Pavlo Matsenko (24 December 1897, Kyrykivka village, now: Kyrykivka village, Velykopysarivskyi district, Sumy region - 8 March 1991, Winnipeg, Canada) was a Ukrainian musicologist, conductor, teacher, publicist, editor, and public figure.
Biography.
He comes from a Cossack family. He was educated in his native village of Kyrykivka, then studied in Kharkiv and Sumy. He fought and was wounded in the First World War. He graduated from the senior officers' military school in Kyiv and joined the 2nd Sloboda Regiment of the UPR Army in 1917.
European period
Being evacuated by the British to the island of Cyprus, he fell ill with typhus and conducted church and secular choirs on the same island in 1921-1922. Soon after, in 1923-1924, in Bulgaria, he organised and conducted a Bulgarian choir in the forests and mines and in a factory.
Moving to Prague in 1924 and entering the Drahomanov Higher Pedagogical Institute, he graduated from the Faculty of Music and Pedagogy, continued his studies at the Prague Conservatory of Music, and in 1927-1928 graduated from the Czech School of Higher Pedagogical Sciences. In Prague, he conducted the Ukrainian Academic Choir, and in 1929-1931, the choir of the Ukrainian Catholic Church in Vienna. In 1932, he was awarded a doctorate in music and pedagogy.
Winnipeg period
At the invitation of the Ukrainian National House in 1937, he arrived in Winnipeg, where he worked as a teacher and conductor until 1940. In 1940-1945, he taught at the Ukrainian Educational Courses for young people in Canada and America, which he initiated. In 1941, he founded the Ukrainian National Association Youth Choir and conducted it until 1949. He was secretary of the Ukrainian Canadian Committee (UCC) from its inception, and later chairman of its educational section.
He became involved in the cultural and social life of the Ukrainian community in Winnipeg, working as a cultural and educational liaison officer for the Ukrainian National Organization of Canada, co-founder and long-time secretary of the Winnipeg Centre for Ukrainian Culture and Education, co-editor of the newspaper Novyi Shliakh and a contributor to Ukrainian magazines and journals. His work in the educational field was not limited to Winnipeg: he was a corresponding member of the Ukrainian Canadian Academy of Sciences, rector of St John's Institute in Edmonton, and professor of music at St Volodymyr's College in Roblin (UGCC) and St Andrew's College (UOC) at the University of Manitoba.
He is the author of scholarly works, research, and journalistic articles.
