Akord’s Three Feasts of Christmas

Olena Wawryshyn

Akord, a Ukrainian-Canadian men’s choir from Ottawa, has just released Three Feasts of Christmas, a CD featuring 14 traditional carols and shchedrivky.

Among the carols are the old standards – "Boh Predvichnyi," "Nova Radist" and "Chrystos Rodyvsia" – feting Christ’s birth.  The shchedrivky, ancient New Year songs, about prosperity and the cycles of nature, which pre-date the acceptance of Christianity in Ukraine, will also be familiar to listeners. "Dobryi Vechir Tobi" opens the CD while "Shchedryk" rounds it off.

Interspersed with the songs are traditional vinchuvania or Christmas and New Year greetings.

This CD is Akord’s first recording. The choir was founded in 1993 when six men who shared an interest in Ukrainian liturgical music got together to sing Dr. Paul Macenko’s arrangement of the "Jerusalem Matins".

A year, later Olya Zatruszenko, a graduate of the M. Lysenko State Conservatory of Lviv in Ukraine, became the choir’s music director. Under Ms. Zatruszenko, Akord began broadening its repertoire. The choir now sings Macenko’s Matins annually in Ukrainian Orthodox and Catholic parishes in Ottawa and elsewhere upon invitation and also performs at various concerts and festivals.

Copies of Three Feasts of Christmas can be purchased online (www.ackordchoir.ca) on Akord’s website.