The Repertoire of Mykhailo Starytsky Music and Drama Theatre (1885–1891)

Abstract

Relevance of the study. The theater activities of M. Starytsky, a playwright, director, entrepreneur, have not received a worthy evaluation; in particular, there is no thorough development that touches upon to the analysis of his work on the repertoire formation of the music and drama theater during 1885–1891. This determines the choice of the subject and the relevance of the study.The aim of the article is to analyze M. Starytsky’s dramatic activities in 1885–1891 and the information about the plays of the theater under his leadership during this period.Research Methodology. The research used the general scientific methods of cognition — analysis, synthesis, generalization, which allowed analyzing and systematizing a significant amount of material, and the methods of mathematical statistics (to determine the proportion of different genres in the repertoire of M. Starytsky theater).Results. The data analysis on the activities of M. Starytsky theater during 1885-1891 and his dramatic creative work at the same period of time has enabled to determine that the formation of the repertoire of this theater was influenced by both internal factors (the composition of the troupe, M. Starytsky’s personal experience to create music and drama performances, obtained in collaboration with M. Lysenko, and the repertoire policies developed in the first Ukrainian professional troupe along with M. Kropyvnytskyi) and external ones (the need to compete with the powerful drama groups, the taste of the audience, censorship and diverse governmental prohibitions and restrictions, particularly on the subjects and translations of dramas).It is important that the main source of replenishment of the repertoire of the theater was mainly M. Starytsky’s dramatic activity and the actors of his troupe.From the analysis of the genre representation of repertoire pieces of the troupes of M. Starytsky it turns out that of thirty works 16 pieces or 53% belong to music and drama genres, and 14, or 47% — to the drama works, which confirms the music and drama style of his theater.Novelty. The internal and external factors which influenced the repertoire formation of M. Starytsky theater during 1885–1891 are determined.The practical significance. The predominance of the music and drama genres in M. Starytsky’s repertoire is shown, and thus the music and drama style of this theater is confirmed.