Viktor Kosenko (1896-1938)

[Christopher]

The Ukrainian composer Viktor Kosenko (1896-1938) has attracted favourable comment on here before, particularly for his piano concerto (I couldn't find the thread though).

I have found on youtube another complete performance of his piano concerto:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FjJ5mdOQ64 - movement 1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCLd6EDQkOE - movement 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYK7GJJwLAs - movement 3


Also, someone called Evgeniy Zhaku has orchestrated his moderately well-known "11 Etudes in the Form of Old Dances" (Op.19), originally for solo piano. Played here by the Ukrainian Festival Orchestra under Serhiy Likhomanenko - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gazjQuyj0Zw (1h43m long, but LONG stretch of silence at beginning)

( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8I80Zx8c8yc - 10 minute extract)

(The most popular piece from these Etudes is the 7th etude - Gavotte - here it is for solo piano https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xg4kckDuet0 - click on number 7 at 31:37)

About the work - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eleven_Études_in_the_Form_of_Old_Dances

[Simon]

From the same book of Etudes, the Passacaglia is quite remarkable, once again infused with the spirit of Rachmaninov. The complete set of Etudes is available on Toccata Classics and there are a handful of live recordings available on YouTube as well.

https://youtu.be/YH-0R-DGC_g

[Christopher]

The 11 Etudes are:

1. Gavotte in D-flat major
2. Allemande in B-flat minor
3. Menuet in G major
4. Courante in E minor
5. Sarabande in A minor
6. Bourrée in A major
7. Gavotte in B minor
8. Rigaudon in C major
9. Menuet in E-flat major
10. Passacaglia in G minor
11. Gigue in D minor

The Allemande (No.2) is also particularly attractive.

[Christopher]

It turns out the orchestration of the 11 Etudes is something of a project, with its own website - https://kosenko.in.ua/ - in Ukrainian only but google-translate works well (see below).

Moreover - on the home page, there are three downloads of SCORES available:

1. The original piano version
2. 11 Etudes - orchestrated by Evgeny Zhaku    (Zhaku also is transliterated as Jacques, but I can't find anything on him.)
3. 11 Etudes - orchestrated by L. Bilchinsky   (L. Bilchinsky appears to be this guy - http://esu.com.ua/search_articles.php?id=41816 - Leonid Bilchinsky, 1924-2011)

ABOUT THE PROJECT

The Kosenko Code is an innovative cultural project that aims to disseminate music, namely contemporary orchestral versions of "11 Etudes in the Form of Ancient Dance", by the brilliant Ukrainian composer Victor Kosenko around the world.

Specifically for this project 2 variants of scores were created for a series of famous works of the author: "11 sketches in the form of ancient dances".

Score and parts for triple composition of symphony orchestra. Edited by L. Bilchinsky. Established in 1982. Recruited and edited in 2018.
Score and parts for baroque (chamber) orchestra. Created in 2019 by Ukrainian composer Eugene Zhaku.
The works were restored on the basis of the original piano piano (urtext) by Viktor Kosenko.

The project also involves prominent musicians of our time, whose names are associated with Ukrainian music around the world.

In addition to creating and performing "ancient dances", the project aims to distribute scores free of charge to cultural institutions of Ukraine and the world, to consult and assist musicians in promoting the work of Viktor Kosenko.

The Composer

Victor Kosenko (1896-1938) became one of the most prominent Ukrainian composers of the early twentieth century. His genius is confidently compared to Rachmaninoff and Chopin.

Kosenko was born into a musical family in St. Petersburg. The family realized that the guy was a genius when he played Beethoven's works at the age of 12. Victor studied at the St. Petersburg Conservatory with students of Roman Korsakov. After that the composer moved to Zhytomyr and worked there at a music school. Now this school is named after him. In the last years of his life, Kosenko lived in Kiev, where his apartment museum still operates.

Viktor Kosenko wrote for large orchestra, for chamber ensembles and for his favorite instrument - the piano. For contemporaries, Kosenko was better known as a brilliant, virtuoso pianist-interpreter. His work includes nearly 200 works. He could have created much more, but unfortunately he died at the age of 42 due to the illness he received while performing in the cold halls during his youth.

ABOUT THE WORK

11 sketches in the form of ancient dances are a unique phenomenon in the Ukrainian and European musical culture of the first third of the twentieth century. This cycle, as if, represents a significant achievement of a number of composer generations and, at the same time, outstrips trends that will emerge in the cultural space only in ten years. We have in mind the unique understanding of the composer of the concept of time, its high demands on the participants of the artistic event-play (performers and listeners), because the cycle under consideration is an exclusively monumental work - perhaps not the most extensive piano suite ever written, before or after .Pig, the duration of which is almost 70 minutes. Thus, the "11 Etudes" are designed for the possibilities of a future, exclusive and, let's assume, postmodern performer and listener, able to move into the "canned" atmosphere in an instant, enchanted past, and, at the same time, keenly feel the nakedness of the present. The aesthetic presence in the bizarre, but harmonious classicist-romantic baroque continuum of piano sketches by V. Kosenko, "played out" on the Ukrainian intonation system, convinces that the limits of artistic time as such do not really exist.

Structure of the work
"11 Etudes in the Form of Ancient Dancing" is an important stage in the evolution of V. Kosenko's artistic thinking. The cycle became an alloy of stylistic features of ancient dances, national elements and individual handwriting of the composer.

All dances are grouped into 3 groups:

the first - 5 dances: Gavot, Alemanda, Menuet, Courant and Sarabande;
second - 3 dances: Bure, Gavot, Rigodon;
third - 3 dances: Manuet, Pasakalia and Zhig - bring the listener to the highest climax.
Each individual work is a novelty with its dramatic plan, concept and unity of holistic development.

The Conductor

Serhiy Likhomanenko is the chief conductor and artistic director of the private experimental orchestras of the Eclectic Sound Orchestra and the Kyiv Grand Classic. Conductor of the State Youth Academic Orchestra "Slobozhansky". Until 2019, Chief Conductor of the Kyiv Regional Academic Theater P. Saksagansky.

Sergiy Likhomanenko's activities are also inextricably linked to the Kyiv Grand Classic Musicians Support Fund and the Nation's Talents Festival, which has also been initiated and held in 2013 by Sergiy Likhomanenko.

Today conductor Likhomanenko actively promotes Ukrainian academic music of all periods. Conductor project "Music of the Era of the Renaissance", a large-scale cultural musical project, not only nationwide, but also international.

In 2018, Likhomanenko implemented the project "Kosenko Code - lost scores of prominent Ukrainians." Within the framework of which, with the support of the Ukrainian Cultural Fund, a complete systematization and revision of all versions of orchestral versions of "11 Etudes" by Viktor Kosenko took place.

[Sharkkb8]

There is also a recording of Kosenko's 2nd piano sonata in C sharp minor, Op. 14, on the Piano Classics label.  Soundbites at the Presto link below.

Presto's blurb:  Least known of the composers here is the Ukrainian Victor Kosenko (1896-1938), whose sonatas have long attracted pianists in search of grand statements in the Lisztian tradition. The three movements of the Second are laid out on a relatively compact scale that belies their technical demands and majestic vein of expression; any listener who appreciates the architecture of Medtner's sonatas will find much to enjoy in Kosenko.

https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8495886--kosenko-balakirev-glazunov-russian-piano-sonatas-vol-1

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Kosenko-Balakirev-Glazunov-Russian-Sonatas/dp/B07DXS2NRV/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Kosenko%2C+Balakirev%2C+Glazunov%3A+Russian+Piano+Sonatas&qid=1579640766&s=music&sr=1-1

https://www.amazon.com/Balakirev-Glazunov-Kosenko-Russian-Sonatas/dp/B07FK2T165

[Sharkkb8]

....as well as a couple of recordings on the Centaur label.

https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/search?search_query=kosenko+piano+music

[semloh]

Yes, I really like the piano concerto, and I especially enjoy the performance on YT. The players are so committed and the pianist a joy to watch.
Christopher put a performance in the Downloads section back on 12 March 2016 - the Mediafire links are still 'live', but I'm not sure if it's the same one. My own is by Nikulin with an orchestra conducted by Logvin - no idea where that came from!

[Christopher]

The one on this page - http://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,1196.msg37742.html#msg37742 is with Arthur Nikulin (piano), Academic Symphonic Orchestra of Lviv Philharmonic Society, Dmytro Logvin, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G96MJWiHdr4.  It's easily the best performance of the three that I know of, it has real sparkle. Sadly it is the first movement only.  If it is that one that you are referring to, then as you say Arthur is a joy to watch.  I wrote to him and he actually replied and pointed me in the direction of more Ukrainian music. Full marks to him!

Then there is a recording with Evgeny Rzhanov (piano), The Academic Symphony Orchestra of the National Radio of Ukraine, under V. Litvinenko on this page - http://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,6019.msg63764.html#msg63764 - from  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHyk_V5Y_xQ. It soundslike an "official" Soviet-era Melodiya recording. Frankly it sounds like Mr. Rzhanov had been given the score that morning, and he proceeds to hack it to pieces.

And then there is the youtube recording in this thread, above, with Yulia Samoenko and the Symphonic Orchestra of the Vinnytsia Philharmonia under Georgy Kurkov, which doesn't totally set my house on fire.

[Gareth Vaughan]

I'm finding this thread quite interesting. I like Kosenko's music but don't know a great deal of it beyond the PC. But can anyone explain something, please. Shkoda has recorded,  according to the links, 2 disks of Kosenko's piano music for Centaur, described as Vol. 2 and Vol. 3 respectively. But I can't find a Vol. 1 listed anywhere?

[Mark Thomas]

Yes, that's very odd isn't it? I have volume 2, the three piano sonatas, and all three works are rather attractive.

[Martin Eastick]

As advised by Martin Anderson some time ago, volume 1 of Kosenko's piano music was the one released by Toccata Classics (which of course includes the 11 etudes Op19). I was given to understand that Natalya Shkoda then, for some reason unknown to me, continued the project with Centaur - hence volumes 2 & 3!

[Mark Thomas]

So it appears I have both volume 1 and volume 2. Still odd, but good to have it explained, thank you Martin.

[Gareth Vaughan]

How very curious! But thank you, Martin, for the explanation.

[Oliver Fraenzke]

I got into the music of Viktor Kosenko by two recordings of the Ukrainian pianist Violina Petrychenko: On one of her CDs she compared Kosenko to Sciabin and they really match in some pieces, especially the sonatas opp. 13-15. But there are as well Polish influences, namely in his Mazurkas (of course) - maybe this came from his teacher Michałowski, whom Kosenko held in high regards.

Up to now, I got special interest in the solo piano music by Kosenko. There is a complete recording by Shkoda, which I can recommend; there also is a big essay about his piano music by Osinchuk. Stil unclear for me is the case of the First Piano Sonata: there are two versions, the first print and a much larger second print some years later - I checked the two and found interesting new transitions and some passages, that get more comfortable to play. And then suddenly Kosenko inserted about 8-9 pages completely new. I already asked Juliana Osinchuk, but she wasn't able to help me with details about the reworking process.

Here the Children's Pieces by Shkoda:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZM9t-DYjwBg

And here the middle movement of the piano concerto arranged for piano solo:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4KsiRJ3znE

I discovered some old scores of the piano music from the 1970s, that are as far as I know not available anymore (maybe in Ukraine, but not in the rest of the world). For me, the music of Kosenko has to be regarded higher than now, so I decided to restore and reprint some of the old scores: among those 2 Concert Valses (https://repertoire-explorer.musikmph.de/de/produkt/kosenko-viktor-5) and the Children's Pieces (https://repertoire-explorer.musikmph.de/de/produkt/kosenko-viktor-4), but as well early works and the Etudes. I hope to continue with the songs and some of the chamber music.

The piano concerto is to be performed soon (in the completion), but I don't know anything about performances of his solo or chamber music - hopefully this changes soon!

[Alan Howe]

The piano concerto is to be performed soon (in the completion)

Very interesting. Can you tell us more, please?