Sokil, Mariia

Sokil, Mariia [Сокіл, Марія], b 18 October 1902 in Zherebets (now Kirove), Oleksandrivske county, Katerynoslav gubernia. Operatic soprano; wife of Antin Rudnytsky. She graduated from the Dnipropetrovsk Music Conservatory and performed as a soloist in opera theaters in Kharkiv (from 1927; see Kharkiv Theater of Opera and Ballet) and Kyiv (from 1930; see Kyiv Theater of Opera and Ballet). In 1932–7 she performed in Lviv, Warsaw, Prague, Vienna, and Berlin, and in 1937–8 she gave concerts in the United States and Canada. From 1958 she lectured at the Philadelphia Music Conservatory and the Philadelphia Music Academy. Her notable roles were Marguerite in Charles Gounod's Faust, Tatiana in Peter Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin, Desdemona in Giuseppe Verdi's Othello, Elsa in Richard Wagner's Lohengrin, Maryltsia in Mykola Lysenko's Taras Bulba, Odarka in Semen Hulak-Artemovsky’s Zaporozian Cossack beyond the Danube, and Mimi in Giacomo Puccini's La Bohàeme.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 4 (1993).]