created by Yara Arts Group, artists from Ukraine and Gogol Bordello
with:
Maryana Sadovska, Zabryna Guevara, Meredith Wright, Jina Oh, Akiko Hiroshima and Yaryna Turianska,
Eugene Hutz, Alexander Kozatchkoff, and Sergey Ryabtsev Gogol Bordello
Aaron Alexander percussion
Piroshka Gypsy singer
directed by Virlana Tkacz
music by Maryana Sadovska, Yaryna Turianska and Eugene Hutz
with traditional Ukrainian folk music, Gypsy songs and the
ethno-avant-garde music of Gogol Bordello
set & light design by Watoku Ueno
costumes by Olga Danyliuk and Rachel Comey
video by Andrea Odezynska
assistant video camera: Peter Ihnat
archival footage by Lesia Turianska
movement by company with Shigeko Suga
translations: Virlana Tkacz and Wanda Phipps
development: Tom Lee, research: Mo-Yain Tham
asst. set: Adriana Serano, asst. costumes: Renata Podolec
press photos by Algis Norvila, prod. mgr. Jason Eksuzian
graphic design by Carmen Pujols based on Valentyna Dzuraniuk
December 21 – 23, 2000
La MaMa Experimental Theatre New York
SONG TREE (2000)
discovering the mythical in the everyday
Yara Arts Group, a resident company of La MaMa, creates new World Music Theater pieces by combining stunning singing, breath-taking design and the oldest folk sources imaginable. Recently they traveled to the Carpathians and found ancient winter songs and dances that pre-date Christian times. They also recorded beautiful polyphonic women's songs in the villages of Poltava. The resulting creation, Song Tree, is a work in which spirits of ancient myths descend on a woman who has buried herself in work and science. The production, directed by Virlana Tkacz, features traditional Ukrainian female songs and Gogol Bordello, a very hot, explosive Ukrainian Gypsy ethno-avant-garde band.
Bob Holman, of the Poetry Gathering, called Song Tree: "a luscious experience, flowing from folk to avant-garde, from the bizarre to the holy. It was jampacked, juicy -- a dream where you can live forever and nobody collects the rent." Helen Smindak wrote: "the overall effect of multilingual songs, dances, music, costumes and stage setting created a stunning original work that had the audience spellbound." Writing for the Ukrainian Weekly, Cathy Zadoretzky noted: "Winter solstice magic on the Lower East Side? It surely was. If you were lucky, you were there to experience it and to walk away uplifted by a novel vision of spring to come."
Last summer Yara's director Virlana Tkacz and video director Andrea Odezynska traveled to Ukraine. Together with Ukrainian artists Maryana Sadovska and Yaryna Turianska, they recorded ancient pre-Christian carols and winter songs in the villages of Poltava and the Carpathians. (For more information on this trip see "Kriachkivka: A Village That Sings" and "Utoropy: A Village With Salt in Its History")
Song Tree is an original World Music theatre piece created in rehearsals by the ensemble based on the research material the artists collected. It is a collaborative work by Yara Arts Group, artists from Ukraine and the band Gogol Bordello. Music is by Mariana Sadovska, Yaryna Turianska and Eugene Hutz of Gogol Bordello. The set and lights are by Watoku Ueno, costumes by Olya Danyliuk and video by Andrea Odezynska. The show features the soaring vocals of Mariana Sadovska as well as Yara's great singers Zabryna Guevara, Akiko Hiroshima, Jina Oh, Meredith Wright. The musicians of Gogol Bordello, appear in the piece Eugene Hutz, Sergei Ryabtsev and Alexander Kozachkoff playing both traditional Ukrainian and Gypsy music, as well as their own brand of ethno-avant-garde. They are joined on stage by percussionist Aaron Alexander and the fabulous the Gypsy singer Piroshka.
Director Virlana Tkacz heads the Yara Arts Group and has created nine original theater pieces with the company, all of which had their American premieres at La MaMa. Video is by Andrea Odezynska, whose film, "Dora Was Dysfunctional," won awards at the Hamptons Film Festival and Rotterdam Film Festival and was an Academy Awards Short Subject Finalist. The set and lights are by Watoku Ueno, resident designer and founding member of Yara Arts Group. Costumes are by Olya Danyliuk, a graduate of the Lviv Academy of Arts who currently works in New York as a theatre costume designer. The piece is multilingual but is easily accessible to English speaking audiences. Its traditional Ukrainian songs are translated into English by Virlana Tkacz and Wanda Phipps.
Musical director and co-composer Maryana Sadovska was was born in Lviv and performed with the Kurbas Young Theatre. She worked with Yara on the group's first project in Ukraine in 1991, titled In the Light. Since then she has been working at the Gardzienice Experimental Theatre in Poland as actor and musical director. She has appeared in that theater's productions of The Life of Protopope Awwakum Carmina Burana and Metamorphosis or The Golden Ass, which she co-created using ancient Greek music. She has organized expeditions to collect Ukrainian folk songs for the last ten years. Co-composer Yaryna Turianska is an ethnomusicologist who has been collecting songs in villages near the Carpathians for ten years. This summer she released the first world music CD in Ukraine entitled "Black Stream." Gogol Bordello, led by Eugene Hutz, has become one of the hottest upcoming bands in America, packing the houses at Joe's Pub and Bowery Ballroom. Eugene Hutz is a founding member of Nova Nomada and the author of the books "Newiuorski kazochky" (New York Fables) and "Raised by Cats."
Writing for the Kyiv journal Ukrainian Culture Kateryna Talan so aptly characterized Yara as "a unique psychological and cultural experiment. Virlana Tkacz and her actors perform Ukrainian songs, legends and literary texts that speak to people of other cultures. At the same time Ms Tkacz is consumed with what is unique and original about Ukrainian culture and has totally involved her actors in this project. So a dialogue arises between the past and present, between many cultures creating an fascinating model of human understanding."
Song Tree performed at La MaMa "Theatre of the World" in New York City December 21-23, 2001. The production was made possible, by Yara's numerous individual contributors and with public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs Cultural Challenge Program. Song Tree has been invited to Kyiv for the Berezillia Arts Festival and is currently scheduled to perform there on April 25, 2001. For more information check the calendar and what's new
KUPALA (2002)
songs from the midsummer night festival
created by Yara with Mariana Sadovska
at the Ukrainian Diaspora
International Theatre Festival in Kyiv, Ukraine
and in the villages of Kraichkivka in Poltava
and Svarytsevychi in Polissia
November, 2002
Toward the end of October 2002 Yara actors Zabryna Guevara, Akiko Hiroshima, and Jina Oh arrived in Kyiv, Ukraine, to work with Virlana Tkacz and Mariana Sadovska, the musical dramaturg and director of Yara’s new project Kupala. The cast also included Elzara Batalova and Zarema Tupykova, two Crimean Tatar singer-actors, as well as four young women from Kharkiv’s Oira vocal ensemble. Soon they were joined by Yara’s Marina Celander who brought her 10-month old daughter, Maya. The staff included Svitlana Matvienko, Sofia Riabchuk, Maria Korotchenko, and Nadia Sokolenko. Anna Korotchenko did the costumes and Serhiy Kyselnko the lights.
In a little over two weeks of rehearsal in Kyiv they created a concert version of Kupala that was presented at the Young Theatre in Kyiv on November 14, as part of the International Ukrainian Diaspora Festival in Kyiv. But the highlights of the trip were visits to two very special villages -- Kriachkivka in the Poltava region and Svarytsevychi in the Polissia region, where many of the songs were first recorded. Women from both Kraitchivka and Polissia also appear on the CD Song Tree which Mariana put together in Poland last year and which Yara helped to produce.
On November 9 Kupala’s international cast sang with the women of Kraichkivka in the village hall. It was an unforgettable event. The cast and staff of the Kupala project was joined by a mini-bus load of friends from Kyiv, including the amazing Nina Matvienko, who sang with the women of Kriachivka, director Serhiy Proskurnia, Dan and Angela Thompson from USAID, and many people from the Kyiv press. Then on November 16 the Kupala cast and two writers from Lviv Mariana Savka and Mariana Kiyanovska made the long trek out to Svarytsevychi in Polissia for another unbelievable dialogue of songs with the women of that village.
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Here are some of the reactions of the Yara actors to the events:
"Although my recent experience at the festival was wonderful because we saw so many people interested in this traditional music the most profound impressions were made in the villages . To sing the music of these women back to them and have them receive us with open arms and singing even more songs was awe-inspiring and enlightening. The love and kindness we were showered with made any attempt to match it pale in comparison. I do hope that in some small way it is an inspiring event for the youth of the villages to continue this long-standing and heartening tradition alive for generations to come." -- Zabryna Guevara
Yara's Zabryna Guevara and Jina Oh listen to Nadia Rozdabara sing in Kriachkivka.
"This trip to Ukraine has been an experience beyond my expectations. Whether we were in Kyiv rehearsing for the International Theater Festival with the Crimean-Tatars and Oira from Kharkiv, or visiting the villages of Kriatchkivka and Svarysevytchi - all very different places with their own unique character, one thing remained a constant throughout our trip, which is that we encountered some of the most beautiful, giving, enormous hearts I have ever known. Everywhere we went, people opened their homes and their lives to us and shared everything they had - offering us their gift of food, love, and above all, their beautiful, piercing voices. Although I could not understand what the songs meant, I somehow felt it deep in the core of my heart through the music and through their voices. We were communicating through music and it was more powerful, deeper than any words can express. It was incredibly moving. Every time the grandmas sang none of us could control the flow of tears. I am so grateful for the opportunity to meet such inspiring people through our work. My only regret is that we cannot spend more time with them. This has been an experience that I will hold very close to my heart."
-- Jina Oh
"My experience of this trip to Ukraine has been one of the most special trips I've made in my life! Partly because of the people we met and made contact with: from the girls from Kharkiv and Crimea we performed with, to the people we performed for in Kyiv, Poltava, and Polissia. And partly because Virlana and Mariana gave me the amazing opportunity to travel with my 10-month old daughter, Maya, who got to hear and feel the enormity and power of the voices of the grandmas and the songs they sang in the villages. This will surely stay with her for the rest of her life! The highlights were of course the visits to the villages and meeting these BEAUTIFUL women - in particular Ulana Kuzlo whose voice spoke to me in such a deep way when I heard it for the first time on the CD Yara co-produced, that I HAD to meet her - but also all the love I felt from everybody toward Maya and support for bringing my baby along." -- Marina Celander
"I would like to thank Virlana and Mariana for this great opportunity to be here in Kyiv and especially to visit the villages to meet grandmas. The grandmas were all full of energy and treated us like their own daughters and granddaughters. It was great to see the young people come to see the concert and sing with us. I hope this helps them pass on the great songs that we have learned. Also this trip was very special because, through meeting new people in Kyiv and villages and by learning these songs, I also learned to appreciate my own culture more than before. I'm supposed to visit my family in Japan next year, and I believe it's going to be as great a trip as this one."
-- Akiko Hiroshima
The following spring Yara performed at Passaic County Community College and Yara actors were still talking about their experiences in Ukraine. See Oksana Bauer's article on the event at "Yara Brings Diversity to Community College.") - see page 12.
In the summer of 2000 Yara's director Virlana Tkacz and video director Andrea Odezynska traveled to Ukraine. Together with Ukrainian artists Mariana Sadovska and Yaryna Turianska, they recorded ancient ritual songs in the villages of Poltava and the Carpathians. (For more information on this trip see "Kriachkivka: A Village That Sings" and"Utoropy: A Village With Salt in Its History." see (Our Life, Novmeber 2002)
