Ukrainian Contemporary Music Festival - Letters and Notes: An Exploration of Music and Literature
MARCH 12 - MARCH 15 in Manhattan. Tickets start at $35 per show or $80 for a festival pass.
The Ukrainian Contemporary Music Festival celebrates its sixth season with Letters and Notes: An Exploration of Music and Literature.
WED, MARCH 12 - SAT, MARCH 15
$80 Festival Pass or tickets start at $35 (MAR 12 discussion is FREE)
WED, MARCH 12
A Roundtable on Ukrainian Music and Literature
Roundtable discussion | FREE | MANHATTAN
WED, MARCH 12
5:00p (90 mins)
FREE
Jordan Center for the Advanced Study of Russia at New York University - The Great Room (19 University Place, 2nd Floor, MANHATTAN 10003)
Ahead of the sixth season—and in collaboration with the Jordan Center at New York University—the Ukrainian Contemporary Music Festival presents a roundtable conversation about Ukrainian literature and its intersections with musical composition, featuring literary scholar Tamata Hundorova.
Speakers will explore a century of letters and notes from art song, to underground rock, and everything in between. UCMF Creative Director and Jordan Center Visiting Scholar Leah Batstone will moderate this discussion featuring literary scholars Tamara Hundorova (Princeton University) and Mark Andryczyk (Columbia University), and Emerging Artist Andrew Skitko (Opera Philadelphia, Ukrainian Art Song Project).
THU, MARCH 13
Fantastyka
Live music | World Premiere | New Arrangement | MANHATTAN
THU, MARCH 13
7:30p
Starting at $35 (or $80 for Festival Pass to all events listed here)
The DiMenna Center for Classical Music at Baryshniokv Arts (450 W 37th Street, MANHATTAN 10018)
An exciting collaborative concert with TAK ensemble — Fantastyka will highlight Ukrainian contributions to the sci-fi literary genre and today’s hot-button discussions around technology and artificial intelligence.
Solomiya Moroz’s world premiere (a commission by UCMF) takes Volodymyr Vynnychenko’s classic sci-fi novel The Solar Machine as its starting point and pairs it with a new arrangement of Taylor Brook’s Star Maker Fragments, based on British author Olaf Stapledon’s novel. Rounding out the program is a new arrangement of 2025 composer-in-residence Leonid Hrabovsky’s “And it will be,” written specifically for TAK ensemble.
FRI, MARCH 14
From Kontraktova Square
Live music | U.S. Premiere | MANHATTAN
FRI, MARCH 14
7:30p
Starting at $35 (or $80 for Festival Pass to all events listed here)
The DiMenna Center for Classical Music at Baryshniokv Arts (450 W 37th Street, MANHATTAN 10018)
In the 19th century, the Contracts House on Kyiv’s Kontraktova Square was not only a trading space but contained a concert hall where many of the era’s musical and literary luminaries performed their works. From Kontraktova Square recreates this Kyiv salon with a selection of art songs, chamber works inspired by literature, and poetry readings.
ARTISTS: Diana Ziabchenko, Vira Slywotzky, Hans Tashjian, Teryn Kytasty-Kuzma, The Rhythm Method, and Kebra-Seyoun Charles.
PROGRAM: Lesia DYCHKO, “On the boat” after Lesia Ukrainka | Svyatoslav LUNYOV, Excerpts from Fierce January '23: 35 Songs on verses of Ukrainian poets** | Valentyn KOSTENKO, String Quartet No. 2, II. Andante quasi Allegretto (1929)
Dedicated to Vasyl Ellan-Blakytny** | Stefania TURKEVYCH, “Time Passes” after Taras Shevchenko | Fedir AKIMENKO, Romances and Songs after Ukrainian poems (1937) | Katya SUHLOBINA, “In Memoriam” for string quartet on motives from Serhiy Zhadan** | Yuri ISHCHENKO, “Night shadows” after Mykhailo Semenko | Yuri POVOLOTSKY, Three Romances on Poems by Lina Kostenko | Leonid HRABOVSKY , “Pastels” after Pavlo Tychyna** | Victoria POLEVÁ, “Dover Beach” after Matthew Arnold** | Boris LOGINOV, “The Way” after Mykola Khvylovy** | Valentyn SYLVESTROV, “Farewell” after John Keats.
SAT, MARCH 15
Ukrainian Tone Poems
Live music | Music Premiering | MANHATTAN
SAT, MARCH 15
7:30p
Starting at $35 (or $80 for Festival Pass to all events listed here)
The DiMenna Center for Classical Music at Baryshniokv Arts (450 W 37th Street, MANHATTAN 10018)
The final concert in this festival, Ukrainian Tone Poems, presents exclusively instrumental works inspired by literature. Featured compositions are composed for diverse instrumentations and are inspired alternately by Ukrainian and American literature, both classical and contemporary, from Lesia Ukrainka to Stephen King.
ARTISTS: PINKNOISE, Ukrainian Music Initiative (UMI), and NYU Contemporary Music Ensemble (NYUCME)
PROGRAM: Leonid HRABOVSKY, Keepsake for Elissa (1988)** Based on literary ciphers derived from LISP programming language | Adrian MOCANU, Les chevaux de feu (2022)** Inspired by Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors by Mykhailo Kotsiubynsky | Alla ZAHAYKEVYCH, TERCET for clarinet, violin, and cello (2010)** Inspired by Taras Prokhasko’s Necropolis | Alex VOYTENKO, Homo Fugens (Running Man) (2018)* Inspired by Stephen King | Renata SOKACHYK, The Desert Breathes (2024)**
Inspired by Lesia Ukrainka | Alisa ZAIKA, “he only dreamed of places now…” (2022)**
Inspired by Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Man And The Sea | Lena SIEROVA, The Last Leaf (2010-11)** After the short story by O. Henry | Yurii PIKUSH, Be a Cycle (2023)** Inspired by T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land