Tereshko Parkhomenko

Terentiy (Tereshko) Makarovych Parkhomenko (1872–1910) (or as he was known Tereshko) was one of the most respected kobzars of the late 19th and early 20th century.

He was born 10 September 1872 in the village of Voloskivtsi, Sosnytsia county, in the Chernigov Governorate of the Russian Empire. He became blind at the age of 11 after a grave illness. He learned to play the bandura from the kobzar Andriy Haydenko and became a sought out performer after his performance at the XIIth Archeological Conference. He had a tenor voice and a loud bandura and played songs with a patriotic content that were rarely performed by other kobzars.

This was the first stage performance of the kobzars organized by Hnat Khotkevych. The performance included the performances of six kobzars, including four from Kharkiv, one from Poltava province and one from Chernihiv province. After both the Kharkiv bandurists played and the Mykhailo Kravchenko played (and demonstrated what they knew) it was time for Tereshko to demonstrate his art.

"So that is the way you play". And for some reason he repeated the statement. And he hit the strings! His bandura was large, and loud. His manner of playing was very specific: his left hand played the basses, and the right using a specific device: the fingers hit in one direction and then the other. (Our kobzars tried it but they could not do it). His voice - a high clear tenor. A song no-one had heard before about "Morozenko". Everything added up to a victory for Tereshko. The Kharkiv kobzars sat quiet. The first place of Tereshko was a given fact, and his song about Morozenko became the most popular song.

In his essay "Some facts about the kobzars and lirnyks" Khotkevych wrote:

"About the kobzars from Chernihiv province I would like to say a bit more because this is a totally new type of bandurist which are establishing themselves and have a great future. This is Terentiy Makarovych Parkhomenko. He is 30 years old and studied under Andriy Hojdenko, however he did not learn any dumy from him nor from his friends. "No matter how much Horilka I gave them, nothing came out of it" - he said. In the meantime Terentiy wanted greatly to learn to perform dumy - something spoke to his soul. I have not seen such a bandurists who listens with such intent to the performance of dumy and historic songs like this Parkhomenko. And his energies did not fall on barren ground: after meeting some Ukrainian intellectuals, he asked that they show him some dumy, he purchased books and song books, and he has a literate guide boy specifically for the reason, that he have the potential to learn dumy and old songs. "I didn't just come to the conference to perform - he said to me - but to learn more songs". And now he has nine dumy in his repertoire, many historic songs - one of which - About Morozenko - you will hear tonight. But taking the melodies of his songs from the intelligentsia which can read and write. Terentiy does not go blindly creating arrangement which are foreign, but gives each song and individuality, returning forgotten recordings, so that the song does not have a bookish character. In such a way we can see that the intelligentsia is able to give back to the people their lost culture, and although it does not look after this culture very well, at least some aspects have been conserved. God grant Terentiy the energy to learn all that he wants. His is the future."

...
Wikipedia