Pecheniha-Uhlytsky, Pavlo

Pecheniha-Uhlytsky, Pavlo [Печеніга-Углицький, Павло; Pečeniha-Uhlyc'kyj; aka Pecheniha-Ouglitzky, Paul], b 20 June 1892 in Pechenihy, Vovchansk county, Kharkiv gubernia, d 2 July 1948 in New York, New York State. Composer, conductor, double-bass player, and teacher. He attended the Russian Music Society school in Kharkiv, studied (1912–14) at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory under Fedir Yakymenko, Aleksandr Glazunov, and Aleksandr Tcherepnin, and then taught theory and composition (1914–20) at the conservatories in Saint Petersburg, Rostov, and Yalta. He settled in New York in 1922 and worked for the National Broadcasting Corporation as a composer, orchestrator, and conductor. From the mid-1930s he was an important organizer of Ukrainian musical life in New York. On 8 January 1939 his compositions were performed by the NBC Radio Chorus and Philharmonic Symphony Society Orchestra at Carnegie Hall in the first Ukrainian symphonic concert in North America. His major works include the opera The Witch (after Yevhen Hrebinka, libretto by Stepan Charnetsky, 1936–40), the ballet Legin' (Young Lad; libretto by Dmytro Chutro, 1938), the tone poem Ukraïna (after Taras Shevchenko’s Haidamaky), three string quartets, and the cantata Biut' porohy (The Rapids Roar; text by Shevchenko) for mixed chorus and orchestra. He also wrote a score for the Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom and other works for chorus, art songs to texts by Shevchenko and other poets, and arrangements of Ukrainian folk songs for chorus and solo voice.

Roman Savytsky Jr.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 3 (1993).]