Specific Character of Ukrainian-Russian Contacts in the Musical Culture of the 17th – 18th Centuries: A Modern View

Abstract

The relevant problem of the significance of the Ukrainian-Russian musical dialogue in the 17th –18th centuries for the future development of Ukrainian and Russian musical cultures is considered in the article. Ukrainian-Russian contacts have taken place in the field of professional music, dominated with religious Christian themes at that time. Significant achievements of Ukrainian musical art of the late 16th - the first half of the 18th century are noted, where Ukrainian Orthodox traditions are combined with the adapted achievements of Polish and Western European art: the reformation of musical notation and the appearance of the five-line Kyiv notation, used to record church singing, the emergence and development of polyphonic church works of the baroque style, the genre of cant and school drama, significant achievements in choral church performance. The backwardness of the musical culture of Muscovy in the period of the 16th–17th centuries from the European world and imitating Ukrainian achievements in church singing, choral performance, canto culture and school theater are emphasized. It is accentuated that the composers, regents, choristers, musical works have been necessary for the implementation of such a restructuring in Moscow musical culture. The voluntary and forced resettlement of Ukrainian musical forces to Russia for almost two centuries is considered in the submitted work. They have taken musical works with them and remained there. It has caused a situation when many Ukrainian musicians are turned in Moscow and St. Petersburg. So, there are reasons to believe that they have been creating Ukrainian culture outside Ukraine in Muscovy (Russia), relying on Ukrainian traditions. There are, in particular, Ukrainian composers M. Berezovskyi and D. Bortnianskyi, who have initiated and developed the Ukrainian classical style of sacred music in Russia among them. At the same time the constant and systematic transfer of Ukrainian musical forces, as it is noted already, for almost two centuries has been bleeding Ukrainian musical culture and affected negatively its development in the 19th century.