture. At the initiative of Eugene Savchuk the entire folkloric content of our oratorio was collected, transcribed and deciphered from one such village – Barbivtsi. Sixteen authentic folksongs form the basis of the score of this Christmas oratorio. The authoress immersed herself into the world of carols, greeting songs, Christmas chants, lyrical songs, and has created a contextually unique folk drama. Each song constitutes a separate self-sufficient number, but all are unified by ritual dramatic contexts. Profoundly inspired by the heart of ancient Ukrainian vocal culture and age-old national traditions, Hanna Havrylets has created a musical fresco, contributing organically to the millennial history of Ukrainian spiritual music. The well-known Ukrainian musician and composer Heorhii Chernenko has very carefully embellished this picture with percussion arrangements. In addition, he contributed an original work of his own, “Maidan” (№12. The public square), echoing the events that occurred in Kyiv’s main square during the Revolution of Dignity. Then, in the winter of 2013, all of Kyiv resounded with the ringing bells of St. Michael’s Golden-Domed Monastery mingling with the timpanis of the “Kozak company” and hundreds of various metallic sounds. And over this multisonorous orchestra from the scenes of the Maidan, a carol rang out all over Ukraine and the world, so masterfully presented by Hanna Havrylets: A new joy is risen, which we never knew, on the plains of our Ukraine a bright star shines new. Do you hear, my brother, the strange novel strains: they have shackled into chains our famous Ukraine. Many a young sister quietly awaits her brother, and many a mother vigils for her son. Look on us, O Jesus, from the highest heaven, give Ukraine her liberty, freedom must be won!

(M. Hobdych from the article by H.Stepanchenko “Hanna Havrylets. A Sketch of her career and output”)

English translation: Zenoby Lawryshyn

This project has been supported by the family of Danylo and Myroslava Bilak, who dedicate the production of this disk to their parents, Alma, Larysa, Jaroslaw and Victor.