The strategy of historically oriented orchestration of M. Verbytskyi’s play “Pidhiriany”
Authors: Bohatyriov Volodymyr 
Published: August 2024

Statement of the problem. The historical circumstances that influenced Ukrainian culture throughout the XIX–XX centuries have given rise to the contemporary challenge of accessing musical scores, particularly original scores or orchestral voices of music theatrical works and orchestral compositions. Even the presence of copies of piano arrangements, individual instrumental parts, or segments of complete scores in private or state archives does not afford a comprehensive evaluation of the creative output of Ukrainian composers from the past nor enable its broad presentation to the public. This necessitates contemporary composers to engage in the restoration, reconstruction, or arrangement of compositions by Ukrainian classics. The article analyses the version of M. Verbytskyi’s play “Pidhiriany” created by the author of the study, in terms of orchestration strategy. Objectives, methods, and novelty of the research. Since the aspects of historically oriented orchestration have not been included in the scientific discourse, the purpose of this study is to establish an algorithm of actions that make possible this strategy. The actions are systematized as a result of the orchestration of M. Verbytskyi’s “Pidhiriany” by the author of this article. For these purposes, the following methods are used: historical, which defines the context of the emergence of the “Pidhiriany” play and the chronology of its productions; historical and theoretical to analyze the concepts of “authentic performance”, “historically informed performance”, “historically oriented performance” and their role in scientific discourse; technological, which defines specific orchestration techniques. The novelty of the work is to formulate the concept of “historically oriented orchestration” and to identify its key provisions implemented in the process of working on “Pidhiriany”. Recent research and publications. The work is based on sources devoted to the history of creation, context of appearance, and chronology of productions of “Pidhiriany” by M. Verbytskyi (Kozak, 2017a; 2017b), the linguistic aspect and stage fate of the play in Galicia (Antoshevska, 2023), the ban and restoration of the composer’s creative heritage (Kolomoiets, 2023b), the characteristics of his orchestral style (Kornii, 2001) and the style of the era (Korobetska, 2011), and some aspects of orchestral thinking (Savchenko, 2022). Some sources are devoted to the discourse of historically informed or authentic performance and the functioning of its concepts in Ukrainian musicology (Velychko, 2015; Lazarevych, 2017; Nikolaievska, 2017). Results and conclusion. The proposed definition of “historically oriented orchestration” in the article is a method of reorganizing the timbre-textural structure of the work, which allows to correlate the fixed final result with the traditions of the era in which the work was created. Among its key provisions are the following: 1) the chosen instrumental ensemble (orchestra) is similar or appropriate to the particular era; 2) the main features of the orchestral style of the era, national school and author of the original source are preserved; 3) characteristic genre features are emphasized in the orchestration; 4) the musical texture corresponds to a certain epochal style; 5) orchestration techniques and the range of musical expression (such as timbre colouring, agogics, articulation, instrumental techniques) are determined by the style of the era and a particular composer. In the analysis of M. Verbytskyi’s play “Pidhiriany”, the tools that enable the implementation of the strategy of historically oriented orchestration are revealed: • firstly, the instrumental composition corresponding to the style of the composer and the his era (a small symphony orchestra without trombones and tuba); • secondly, a differentiated interpretation of the orchestral groups functions (reliance on strings and bows with a wide range of functions, subsonance and harmonic accompaniment of woodwinds, rhythmic and harmonic function of horns, trumpets and timpani); • thirdly, the established methods of interaction between vocal voices and the orchestra (instrumental episodes have rich orchestration, during vocal episodes the orchestra performs a supporting function); • fourthly, the use of basic performance and instrumental techniques. As a result, a created timbre-textural structure of the work corresponds to its genre, epochal and individual style of the composer.