Автор: Богданович Мария Александровна
VLADIMIR HORN
Shepherding was one of the ancient and widespread trades of the Vladimir province (especially in the villages of Kameshkovo, Suzdal, Yuryev-Polsky, Kolchugino, Kovrov counties). From April to the end of October adults and adolescents earned their living by this labor. Shepherd’s horns have gained great popularity among the people, especially among the peasants.
As a musical instrument, the shepherd’s horn was widespread in the villages of central Russia. Horn-players (‘rozhechniki») of the Vladimir province gained particular popularity as musicians in the middle of the 19th century.
In spring they went to seasonal work in the villages of other provinces and took their horns along. In fact, an entire seasonal trade of Vladimir horn-players was formed. They were indispensable festival participants in the villages, they performed at city fairs. Ensembles composed of horn-players were referred to as «choirs». At the beginning of the 1870s, in the village of Mishnevo, Kovrov county, the Vladimir province (now Kameshkovo district), the peasant Nikolay Vasilyevich Kondratyev created an orchestra consisting of 12 shepherds from various villages — Mishnevo, Suslovo, Gorki, Berkovo, Ostrov, Mashkovo, Simakovo.
These illiterate people were good musicians who played from memory and freely improvised. The first performances of the horn-players’ «choir» were held mainly at festivities in neighboring provinces. Particular success came to the peasant musicians in St. Petersburg in the summer of 1883. The fame of them reached the imperial court: they were invited to Peterhof and had the honor to play for Alexander III himself and his family. In 1889, Vladimir horn-players performed at the World Industrial Exhibition in Paris.
In the spring of 1892, Kondratyev’s choir was invited to a two-month tour in Paris. (A historical photo has been preserved in a French magazine: 12 bearded men in top hats, wide robes and bast shoes, a shepherd’s horn is pressed to everyone’s lips. The rozhechniki had to show their rough hands, proving to the enthusiastic audience that they were not dressed up artists from the conservatory, but real peasants. But the Paris tour ended sadly. abandoned in a foreign land by a runaway entrepreneur, penniless, without knowledge of foreign languages, courageous and strong peasant musicians walked all over Europe on foot, reaching their home.
In 1896, Vladimir horn-players performed at the All-Russian Industrial and Art Exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod with great success which was noted in the press. At that time, the young writer Maxim Gorky drew attention to their art and the faithful transmission of the tunes of Russian songs. In 1902, the creativity of Vladimir’s horn-players won the hearts of the visitors of the All-Russian Handicraft Exhibition in St. Petersburg.
N.V. Kondratyev directed Vladimir horn-players until the beginning of the 20th century. then he passed this role to his disciple and member of the choir PG. Pakharev. Already in the Soviet times, the choir of horn-players performed at Vladimir provincial meetings and conferences. In 1923, it got a warm welcome at the first All-Russian Agricultural Exhibition in Moscow. After the death of P.G. Pakharev in the early 1930s, the ensemble broke up.
In 1936, A.V. Sulimov, a native of the village of Vysheslavskoye in the Suzdal county, a virtuoso horn-player, newly created a choir from Suzdal, Ivanovo and Kovrov horn-players, which was in the service of the Red Army, and then was included in the Song and Dance Ensemble of the Moscow Military District. Repertoire of the A.V. Sulimov’s horn-players consisted mainly of Russian folk songs, but there were also military-patriotic works, for example, the famous «Katyusha».
Vladimir peasant musicians with their original creative work contributed to the development of folk music. Since that time, the shepherd’s horn was called «Vladimir horn» thanks to the fame of N.V. Kondratyev and his horn-players, although it was widespread in many provinces.
Traditions of musical art of Kondratyev’s, Pakharev’s, Sulimov’s choirs on the Vladimir land today maintains and develops the folk music ensemble «Vladimir Rozhechniki» of the Regional Center of Folk Art (director — Alexander Lebedev, Laureate of the Russia Government Prize «Soul of Russia»).
Ancient music of Vladimir horns-players, performed by this ensemble, is included in the Unified Register of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of the Vladimir Region.