Oleksandr Bilash
| Oleksandr Bilash | |
|---|---|
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| Background information | |
| Born |
March 6, 1931 Hradyzk, Ukrainian SSR |
| Died | May 6, 2003 (aged 72) Kyiv, Ukraine |
| Occupation(s) | Composer |
| Years active | 1956–2003 |
Oleksandr Ivanovych Bilash (also spelt Olexandr Bilash, Alexander Bilash, Ukrainian: Олександр Іванович Білаш) (March 6, 1931 – May 6, 2003) was a Ukrainian composer and the author of popular lyric songs, ballads, operas, operettas, oratorios and music for films. Laureate of the Taras Shevchenko State Award (1975), People's Artist of Ukraine (1977), People's Artist of the Soviet Union (1990). Hero of Ukraine (2001).
Bilash was born on March 6, 1931 in the town of Hradyzk, Ukraine (now Hlobyne Raion of Poltava Oblast, Ukraine) to a family of skilled amateur musicians. His father, Ivan Panasovych Bilash, played balalaika and guitar; his mother, Yevdokiya Andriyivna, was a solo singer at rural gatherings.
After studying for a year in the Kiev music school for adults, Oleksandr traveled to the city of Zhytomyr where he entered the second year of the Viktor Kosenko Music School. In 1951, Bilash had successfully passed the entrance examinations for entry into the faculty of Composition of the Kiev State Conservatory (now The Tchaikovsky National Academy of Music). He studied composition with the outstanding Ukrainian composer and teaching professor Mykola Vilinsky. Oleksandr Bilash graduated from the Kiev State Conservatory in 1957.
From 1956–1961 Bilash worked as an Instructor of music theory at the Kiev Pedagogical Institute (Kiev Teachers Training Institute, now Borys Grinchenko Kyiv University). Already Bilash had emerged as a pre-eminent and prolific Ukrainian composer who had contributed immensely to variety of musical genres and styles. Many of his lyric songs became very popular in Ukraine. His lyric songs have become a part of the 'golden fund' of Ukrainian national culture and many of them are often perceived as traditional folk songs. He composed the opera "Haydamaky" (1965), "The Ballad of War" ( 1971 ), "The Grooms" (1985), operetta "The Legend of Kiev", "The Bells of Russia". Bilash cpposed the soundtrack to numerous movies. One of them - "Roman and Francesca" (1960) with the celebrated lyric songs by Bilash was the first Soviet film (musical) where love between a Soviet sailor and a foreign girl was not criminalized. At the time of Chernobyl nuclear accident in April 1986, the popular lyric song "Dva kolyory" (Two colors) composed by Oleksandr Bilash sounded like a revelation.
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