Bandurist Vasyl Yemets is the first bandurist to perform in Hollywood. He was listened to in Chicago, New York, Boston and Los Angeles, and the American press discovered Ukraine through the music of the bandura. Yemets became one of the first Ukrainian artists to publicly present Ukrainian culture in the USA, giving over 35 concerts.
This was reported by Istorychna pravda.
In February 1930, Vasyl Yemets gave a concert in Chicago at The Civic Opera House, which was packed to the brim. The audience discussed the appearance of a “Russian émigré” and an unknown instrument – the bandura. Backstage, administrator Bertha Ott tried to convince the artist to go on stage, but he refused if he was announced as “a Muscovite playing a Moscow ethnic instrument.” Yemets declared: “I am Ukrainian, madam!” After entering the stage, Cossack dumas were performed, which made a strong impression on the audience. The Chicago Ukrainian magazine "Sich" later wrote:
"The opera breathed true national music, which is as closely connected with the Ukrainian spirit as our language itself... In the roar of golden strings, a thousand-year-old antiquity was heard, the shadows of the Boyans came, distant revelries on glorious graves, feasts of princely wives, the incomparable beauty of "The Words of Igor's Campaign" were felt.
The Cossack thoughts were stirred, which the blind kobzars carried through the darkness of captivity to the present day and hid in the people the glorious tradition of the heroic times of Ukraine - the best guarantee of its Resurrection and Freedom... The American press very favorably assessed that, still completely unknown to them, Music and Instrument, dedicating many praises to our glorious Countryman, of whom we should be boldly proud...".
Vasyl Yemets was born December 27, 1890 in Slobozhanshchyna. Kobzars often stayed at his parents' house, and from childhood he listened to their music. His teachers were Taras Shevchenko and kobzar Ivan Kuchuguru-Kucherenko, who gave him lessons for free. In 1911, at a gymnasium evening in Okhtyrka, Yemets performed Shevchenko's "The Dug Grave", which caused a stormy reaction in the hall. He later recalled:
"When I finished singing, a sense of tragedy so overpowered me that... out of anger and great regret, tears dripped down the strings of my kobza. Only an ideological young man who was ready to go to prison, to Siberia, or even give his life for Ukraine could feel and experience this way."
As a student at Kharkiv University, Yemets wrote about the history of kobzarism and in 1913 created the "First Kuban kobzar school". In 1916 he performed at the Bolshoi Imperial Theater in Moscow, where he performed Cossack dumas and works by Beethoven and Mozart.
Historian Ilya Zinchenko noted: "Emets was the only bandurist in the world who performed on this stage, and the success was stunning".
In 1918, Vasyl Yemets participated in the defense of Kyiv as part of the Battle Camp of the UNR. During the hetmanate of Pavlo Skoropadsky, he organized the "First Kobzar Band", later called the First State Bandurist Band. The Chicago magazine "Time and Events" wrote about this. The debut of the band took place at the Bergonier Theater in Kyiv, where the anthem with the line "Ukraine has already risen" was played.
At the end of 1919, Yemets was forced to emigrate. According to the magazine "Time and Events", Ivan Ogienko issued him a certificate, according to which the “kobzar artist” was to make a concert tour of Europe in order to “acquaint European citizens with the national Ukrainian musical instrument – the kobza”.
In the 1920s and 1930s, Yemets actively gave concerts in Europe and the USA. Symon Narizhny’s book “Ukrainian Emigration. Cultural Work of the Ukrainian Emigration between the Two World Wars” states that in 1930 he gave over 35 concerts in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, Pittsburgh, Detroit, Cleveland and other cities in the USA. He also published records, scientific works and organized kobzar chapels.
In the late 1930s, Yemets settled in Hollywood, where he performed concerts of Ukrainian and classical music. He recalled:
“For the first time in history Hollywood, during the Second World War, heard the sounds of the Ukrainian bandura and Ukrainian music, and with it the name of Ukraine dear to us.
Historian Valentina Korotya-Kovalska wrote that the Capital company released his record “In the Mountains of Ukraine”. Vasyl Yemets’s repertoire included over 200 works.
American poet David Knowlton wrote: “You need the genius of Homer and the eloquence of Sappho to express the satisfaction that we have from friendship with Vasyl Yemets and from his music.”
Yemets himself noted: “Everything I did in my life was dedicated to Ukraine and only to it.”
Vasyl Yemets died in 1982 in Los Angeles. In one of his books he wrote: “Cossack bandura players sacrificially served Ukraine not only with Cossack sabers and rifles… but they also knew how to live their lives to give, so that the immortal glory of Ukraine may live on."
Photo: stpravda.com.ua, uain.press
Author: Danylo Pievchev