Ukrainian performer-guitarist, composer, musicologist, artist.
From the creative biography
Anatoly Shevchenko began his creative career at the Rostov Art School named after M. B. Grekov, which he graduated in 1961. While mastering painting, he devoted a lot of time to music. He learned the guitar on his own. Then he wrote his first works.
In 1967, he graduated from the Simferopol Music School named after Pyotr Tchaikovsky. After college, he taught at a music school and performed at concerts for the Crimean Music Society. His repertoire included world guitar classics and his own compositions.
"Archer" - a fragment of a rock painting of the Mesolithic era (Spain), which A.A. Shevchenko chose as his personal symbol (logo)
Flamenco had a special place in Anatoly's work. Anatoly began to engage not only in the practice, but also in the theory of this ancient culture. Acquaintance with her added new colors to the master's works.
In 1976, he wrote the Carpathian rhapsody "Wind from the Poloniny", which was later published in many countries around the world. By 1976, he had prepared two solo Flamenco programs and the first theoretical work - "Unconquered Games of Flamenco", in which parallels between flamenco and ancient music were drawn.
During this period, Anatoly and Natalia Shevchenko started the practice of concerts in museum halls among paintings and sculptures. Anatoly began touring the USSR. At that time, "Guitar Lexicon" by Jozef Povrozniak was published in Poland, for which Anatoly prepared articles about Flamenco and some of its genres. A. Povrozniak wrote about Shevchenko himself. The Polish musician considered him one of the most interesting guitarists. Shevchenko's first plays were also published in Poland by Povrozniak.
From 1977 to 1981, the Shevchenko family organized Flamenco Fiestas every fall in Simferopol.
In 1982, A. Shevchenko was invited to the Odessa Philharmonic, where he remained a soloist until his last days.
A. A. Shevchenko, performer
Performer Anatoly Shevchenko already presented two cycles in his first Odessa Philharmonic seasons: "Guitar Anthology. Music from Antiquity to the present day" (7 concerts) and "Geography of the guitar" (8 concerts). He traced the history of guitar music and music for related instruments not only in Europe, but also abroad. At the same time, he started writing small essays for his programs and creating graphic logos for them. Anatoly performed more than a hundred programs in Odessa, in other cities of Ukraine, in Spain, Poland, Germany, and the USA. They played ancient and modern music, own compositions, Flamenco.
In addition to flamenco, A. Shevchenko also played classical music, music of the East (raga, makam, mugam, dasdah), ancient Greece, the Sumero-Babylonian hymn "On the Creation of Heaven and Man by God", which German musicologist Kurt Sachs dated to the 27th century. BC, modern Ukrainian music (Karamanov, Grabovsky), own works.
Ukrainian music was presented from Lviv tablatures of the 16th century. to the works of modern composers. And, of course, Shevchenko's own compositions: "Ukrainian Suite", "Crimean Sketches", "Odessika".
Some programs that were in A. Shevchenko's repertoire
A. A. Shevchenko, composer
Composer Anatoly Shevchenko wrote four concertos for guitar and orchestra, among them Concierto Flamenco and Concerto Grosso, Polyphonic notebooks, sonatas, suites, vocal cycles, separate pieces for guitar, symphonic poems, cycles for children "Music of Nikitika", "Three Steps to Parnassus" and other works.
In 1987, at the "Guitar-microcosm" competition in Esztergom, Anatoly received a prize for the series "Touches". In 1996, the cycle was published in the USA. Several collections of the Master's compositions were published in Ukraine.
Acquaintance with Flamenco added new colors to the composer's palette of the Maestro. In the mid-1970s, he wrote the Carpathian Rhapsody "Wind from Polonyna", in which he combines Ukrainian national motifs and the technological possibilities of both the classical guitar and the Flamenco guitar. Carpathian Rhapsody has become the hallmark of Anatoly Shevchenko, his composition which is most often performed by guitarists all over the world.
List of works written by Anatoly Shevchenko
A. A. Shevchenko as a musicologist
An ancient vase, on the basis of a fragment of which Anatoly Shevchenko deciphered the ancient Greek notation
Anatoly Shevchenko is the author of a number of musicological works.
In 1976-77 he wrote The Unconquered Games of Flamenco, a theoretical treatise on the enigmatic musical culture that originated in southern Spain. In 1988, the publishing house "Music Ukraine" published the practical part of this work under the name "School of Flamenco", a sheet music collection of basic genres of Flamenco and examples of improvisation. For musicians of the Soviet and, for a certain time, post-Soviet space, "School of Flamenco" was the only training manual for playing in this style. The full version with the theoretical part has not been published yet. In it, Anatoly not only talked about the peculiarities of Flamenco, but also for the first time traced the points of contact between this art and the music of Antiquity.
Concert cycles "Guitar Anthology", "Guitar Geography", "Music of Hellas" and "Flamenco" programs allowed the Maestro to write musicological works "Testament of Orpheus" and "Music of Hellas". In the work "Testament of Orpheus" Anatoliy beltniv, why right now we have the opportunity to adequately perceive ancient music, to hear it, and not write it off in the archive. But he spoke about the role of ancient music, which, like Flamenco, is a link connecting the music of the East and the West.
"Spiral" by A.A. Shevchenko, which was researched by him during the writing of the monograph "Music of Hellas"
In "Music of Hellas", Anatoly outlined the stages of musical development of mankind and substantiated the concept of the integrity of world music, which is continuously developing from ancient times to the present day. Graphically, he depicted his theory of the development of the musical system in the form of a spiral. This is the process of the development of music from the first steps to the highest stage - from primitive aleatorics to 20th century aleatorics. When the potential possibilities of sound organization are exhausted, after "4 minutes 33 seconds of silence" (D. Cage, 1952), the process enters a new cycle, in which all the previous stages of development are repeated in general terms. Only now on a new level. It is aleatorics, according to the concept of cyclical development of the musical system, that begins a new cycle of musical evolution.
He also portrayed his scientific idea in a musical version. Concerto Grosso for guitar and orchestra is a textbook on the development of the sound musical system from the chaotic chants of our distant ancestors to modern aleatorics. Concerto Grosso is not the definition of a musical genre. This is a metaphorical definition of a witty idea to reflect in a small work the entire path of music development from its origin in ancient times to the present day. This is an unprecedented case in the history of music, when Music itself becomes the protagonist of the composition. The process of music development unfolds before the listener from the first steps to the highest stage. And when the potential possibilities of sound organization are exhausted, the process enters a new cycle, in which all previous stages of development are repeated in general terms. Only now on a new level.
Thanks to the fact that Anatoliy traced the evolution of the tuning of the avlos, kifara and other musical instruments, as well as the evolution of the ancient Greek notation, he was able to decipher the sound formula that was depicted on a vase of the 6th century. B.C. Epibomion, that's the name of this sound formula that the ancient Greeks left to the next civilizations along with the image of two auletes and two kypharians. Musicians performed his Epibomion during the sacrifice that opened the Panathenaic Games, the main festival in ancient Athens. A vase with such an image, filled with olive oil, as well as a wreath made of sacred olive, were awarded to the winners of musical, athletic, and equestrian competitions.
In addition to Epibomion of the 6th century BC. e., in the conceptual work "Music of Hellas" Anatoliy deciphered Parode 1 from Aristophanes' comedy "Clouds". This allowed him to present in "Music of Hellas" the most complete anthology of monuments of ancient music at the beginning of the 21st century. There are also krusis and performance editions of the maestro himself, which he used in his programs "Music of Hellas" and "Sounds of Hellas" (the basis of ancient Greek polyphony is krusis - accompaniment on the kypher that permeates the singing, and the ancient Greek kypharistics itself consists of solo performance and accompaniment of singing by playing the kifar - kifarody).
In addition, Shevchenko investigated the influence and interaction of the development of music with the evolution of both science ("Sound concept in cosmology from the harmony of the spheres to "string theory") and society (Algorithm of love in B-flat major). He understood music not only as a performer, but also as a philosopher and scientist.
List of publications
A. A. Shevchenko as an artist
The graphics and paintings of Anatoly Shevchenko, the artist, were presented at exhibitions in Odessa, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Spain. Some of the works are in private collections in Ukraine, Russia, the USA, Spain, the Czech Republic, and Germany.
Four personal exhibitions were held in Odesa (Kvartira Gallery, Literary Museum, Center of Ukrainian Culture, and Odesa Museum of Modern Art. 2012-2014) already after the Master passed away.
Family
Wife — Natalia Viktorivna Shevchenko.
Daughter — Iryna Anatolivna Shevchenko, journalist.
