The embodiment of mater’s archetype in song genre (on repertoire material by master students of Popular Music and Jazz Department)
Background. The Mother has always been one of the most popular images in art. A woman giving birth to another human being and caring for it has always been in a focus of attention of artists and philosophers. From this standpoint, the mother is defi ned as an “eternal theme” [3], on the one hand, and as archetype on another one [1; 2]. That allows methodists of primary education to create lessons, devoted to the fi gure of the mother in different arts [7], thus explaining unknown (peculiar features of every art) through well-known (attitude towards mother). In the music, including popular music, the image of The Mother can be found extremely often, as the list of performers whose heritage includes at least one song about his mother, seems to be infi nite; moreover, it consists of the artists representing different national traditions and styles. But the usage of the works of pronounced theme at the highest level of musical education has received neither methodical nor scientifi c development, regardless of including these songs into the repertoire of the students’ programmes. The realm of the music can serve as an undeniable evidence that the music is full of images of maternity: both in religious works (“Ave, Maria” by Schubert and Bach- Gounod), “Vergin tutto amor” by Durante, “Bogoroditze devo raduysa” by Rachmaninov, Yanchenko and others) and in secular (the roles of Santuzza in “Cavalleria Rusticana” by Mascagni, Cio-Cio-san in “Madama Butterfl y” by Puccini, Russian romances by Gurilyov (“Matushka-golubushka”), Varlamov (“Krasnyi Sarafan”). This list could be continued. The accessibility of the image of the mother to every child, its open emotionality make it extremely suitable material for learning the basic principles of art by the children. B ut at the highest level of education, such usage of achievements of culturological and psychological science can scarcely be seen. Although the lack of methodical and theoretical cognizance of given problem does not exclude the usage of songs that feature the theme of maternity, in one way or another, or the attitude towards the parents, in the educational process. Although the main part of the repertoire performed by students of the Popular Music and Jazz department is oriented at the Western-European and American music, the traditions of education don’t allow to exclude the Ukrainian music from the programme. As the experience shows, it is easier to work on this material – for three main reasons. The fi rst one is the accessibility of the Ukrainian language (both for memorizing and for pronunciation), the second one lays in the fact that Ukrainian songs seem to be perceived more emotionally (that is a prerequisite of a successful work on a composition), and the third one is that the students are often familiar with the Ukrainian songs (both with the melody and the lyrics) even before they start working on them, because they widely distributed in the popular culture. The image of The Mother is among the most often used in the Ukrainian songs. It is featured in the folk songs as well as in academic and popular music, connected with the principles of Ukrainian song intonational features. The one of the most popular song from the latter group is “Pisnya pro Rushnyk” (music by Platon Mayboroda, lyrics by Andriy Malyshko). When it was written in 1958, its popularity skyrocketed (it was even broadcasted by the Voice of America [6]), and it is still widely known. This makes stated song a suitable repertoire for learning the traditions of popular vocal craftsmanship. The lyrics feature some stable motives causing the dominance of the lyric expression. These motives are the retrospection (as all the events of the song are placed in the Past), separation with the mother, and her everlasting love. All the things stated above and slow, somewhat solemn but enlightened melody makes it perfectly clear what emotional state is needed for this song – because the archetype character of the image of The Mother makes it easily perceptible by almost everyone. The objective of this research lays in the revealing of the signifi cant role played by the image of mother in the repertoire of students of the Popular Music and Jazz department and in generalization of typological features of these songs. Methods. In order to reach those objectives, several methods have been used: genre and style analysis, analysis of lyrics and music and their relevance, compositional analysis. Results. The image of The Mother, that is an archetype by itself, has been rece iving its incarnation throughout all known history of humanity, thus acquiring a features of “eternal theme”. The fi gure of the mother (both in the religious and secular meaning) has been portrayed in academic music, in popular one and in the folklore. Generalizing the results of observances, we can conclude, that the songs featuring the image of the mother are characterized by the dominance of the lyrical mode of expression and sincere emotionality. They often have a retrospective view, naturally caused by belonging of the mother to the older generation than her children. As a repertoire of students of the Popular Music and Jazz department the songs about the mother can serve as a material suitable, on the one side, for developing technical and performer skills; and on the another – its content is mostly accessible for open emotional reception, that makes it much easier to work at. Typological features of “the songs about the mother” that have been revealed in this research, do not become cliché as they are different in the language, in the character, and in the nuances of content. Practical signifi cance. The results of this research can be used as methodical recom mendations on the choice of the repertoire of the students and the work on it. Various advices have been given both on musical and verbal aspects of analyzed songs.