Karabyts, Ivan

Karabyts, Ivan [Карабиць, Іван; Karabyc'], b 17 January 1945 in Yalta, Pershotravneve raion, Donetsk oblast, d 20 January 2002 in Kyiv. Composer and conductor; husband of Marianna Kopytsia and father of Kyrylo Karabyts (Kirill Karabits). A graduate of the Kyiv Conservatory (1971) and a student of Borys Liatoshynsky and Myroslav Skoryk, he conducted the Song and Dance Ensemble of the Kyiv Military District (1967–75), taught at the Kyiv Conservatory (from 1983), and then served as artistic director of the Kyiv Camerata (Kyivska kamerata) (1994–2000). From 1989 to 2001 he was artistic director of the Kyiv Music Fest international music festival. He was a cofounder and jury member (1995–2001) of the International Competition for Young Pianists in Memory of Vladimir Horowitz. His compositions include a cycle of 24 preludes for piano, a piano trio, 3 concertos for orchestra, 3 art song cycles for voice and piano (including Pastels to the words of Pavlo Tychyna), the oratorio Charming the Fire, the opera-oratorio Kyiv Frescoes, a cantata based on Hryhorii Skovoroda’s poem collection Sad bozhestvennykh pisen' (The Garden of Divine Songs), and film scores.

Marko Robert Stech

[This article was updated in 2020.]