A musical performance to die for. Literally, not so long ago.

[captainsblog]

One of the downsides of being a solo practitioner, and working almost entirely through referrals, is that I'm not exposed to as many new people, through co-workers or walk-ins, as I might. Fortunately, Eleanor is in a very visible sales position, and her experiences often make up for that in at least the emotional sense.

This weekend was one of those times.

A new customer came in to buy some furniture. He turned out to be native to the Ukraine, and thanks in part to some of Emily's Global studies of that area, they hit it off at once with talk about some of the history of that part of the world. Much of it older than 20 years or so wasn't the most pleasant, and the recent sights of the big wildfire clouds on California radar reminded him all too much of the even deadlier clouds on the Ukranian horizon caused by Chernobyl.

Yet there were happier stories to share, even if they had a frightening background. The customer's father was one of a number of Ukranian-American immigrants with an amazing love of, and talent for, a musical instrument I'd never heard of before. It's called a bandura, and while its sound recalls a mix of lute and harp, its look

also evokes something of a cross between those instruments and a cello, especially once you take its size into account.

 That would be a group of Ukranian bandura players from sometime near the founding of the Ukranian Bandurist Chorus around the turn of the last century. The site goes on to explain that these players had far more to worry about than breaking a string:

The Chorus' history rapidly evolved into a turbulent one. The ideals of the bandurist - God, truth, freedom, and human dignity heralded through song - were a threat to the then-newly formed Soviet Union. Under Joseph Stalin's rule, artists and intellectuals were arrested, exiled or executed in an attempt to eradicate every remnant of Ukrainian culture.

Hnat Khotkevych was executed in 1938 in Kharkiv and his compositions were banned throughout the Soviet Union. Many conductors, chorus members, and blind bandurists-minstrels were also accused of enticing the populace to nationalism and were executed. In 1935 the remaining members were forced to reorganize into the State Bandurist Chorus of the Ukrainian SSR.

In the years that followed the Chorus was exploited and persecuted by both the Soviets and the Nazis. It was not until 1949 that through the assistance of allied forces many of the Chorus' members immigrated from refugee camps to the United States where many established a home base in Detroit, Michigan.

The father of my wife's customer, now in his 80s, was one of those Detroiters to preserve this form of expression, both musical and cultural, despite the best efforts of a tyrant to blot it out. His group has been on a whirlwind tour of North America, and the dad's only concession to age has been his reluctant willingness to sit on an onstage chair when he is not actually performing.  They had a gig in Toronto the other night, and Eleanor's customer planned on making a surprise visit to see this performance, perhaps the last time the group as now constituted will ever be this close to home.

If any of you musical types have any familiarity with this instrument or the music made with it, I'd love to know what you know about it.  For no matter how much I relate to those of you here who hate marching band-type activities (and believe me, in my time I did), this story makes clear that a love of music can come at a far higher cost in tyrannical times.