Ukrainian opera arias

The Ukrainian arias catalogue is one of the collection’s most detailed repertory documents. It identifies character, work, composer and performer for several operatic excerpts, then places art songs beside them. All are associated explicitly with Ukrainian-American mezzo-soprano Renata Babak. Its written form keeps those relationships clear and searchable.

Opera entries

Several English spellings have been regularized. Zaporozhets za Dunayem is retained in transliteration rather than translated as “Zaporozhian beyond the Danube.” Maryltsia is kept close to the form supplied by the collection because the character label is less certain than the opera and composer. Ingegerd replaces a visibly corrupted spelling while preserving the intended character in Yaroslav the Wise.

Art songs included on the same page

Four song entries broaden the page beyond opera. The collection records an art song by Marko Kropyvnytskyi; a lullaby by Yuriy Ishchenko with words by Lesia Ukrainka; an art song by Anatol Kos-Anatolskyi; and “If You Wish, I’ll Be with the Forest,” by Lesia Dychko with words credited to Rudenko. Each is associated with Renata Babak.

Opera aria and art song place different demands on a catalogue. An aria is usually indexed by character and dramatic work. An art song is more often indexed by title, composer and poet. Presenting them together reflects the collection’s interest in Babak’s Ukrainian repertory rather than a claim that all entries belong to one genre.

Zaporozhets za Dunayem

Two characters from Hulak-Artemovskyi’s opera appear here: Odarka and Oksana. The collection also returns to the opera in the Renata Babak memorial programme, where it names Odarka’s aria, Oksana’s aria and the duet of Odarka and Karas. That programme assigns the numbers to specific participants at the 2004 event, while this page records Babak’s own repertory.

The recurring opera illustrates how cross-references work across the site. One work can be approached through a performer’s repertory, a memorial programme and a general Ukrainian-opera index. Keeping those contexts separate prevents the cast of one event from being mistaken for the cast of another.

Taras Bulba, The Forest Song and Yaroslav the Wise

Maryltsia’s aria from Lysenko’s Taras Bulba has a dedicated opera page. Mavka’s aria places Vitaliy Kyreiko’s The Forest Song in the catalogue, while Ingegerd’s aria represents Heorhiy Maiboroda’s Yaroslav the Wise. No performance dates or venues are documented for these entries, so none is supplied.

Heorhiy Maiboroda should not be confused with Платон Майборода / Platon Maiboroda, whose art songs have a separate collection page. Preserving both given names matters in a catalogue where surnames recur.

Stage captions around the catalogue

The catalogue also includes several stage captions for Babak: Amneris in Aida at Lviv Opera and Odesa Opera; Laura in La Gioconda at Odesa Opera; Ortrud with Ivan Kozlovsky as Lohengrin at the Bolshoi Opera in Moscow; Eboli with Nicolai Ghiaurov in Don Carlo at the Bolshoi; Amneris in Aida in Washington, D.C.; and a concert with Paul Plishka at the Kennedy Center in Washington. These details are included because the captions supply roles and places directly.

The most useful way to read these entries is laterally as well as line by line. A reader can follow Babak across several composers, compare character names with work titles, or move from a theatre caption to the corresponding performer page. That structure reveals the breadth of the catalogue without turning its partial dates into a continuous career chronology.

The main Babak role catalogue provides a complementary list across Russian, Italian and French opera. Together the two pages form the strongest performer record on the site.