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Sadovska launches TWGCF 2001-2002 concert series
By Lesia Bihun

Singer and actress Mariana Sadovska launched The Washington Group Cultural Fund's 2001-2002 concert series on September 23, before a capacity audience at the Lyceum in Old Town Alexandria, with a recital illustrating the depth and breadth of emotions expressed in the folk songs of Ukraine.

From a young woman's longing for the carefree moments of her childhood in "Oi vershe, miy vershe" to the rollicking "Pyiemo, pyiemo," in which four women wonder what kind of liquor could have made them so drunk after three days of drinking, the program moved the audience from sadness to laughter, and then further into the heartrending grief of a young widow asking her son about the whereabouts of his father in "Vdova" and to outright hilarity over a young village woman's marital problems with a much older man in "Ozhenyvsia staryi did".

The program selections included songs from Ukraine's various ethnographic regions: Lemko, Lviv, Poltava, Hutsul and Polissia, to which Ms. Sadovska had conducted expeditions to collect their authentic folk songs and traditions, as well as examples from neighboring Poland and from Serbia. Ms. Sadovska used a harmonium to intensify the colors and shades of her voice. When she sang about a girl who became a bird in her mother's orchard, the audience heard trills, warbling and quivers. And the coloration of her voice would change from a soothing mother's lullaby for a nursing baby to a raw, commanding voice in her "calling" songs, used to draw out spirits and push away clouds.

To enhance the audience's understanding and appreciation of the program, Ms. Sadovska introduced and explained each selection in English. Born in Lviv, Ms. Sadovska performed for three years with that city's Kurbas Theater. From 1991 to 1999 she worked with the Gardzienice Theater in Poland, before coming to New York to perform with the Yara Arts Group, where she is now artist-in-residence.

In her opening remarks, TWG Cultural Fund Director Laryssa Courtney dedicated the concert to the memory of the victims of the terrorist attacks on September 11. Minister Counselor Volodymyr Yatsenkivskiy of the Ukrainian Embassy (which has extended its patronage to the concert series) greeted the audience, which included the former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine William Green Miller and his wife Suzanne, both staunch supporters of the Ukrainian arts. The second of five concerts in the TWG Cultural Fund series on November 4th will feature soprano Lesia Hrabova.


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