Raising public awareness in N. O. Yeshchenko’s performance activity

The article is dedicated to an outstanding personality, Merited Artist of Ukraine, professor of Kharkiv I. P. Kotlyarevsky National University of Arts. Nataliia Olexandrivna Yeshchenko (1926–2015) is the pianist, teacher, artist, scientist, who devoted her entire life to music. In her work she preserved traditions of the Kharkiv piano school, the founders of which were P. Lutsenko, O. Horovyts, M. Khazanovskyi. Her rich and fruitful activity left a noticeable mark in the history of piano performance in Ukraine. The work of the famous performer attracted the attention of reviewers and researchers, but it did not specifically focus on such an aspect as public awareness. The purpose of this article is to consider the educational direction of N. O. Yeshchenko’s performance as an important aspect of the work of an outstanding pianist of the 20th century. In the course of the research, it became necessary to turn to archival materials, in particular personal documents of the pianist, reviews of her concerts in periodicals, audio recordings of her works, her repertoire list. Based on the analysis of the mentioned source base, we support the idea that the performance art of N. O. Yeshchenko had a clearly defined educational orientation. Unforgettable was her concert-educational activity, which manifested itself in various aspects of her performance: numerous monographic concerts dedicated to the works of great composers, performances with a symphony orchestra, playing in a piano duet, accompaniment to vocalists and instrumentalists. She willingly took part in concert lectures, performed in front of a wide audience in sponsor concerts, also took part in various concerts in remote areas of the country. She bequeathed such a broad vision of the musician’s performing mission to her students. Thanks to music she constantly had a dialogue with the audience through numerous publications in periodicals. By including little-known or, unfortunately, forgotten works she showed the audience the layers of beautiful music, and was the first performer of works by Ukrainian composers, including Kharkiv authors. Programs (often organized in collaboration with a musicologist) featuring works of a certain genre, such as waltz, rondo, transcriptions, miniatures, introduced the listener to the world of genres still unknown or little known to them. A significant contribution to the treasure trove of Ukrainian performance was the concert performance of world-famous complex cycles of piano literature: 12 F. Liszt`s “Transcendental Etudes” and “24 Preludes” by S. Rachmaninoff. So, the analysis of N. O. Yeshchenko’s performance art shows that raising public awareness in the performance field was the main direction of her activity.