The Vast Riches of Ukrainian Baroque Within Music

Taking small detours in any country’s history is a process that is granted to give you an eye-opening experience. The detour we would like to suggest is inevitably connected to the part of Ukrainian culture that has spread far and wide in modern society but which still has many tricks up its sleeve. Indeed, music is the source of many undiscovered and even forgotten ideas, that are difficult to replicate, as the time it was bound to also matters. And yet, we have this grand opportunity to become the listeners of a part-song concert from seventeenth and eighteenth centuries with the help of the choir and lead singers from Open Opera Ukraine.

Part-song is the genre of choral music which consists of secular songs performed in several vocal parts. To some extent, the process of performing this music is somewhat similar to a bagpipe, as the highest part carries the melody, while other voices are supplying it. The extent of part-song is rather rich with combined efforts of alto, soprano, bass and tenor performers which concluded into the all-mighty Ukrainian baroque music.

The main question is how everyone can hear the memorable sounding that was brought to us several centuries ago. Open Opera Ukraine will present ten works of a talented composer – Mykola Dyletskyi and three more works of unknown authors with the number of performers going up from four to twelve! Furthermore, you’ll get a thorough explanation as to how the genre was changing, how the singers were practicing and why the nearly-ideal acoustic can be obtained only at night-time. It’s an exhaustive topic and the perfect way of seeking out historically-significant cultural traditions. To see this presentation you need to register here and the link for the online-translation will be available as we get closer to the needed date, which is September 24, 19.00. We hope, that this event will cater to the music tastes of many and perhaps will get more people into part-song, than expected.