DATELINE NEW YORK: A galaxy of Ukrainian stars (04/11/99)

DATELINE NEW YORK: A galaxy of Ukrainian stars

by Helen Smindak

Plishka's milestones

At a time when Placido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti have just reached the 30-year mark at the Metropolitan Opera, basso Paul Plishka remains a star singer of principal roles after 32 years at America's most important opera house. He made his Met debut in September 1967 in Ponchielli's "La Gioconda" and is still going strong.

That feat also makes him the longest-running Ukrainian singer at the Met, surpassing bass-baritone Andrij Dobriansky, who put in 25 seasons (from 1969 to 1996), and the Ukrainian-born basso Adam Didur, whose Met career also lasted 25 years, from 1908 to 1933.

According to the Metropolitan Opera archives, Mr. Plishka has given more than 1,000 performances of more than 50 roles. This summer, he will appear in the Met Opera in the Parks series in "Lucia di Lammermoor." He is already on the roster for the turn-of-the-millennium season that will open next fall.

Mr. Plishka is known as a singer's singer - an artist both respected and loved in the business, as well as by audiences. He has appeared with Eve Queler's Opera Orchestra of New York (OONY) more than any other artist (26 times in 27 years), most recently as the Count in "I Masnadieri," a role he sang "with sympathetic authority," according to Paul Griffiths of The New York Times.

Over the years, the basso has captured superlatives from music critics in New York and around the country, including Harold S. Schoenberg of The New York Times, Bill Zakariasen of the New York Daily News and Martin Mayer of Opera News. Count among these the Los Angeles Times' Martin Mayer, who cited his "bigger-than-life performance" in "I Lombardi" at the 1979 San Diego Verdi Festival.

In the mid-80s, Donal Henahan pointed out that OONY's "Nabucco" cast had "a tremendously vital Zaccaria in Paul Plishka, whose arias brought almost as hot a response from the audience as did (Ghena) Dimitrova's."

"Mr. Plishka, always in possession of a rich and supple bass, has developed into a singing actor of great confidence and ardor," Mr. Henahan wrote in The New York Times.

The Met's 1983 performance of "Lucia di Lammermoor" in Central Park, before a crowd of 75,000 people, was reviewed by The New York Times' Tim Page, who wrote that "Mr. Plishka's dark, noble voice boomed with effortless power, and his ensembles with John Gilmore and (Brian) Schexnayder were exemplary."

The singer has been lauded frequently by The New York Times' Anthony Tommasini, who recently described him as "a seemingly indestructible bass." Mr. Tommasini noted that Mr. Plishka "brought his booming voice and stylistic know-how to the role of Don Basilio in Rossini's "Il Barbiere di Siviglia," during last summer's Met in the Parks series.

Following a performance of "Il Trovatore" last February, Mr. Tommasini concluded: "The tireless bass Paul Plishka, who sang Fernando, continues to be a model of vocal, musical and dramatic professionalism."

Mr. Plishka's appearances at the Met have incorporated many prime roles, including the starring role in Mussorgsky's "Boris Godunov," described by Mr. Zakariasen as "one of the most impressive and especially convincing Borises the Met has featured,"

This season, he began in November with "Aida" and continued with "Lucia di Lammermoor," "Il Trovatore" and "Simon Boccanegra." He will appear again in "Aida" on the 19th and 23rd of this month, singing the role of the High Priest, Ramfis, during the final week of the Met season.

Away from the Met, he has been just as busy, performing in "I Masnadieri" with the Opera Orchestra of New York and in "Ernani" in Marseilles, France. He gave a solo recital last December at Montclair State University in New Jersey, with longtime friend and accompanist Thomas Hrynkiw at the piano, presenting a program that featured arias from Mozart, Tchaikovsky and Verdi operas, as well as music by Rachmaninoff, Sonevytsky, Bowles, Ives, Duke and Hageman.

The concert at Montclair State was a sentimental journey on two counts - a return to his alma mater and to the place where he met his wife, Judy, an attractive, dark-haired woman who has devoted her life to assisting her husband's career.

Born in Old Forge, Pa., Mr. Plishka was "discovered" in New Jersey at age 17 by music teacher Armen Boyajian and received his first vocal training in Boyajian's new Paterson Lyric Opera Theater. At 23 he won first place in the Baltimore Opera auditions; shortly thereafter he gained a contract with the newly formed Metropolitan Opera National Company. After a year of cross-country touring with the company, he was invited to join the Metropolitan Opera itself.

His career has taken him around the world: to Covent Garden, La Scala, the Paris Opera, the Bavarian State Opera, the San Francisco Opera and the Houston Grand Opera, among many others. He has appeared in several Met telecasts, has often been heard in Met Opera Saturday matinee radio broadcasts and has also been a guest panelist in Met radio interviews. He has had a distinguished career as a soloist with America's major orchestras, as a recitalist and as a recording artist.

Mr. Plishka has been inducted into the Hall of Fame for Great American Opera Singers at the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia. In 1992 he received the Pennsylvania Governor's Award for Excellence in the Arts. The Ukrainian Institute of America named him "Ukrainian of the Year" in 1985, thereby recognizing his contributions to the Ukrainian community - performances at Soyuzivka and Ukrainian festivals, guest appearances with such Ukrainian groups as the Dumka Chorus of New York, solo recitals that spotlighted Ukrainian music and public affirmation of his family's Ukrainian identification.

His extensive discography encompasses a recording of the Verdi "Requiem" with the Atlanta Symphony and Robert Shaw that won a Grammy Award for the best classical album of 1988. Other recordings include a 1979 release of Ukrainian folk songs, a recital of Russian songs under the title "The Russian Soul" and a Christmas-season CD recorded with the Marble Collegiate Church Choir in 1995, "Christmas With Paul Plishka."

Two recording projects now being created by Mr. Plishka and Mr. Hrynkiw are "Plishka Sings American Songs" and "Plishka Sings Arias and Scenes from Ukrainian Operas," the latter embracing the music of Bortniansky, Hulak-Artemovsky, Lysenko, Dankevych, Maiboroda, Maitus and Liatoshynsky. Much of the music from these upcoming releases will be heard this coming Saturday, April 17, when Mr. Plishka and Mr. Hrynkiw present an evening of operatic arias and American and Ukrainian music during a benefit concert at the Ukrainian Institute.

Also at the Met

Baritone Vassily Gerello, who made his Met Opera debut in 1997 as Alfio in "Cavalleria Rusticana," returned to the Met last month as Yeletsky in Tchaikovsky's "The Queen of Spades." A member of the Kirov Opera since 1990, the Chernivtsi native spent February in Houston, where he sang Germont in a new production of Verdi's "La Traviata" at the Houston Grand Opera.
Singing Rodolfo in "La Bohème" this past February was "the Ukrainian tenor Vladimir Grishko," as he was accurately identified in The New York Times Classical Music and Dance Guide. It's the role in which he made his Met debut in 1996. Mr. Grishko also appeared at the Met in March, in Mussorgsky's sprawling masterpiece "Khovanschina."
Soprano Maria Guleghina, who wowed the critics last fall with her performance of the title role in "Aida" and appeared in "Tosca" as well, made a spring visit to the Met for three more performances of "Aida." First heard at the Met in 1991 as Maddalena in "Andrea Chénier," the Odesa-born soprano has also appeared at the Met in "Cavalleria Rusticana" and "The Queen of Spades." In February she sang Lady Macbeth in a new production of Verdi's "Macbeth" at the Paris Opera.
Baritone Sergei Koptchak, who hails from the ethnically Ukrainian Presov region in northeastern Slovakia, appeared in Janacek's "Katya Kabanova" in January. James R. Oestreich of The New York Times found that Mr. Koptchak "reveled in the role of the dyspeptic uncle" in the Met's revived and acclaimed "Kabanova" production. Mr. Koptchak sang the role of the Priest in February performances of Schoenberg's "Moses und Aron."
In her Met debut season, mezzo Elena Zaremba sang Azucena in February and March performances of Verdi's "Il Trovatore." Her deep, strong voice was heard during the "Live from the Met" radio broadcast of the March 6 matinée performance. Though born in Moscow, she is known to have revealed to a London journalist that her mother is Ukrainian.

The New York City Opera

Soprano Oksana Krovytska, whose compelling portrayal of the title role in "Madama Butterfly" at the New York City Opera last year made critics sit up and take notice, appeared in the same role last month in a new production that featured vividly abstract sets. With February appearances in Monaco in "The Bartered Bride" and the NYCO performances of "Butterfly" now behind her, Ms. Krovytska is preparing for a concert at the Ukrainian Institute of America on April 24, together with Pennsylvania mezzo Charlene Marcinko, Yaroslav Hnatiuk of Ukraine and accompanist Thomas Hrynkiw.
According to The New York Times critic Anthony Tommasini, bass Stefan Szkafarowsky gave "a confident performance" as the Commendatore in the NYCO production of "Don Giovanni," which opened on March 30 and runs for nine performances, to April 25. Fresh from a stint of singing the roles of Varlaam and Pimen in "Boris Godunov" at the Kennedy Center in Washington, Mr. Szkafarowsky is also appearing this month in a new NYCO production, Richard Strauss' "Intermezzo" (April 13, 16, 18, 21 and 24).

DiCapo Opera Hit

Alexandra Hrabova's personal manager, Bohdanna Wolansky, says that the coloratura soprano "scored a tremendous hit with critics" when she appeared in the DiCapo Opera performances of "La Traviata" in February. Although Ms. Hrabova was cast in four of the eight performances, The New York Times declared that she was "really the star of the show." Winner of nine of 11 competitions she entered recently, Ms. Hrabova is getting set to perform with the New York Vocal Artists at Weill Hall on April 30 and June 11. In mid-May she leaves for New England on a tour with the DiCapo-affiliated National Opera Company.

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