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Washington, D.C., Sunday, October 8, 2000... The outstanding Experimental Bandura Trio performed at The Washington Groups (TWG) Leadership Conference 2000 held on October 6-9th in Washington, D.C. The group was brought to the Conference by TWG's Cultural Fund. The performance was unique, exciting and bold and demonstrated the best in the contemporary musical language available today for the ancient instrument, the bandura.
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| The Experimental Bandura Trio performing at TWG Leadership Conference 2000 |
The bandura is a stringed instrument originating in Ukraine, where in centuries past blind bards (kobzari) used it to accompany their epic songs. For the last three years Michael Andrec, Jurij Fedynsky, and Julian Kytasty have worked together as the Experimental Bandura Trip to develop from the bandura's deep tradition and melodies a basis for their new "downtown-style" of free improvisation. On March 29, 1957 Dr. Zynovij Shtokalko, one of the great bandurists of the twentieth century, went into the basement of his Brooklyn, New York apartment, picked up his bandura and turned on the tape recorder. Forty years later the resulting music, Atonal Etudes 1 & 2, became the inspiration and starting point for the work of the Experimental Bandura Trio.
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| Michael Andrec playing a solo on the bandura |
Julian Kytasty is a very prominent bandurist. He conbines a thorough knowledge of the traditional instrument, passed on in his family for three generations of players, with formal training in composition and a bent for improvisational music. He has created original scores for the Yara Arts Group (a resident company at the LaMama Experimental Theatre in New York) and, most recently, for "Bread With Honey," a dance and music event with choreographer Katja Kolcis. Mr. Kytasty is music director of the New York Bandura Ensemble.
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| Juriy Fedynsky playing a solo on the bandura |
Michael Andrec has been arranging and composing for the bandura and performing as a soloist since the last 1980's. His bandura compositions are experimental in the best sense of the word, with each exploring new territory for the instrument. He has been influenced by such diverse sources of American minimalists, John Cage, and traditional music from around the world (an interest that began with playing in a gamelan during his student days at Bowling Green Unversity in Ohio, USA). In his spare time, he is a research scientist.
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| Juriy Fedynsky, on bandura, and Julian Kytasty,
on wooden flute, playing a modern duet |
Jurij Fedynsky graduated from East Carolina (USA) with a degree in piano performance, and since then he has devoted himself to mastering the bandura and composing for it. He has developed new tunings and a repertoire of extended techniques that give his bandura music a sound unlike anything that has gone before. Jurij currently lives in Kyiv, Ukraine, where he studies bandura and plays rock-and-roll.
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| Laryssa Chopvisky, Director of The Washington Group (TWG) Cultural Fund introducing the Experimental Bandura Trio. Members of the trio are Juriy Fedynsky (left), Julian Kytasty (middle) and Michael Andrec (right). |
Julian Kytasty is the contact person for the Trio and can be reached at: Experimental Bandura Trio, 138 2nd Avenue, NY, NY 10003, jkytasty@erols.com. The Trio has produced a CE entitled, "Experimental Bandura Trio." The Washington Group (TWG) is an association of Ukrainian -American professionals.