The Evolution of Romantic Songs

Last week the National Philharmonic of Ukraine hosted a soiree devoted to Ukrainian romantic songs, the brainchild of Oleh Skrypka, frontman of the Vopli Vidopliasova band, as part of the Dream Country ethnic festival. “It’s widely claimed that our traditional folk songs are a purely rural phenomenon,” Mr. Skrypka says, “as if there had been no urban culture in Ukraine. In reality, it did and does exist, but Ukrainian urban romantic songs remain on the informational fringe. We still sing certain songs without knowing that they are Ukrainian classics.”

The concert’s program included compositions from the 17th-late 20th centuries, thus demonstrating what may be called the evolution of this type of song. Nina Matviyenko, accompanied by an ensemble of ancient music conducted by Kostiantyn Chechenia, sang the secular chant “O Venus Bant” and the song “A Sycamore Is Standing” (lyrics by Hryhoriy Skovoroda). The Hurtopravtsi group performed a folklorized version of a romantic song. According to the group’s leader Iryna Klymenko, songs in this genre were once performed in noblemen’s manors to the accompaniment of musical instruments, while the common people used to sing them in several voices. In Left Bank Ukraine this genre was loosely divided into women’s songs, mostly about love, and men’s songs on patriotic themes, although men also used to sing about love. In the 1930s many patriotic songs were turned into love lyrics: for example, the line “my country, you are my heaven” was rewritten as “my sweetheart, you are my heaven.”

Taras Kompanychenko played beautiful romantic songs on Ostap Veresai’s kobza to the accompaniment of virtuoso violinist Serhiy Okhrimchuk: from Stepan Vahanovsky’s collection Forget Me (C17), Semen Klymovsky’s “A Cossack Went Riding Beyond the Danube” (C18), and the Ukrainian modernist Vasyl Pachovsky’s “Forget Me” (early C20). Although Taras has sung on countless occasions in castles, museums, and Catholic and Lutheran churches in Europe, this was his debut at the National Philharmonic of Ukraine. Oleh Skrypka also debuted here with the VV hits “Dream Country” and “The Waves of Amur,” as well as the folk songs “Don’t Ask Me” and “Oh, in a Cherry Garden.” Last year he issued a romantic solo album called Solace. Oleh has also translated into Ukrainian Yevhen Hrebinka’s romantic song “Black Eyes” and performed it here for the first time.

“Black Eyes” is one of the world’s most popular songs: it was sung more often than any other song in the 20th century. Since the original lyrics were in Russian, it was often considered part of Russian culture. However, in Ukraine, Opanas Markevych, Vasyl Kapnist, and Taras Shevchenko also wrote some poetry in Russian, while Danylo Bratkovsky, Petro Mohyla, and Pylyp Orlyk wrote in Polish in the 16th-18th centuries. VV’s front man thinks it is time to redress an historical injustice.

As the concert was drawing to a close, the singer Nina Halaktenko performed some numbers written by the Ukrainian composer Valentyn Sylvestrov. When the soiree was over, the audience was treated to a performance in the lobby by a showpiece military band and dances performed by the cadets of the Ivan Bohun Military Lyceum. Those who wished could join them. Kompanychenko said this was what the Ukrainian nobility did for entertainment at the turn of the last century. For example, country houses in Boyarka, near Kyiv, used to receive guests, such as Lesya Ukrainka, Mykola Lysenko, who even composed his overture to the opera Taras Bulba there, Borys Hrinchenko, et al. The audience had a good time promenading to the music of the brass band.

The soiree devoted to Ukrainian romantic songs was above all an attempt to draw public attention to the evolution, chronology, and diversity of this genre, as well as to instill a sense of good style and taste in today’s elite by evoking the best examples of 19th-early 20th-century gatherings of the nobility.