Fedir Havrylovych Oreshkevych (* 24 April (6 May) 1872, Odesa - 2 October 1932, Kyiv) was a Ukrainian opera singer (lyric and dramatic tenor).
He came from a military family, graduated from a cadet school, and served as an officer in the tsarist army until 1897.
From 1897 to 1900, he studied singing in St. Petersburg with Fyodor Gushchin.
In 1900 he made his debut at the Tiflis Opera and was accepted to the Mariinsky Theatre. In the 1904-1905 season he sang in Warsaw.
In 1902 and 1904, he toured the New Summer Theatre "Olympia" in St. Petersburg, in 1909 - the Solodovnikov Theatre in Moscow, and in 1910 - in Yekaterinoslav.
In 1906-1913 and 1915-1925 he was a soloist at the Kyiv Opera House, and from 1920 to 1925 he was the theatre's chief director. In 1914-1915 he was a soloist at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow.
He taught at the Music and Drama School of Mykola Lysenko.
In the 1910s, he taught at the Kyiv Conservatory; among his students was the future People's Artist of the Ukrainian SSR Vira Guzhova.
From 1917, he took an active part in the organisation of Ukrainian opera.
Creative work
According to the memoirs of his contemporaries, he had a flexible, beautiful voice with a particularly developed upper register. He was equally good at both lyrical and dramatic roles.
He also performed as a chamber singer, his repertoire included romances and Ukrainian folk songs.
His stage partners included L. Balanovska, Kateryna Voronets-Montvid, M. Hushchyna, Valentyna Kuza, Maksymilian Maksakov, Hryhorii Pyrohov, Joachim Tartakov, Pavlo Tikhonov, Oleksandr Ulukhanov, Platon Tsesevych, Oleksandra Chaleeva, Fyodor Chaliapin, and Maria Jansa.
He recorded on gramophone records, in particular, at the Extraphon company.
Parts performed
Radames - "Aida" by G. Verdi,
Duke - Rigoletto by G. Verdi,
Alfred - La Traviata by G. Verdi,
Werther - "Werther" by J. Massenet,
Yontek - "Halshka" by S. Moniuszko,
Shuisky - Boris Godunov by Mussorgsky,
Golitsyn - "The Hiding Place" by Mussorgsky,
Hoffmann - Tales of Hoffmann by J. Offenbach,
Guidon - The Tale of Tsar Saltan by Rimsky-Korsakov,
Herman - The Queen of Spades by Tchaikovsky,
Lensky - Eugene Onegin by Tchaikovsky,
Sadko - "Sadko" by Rimsky-Korsakov,
Berendey - The Snow Maiden by Rimsky-Korsakov,
Lykov - The Tsar's Bride by Rimsky-Korsakov.
