Solomia Amvrosiivna Krushelnytska (September 23, 1872, Bilyavantsi, Buchatsky District, Kingdom of Galicia and Volodymyr, Austria-Hungary, now Buchatka OTG, Chortkivskyi District, Ternopil Oblast, Ukraine - November 16, 1952, Lviv, Ukrainian SSR) was a Ukrainian opera singer, teacher. During her lifetime, she was recognized as the greatest singer in the world. Among her numerous awards and honors, in particular, the title of "Wagnerian prima donna" of the 20th century. Enrico Caruso, Titta Ruffo, Fyodor Chaliapin considered it an honor to sing with Krushelnytska on the same stage. The Italian composer Giacomo Puccini gave her his portrait with the inscription "To the greatest and most charming Butterfly - Giacomo Puccini. Torre 1904" ("Alla più grande e deliziosa Butterfly - Giacomo Puccini. Torre '904").
In the modern Ukrainian tradition, she is included in the list of the most famous women of ancient and modern Ukraine
Biography
Childhood
The Krushelnytskyi family, beginning 1900s Standing: Volodymyr and Solomiya. Sitting in the center: Theodore's parents, Fr. Ambrose Below: Elena with her daughter Maria-Solomia, Maria, Emilia, Anna.
She was born on September 23, 1872 in the village of Bilyavintsi, in the family of a Greek Catholic priest, Fr. Amvrosii Krushelnytskyi and his wife Teodora Maria (1844-1907), daughter of the UGCC priest, public figure, writer Fr. Grigory Savchynskyi, one of the first initiators of the poetic fable in Galicia. It comes from the noble and ancient Ukrainian family of the Krushelnytsky coat of arms of the Sas. The family moved several times: first to Osivtsi, then to Stary Petlykivtsi, for some time the family lived in the foothills of the Eastern Beskids - in the village of Tysov near Bolekhov. In 1878, they moved to the village of Bila in the suburbs of Ternopil, where they settled. Sisters Hanna and Emilia were also singers.
Maria Mykhailivna Tsybulska, an acquaintance of the family, recalls the childhood years of Solomiya Krushelnytska:
We remember the young Solomiya, how she sang in the evenings in a group of girls somewhere in the kindergarten or on the square. Even then, her voice was strong, beautiful and very different from others.
Already in her childhood, Solomiya knew a lot of folk songs, which she learned directly from the villagers.
Studying in Ternopil
She started singing from a young age. She studied at the Ternopil school of the "Friends of Music" society. She received the basics of musical training at the Ternopil Classical Gymnasium, where she took external exams. Here she became close to a musical group of high school students, whose member was also Denys Sichynskyi, later a famous composer, the first professor of music in Galicia.
In 1883, the first public performance of Solomiya Krushelnytska, who sang in the choir of the "Russian Conversation" society, took place at the Shevchenko concert in Ternopil. At one of the concerts of this choir on August 2, 1885, Ivan Franko was present, who, together with Ukrainian, Russian and Bulgarian students and the composer Ostap Nyzhankivskyi, the artist and poet Kornyl Ustiyanovich, was traveling around the region at the time. Writer Pavlo Dumka, from the nearby village of Kupchyntsi, was also at the concert.
In Ternopil, Krushelnytska got to know the theater for the first time. From time to time, the Lviv Theater of the "Ruska Besida" society performed here, whose repertoire included operas by Semen Gulak-Artemovsky and Mykola Lysenko. She had the opportunity to observe the performance of dramatic actors Filomena Lopatynska, Antonina Osypovicheva, Stepan Yanovych, Andriy Muzyk-Stechynskyi, Mykhailo Olshanskyi, Karolina Klishevskaya.
Lviv Conservatory
In 1891, Krushelnytska entered the Lviv Conservatory of the Galician Music Society.
The management of the conservatory highly appreciated the abilities of the young singer:
It has all the data to become a decoration of even the first-class stage. The broad, ringing and very nice sound of her mezzo-soprano, musical education, high sense of beauty, charming superficiality, stage direction, in short, all the signs with which her nature endowed her, bequeath her the best future in the artistic world.
At the conservatory, she studied with Professor Valery Vysotskyi, who trained a constellation of famous Ukrainian and Polish singers. While studying at the conservatory, she performed as a soloist for the first time: on April 13, 1892, she performed the main part in H. F. Handel's oratorio "Messiah". On June 5, 1892, she performed Mykola Lysenko's song "Why do I have black eyebrows" in "Lviv Boyan".
On April 15, 1893, Solomiya Krushelnytska made her opera debut as Leonora in the opera "Favorite" by the Italian composer Gaetano Donizetti on the stage of the Lviv City Theater Skarbka. The famous Rudolf Bernhardt and Julian Hieronymus sang with her. Performances in the role of Santucia in P. Mascagna's "Village Honor" were also very successful.
In 1893, Krushelnytska graduated from the Lviv Conservatory. Her diploma read:
Miss Solomiya Krushelnytska receives this diploma as a certificate of artistic education, obtained with exemplary diligence and extraordinary success, especially at the public competition on June 24, 1893, for which she was awarded a silver medal...
Opera scene
While still studying at the conservatory, Solomiya Krushelnytska received an invitation from the Polish Lviv Opera Theater, but she wanted Ukrainian
