It is no accident that Anzhelina SHVACHKA, a National Opera soloist, has won the National Taras Shevchenko Prize of Ukraine this year. Her vocal roles have helped her achieve the status of one of the most brilliant Ukrainian opera singers whose talent is appreciated not only in this country. It was reported recently that the artiste had been awarded the Order of the Star of Italy for outstanding contribution to the development of friendly relations between our countries and enrichment of the two states’ culture.
Ms. Shvachka, you sing most of your repertoire’s parts in the Italian and French languages. I read the libretto of your favorite opera Carmen by Georges Bizet, where you play the main role, in the original for sheer interest and was baffled with complicated linguistic patterns…
“To tell the truth, I perform various operatic parts in six, not two, foreign languages. Indeed, my almost whole repertoire is in Italian, but I also sing in French, English, German, Spanish, and Latin. It is easier to do so in Italian because I studied it in the conservatoire and have no problems with pronouncing and learning texts by heart. But you should also take into account that works were created by European composers in different epochs. To come closer to those times, you need a certain stylization. For example, preparing to sing the parts of Amneris, Eboli, and Ulrica in Giuseppe Verdi’s operas Aida, Don Carlo, and Un Ballo in Maschera, I traveled to Vienna for master classes conducted by Italians who, as native speakers, brushed up my pronunciation until it sounded characteristic. Incidentally, it is a practice of the National Opera of Ukraine to invite experts from foreign embassies in order to hear a piece of good advice whenever an opera by a West European author is being put on.”
You’ve been working on Kyiv stage and toured a lot of European and Asian countries for about 20 years. In what foreign country did you feel the most comfortable?
“Naturally, it is Italy which is called the contemporary European Mecca of operatic art. It may have been a stroke of luck, but I always saw a professional approach to things in all the countries I toured – Estonia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland… The opera is really appreciated in these and other European countries. I liked Japan very much, although everything is different in it – be it culture, architecture, or traditions. This sometimes raised a question: how could they achieve colossal results in any sphere of social life on such a limited territory? I gained bright and lasting impressions from my appearance at the Stade de France in Paris a few years ago, where I sang the part of Amneris in Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Aida in the presence of 75,000 spectators. The organization of this grandiose extravaganza deserves the highest praise, for everything on the stage went off like clockwork.”
Were there any flaws in your artistic career, which you are sorry for or do not want to recall?
“Every vocalist has flaws, for we are all human beings. In my opinion, it is much more difficult for a female, than for a male, vocalist. We have such things as pregnancy, childbirth, and breast-feeding, which produces a hormonal surge and changes your voice. I can admit that I did not fully exert myself, so to speak, on the Bolshoi stage, where I once sang the part of Carmen, because I was six months pregnant. Besides, I had been taken ill with the flu on the eve of the performance, and my temperature ran up to 38 Celsius. Naturally, I was first thinking about the child I was pregnant with, not about the role of Carmen…”
How do you manage to meet the stage director’s and the conductor’s demands and, at the same time, defend the right to your own vision of an opera character?
“I finished a music school as pianist and became a choirmaster, and later, in my first year at the conservatoire, I was invited to work as a part-time vocalist at Kyiv’s opera house. For this very reason, I feel very creative. Performing abroad under a contract, I can express my dissatisfaction to an inexperienced novice director about his modern-style staging. Even if I fail to persuade him, I will still put in a couple of my innovations. Incidentally, in contrast to most of his Western counterparts, our theater’s chief producer Anatolii Solovianenko is doing very much for opera singers, trying to make sure that they feel as comfortable as possible. As for the conductor, any disputes are out of the question. It is a taboo for me. All I can ask him for is to speed up or, on the contrary, slow down the music tempo.”
From now on, one of your regalia is also the title of a Shevchenko Prize winner. What impresses you the most in Taras Shevchenko’s oeuvre?
“Since my school years, I’ve been captivated by the melody of his poetic works. As I felt myself as a composer even in my childhood, I’ve always wished to set his poems to music and make songs out of them. When I feel blue, I take his two-volume edition, which is conspicuous on a shelf, and begin to read the Bard’s lyrics. This immediately produces some energy and then easiness. Far from every poet can penetrate into the human soul – only the one whom the Creator vested with the power of a spoken word.”
