Let us remind that Stankovych wrote folk opera Koly Tsvite Paporot (When Fern Blossoms) in the mid-1970s, and its full version was first played on April 8, 2011, at the Music Premieres of the Season festival, 33 years after it was written! On that day the author could not be present at the concert because of his trip abroad, but his old dream came true on his anniversary.
Mykola Hohol’s works, national folklore, heroic epos, and folk traditions were the literary basis of the opera. When Fern Blossoms was commissioned by the French concert firm Alitepa for an international exhibit in Paris. The premiere was scheduled to be performed at the Ukraina Palace in 1978. But after the dress rehearsal, Soviet censors banned the opera, author was accused of being a “nationalist,” and the unique props and authentic costumes were destroyed.
“Separate parts of When Fern Blossoms have already been performed in Ukraine, as well as in Russia, the US, and Canada,” Stankovych stressed. “But those were mere separate pieces, and it has never been played under this name as a whole before! The term ‘folk opera’ is conditional, because this performance consists of various numbers. Some of them, like Kupala, are rather extended, and involve famous folk songs and tunes, Taras Shevchenko’s poetry, and Hohol’s ideas, related to St. John’s Eve story. This performance was designed as a representation of a new genre, one that would resemble traditional Ukrainian Nativity plays. The performance is tied to historical events, but since it is impossible to fit everything in the two-hour play, the most vivid folk treasures of our land were chosen.
“Believe me, even in my most cherished dreams I could not imagine such brilliant performance of my music, such sincere and warm greetings from my colleagues, friends, musicians, and performers,” Stankovych said during the interval at the concert, when his famous folk opera was performed at the National Philharmonic Society of Ukraine. Indeed, wonderful performance by the Veriovka Choir and the National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine, conducted by Volodymyr Sirenko, was the best present for Stankovych’s 70th anniversary, which was formally celebrated by music community. Famous musicians, colleagues, culture and art figures shared their impressions of this unique event.
Mykola ZHULYNSKY, member of the Ukrainian National Academy of Sciences:
“In our culture, Yevhen Stankovych is a symbol of the unquenchable spiritual history of Ukraine. It is surprising how the composer’s personality, with his astounding greatness and the power of his talent, and the complexity of his artistic career, is totally out of line with any bombastic definitions. His work inspires a feeling of a never-ending inner dialog between the past and present, with the in-depth national sources of his music organically fitting into present-day ornamentations, and thus acquiring astonishingly up-to-date sound. The original, global, and panoramic interpretation of our past, which we hear in his brilliant folk opera When Fern Blossoms, makes one sense the powerful, distinctly neo-baroque element of his music which conquers with its grandeur and vital energy, capable of extrapolating the pettiness of today’s problems into the philosophical dimension.”
Volodymyr SIRENKO, artistic director and chief conductor, the National Merited Academic Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine:
“I have to confess that it was my dream back as a young man, to perform the famous folk opera by Yevhen Stankovych When Fern Blossoms. I was aware of all the dramatic collisions which accompanied the complicated biography of this masterpiece. However, it became known that the dress rehearsal for the opera had been canceled, the scenery destroyed, and eventually only a part of Kupala was performed. Both Fedir Hlushchenko and Anatolii Avdiievsky brought it to Moscow (by the way, Nina Matviienko also helped them). But it was only a fragment which could never give a complete idea of the in-depth concept of this unique work. So I have for a long time been pursuing this cherished dream of mine, and only last year it came true. It was the first performance, so now it is the second. Of course, I would like to see this opera in an impressive stage production. Actually, this is what it was meant for and what it deserves. I think that Yevhen Lysyk’s sketches have survived somehow (the scenery was destroyed). By the way, during the first production in 1978, huge artistic resources were involved: Lysyk (scenery), Shekera (choreography) and, first and foremost, Stankovych’s music. For me his music is especially dear and intimate. I hate banalities, but it always strikes a chord in my heart.”
Mykola HOBDYCH, artistic director and chief conductor, the Kyiv Chamber Choir:
“I think Yevhen Stankovych is the most powerful Ukrainian composer of today. Once the renowned Polish composer Romuald Twardowski said, ‘I had always known that the light will come from the East, but I never thought it would be Kyiv. You have such a powerful circle of composers, which is bound to shake the world.’ I think he meant Stankovych first of all. I do not know of any other author, whose music would so powerfully touch the chords of my soul as Stankovych’s music does. None of his works leaves me indifferent. Take his brilliant folk opera When Fern Blossoms, which is more than 30 years old: even now it has an astonishing effect, as if it had just been written. And its secret lies not only in the fact that the composer drew on ancient sources, not really pressing for Soviet Ukraine, such as the songs about Baida and Morozenko, and organically embedded them in a wide-scale music and drama canvas, consonant with present-day perception. In Stankovych’s music I see a direct historical parallel with Artemii Vedel’s work, although there is a distance of two and a half centuries separating these two artists. Today’s musicians agree that if you want to know the real Stankovych, you have to study his scores well, and then you will realize the absolute discrepancy between his worldly behavior, manner of speaking, and his music. So where is the true Stankovych? There is no doubt: of course, in music.”
