Matsenko, Pavlo

Matsenko, Pavlo or Macenko, Paul [Маценко, Павло; Macenko], b 24 December 1897 in Kyrykivka, Okhtyrka county, Kharkiv gubernia, d 8 March 1991 in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Musicologist and pedagogue. After serving in the Army of Imperial Russia and in the Army of the Ukrainian National Republic, Matsenko emigrated to Czechoslovakia via Cyprus in 1924. In Prague he studied at the Ukrainian Higher Pedagogical Institute (1926–8) and at the Conservatory of Music, where he completed a doctorate in musical-pedagogical studies in 1932. He emigrated to Canada and settled in Winnipeg in 1936, where he initiated and co-ordinated higher educational courses for Ukrainian-Canadian cultural activists. A founding member in 1945 of the Ukrainian Cultural and Educational Centre (Oseredok) in Winnipeg, he was affiliated with the Ukrainian National Federation and a strong supporter of the Ukrainian Canadian Committee. He taught at Saint Andrew's College (University of Manitoba) after 1956, served as rector of Saint John's Institute in Edmonton (1958–61), and lectured at Saint Vladimir’s College in Roblin, Manitoba (1963–72). His publications include arrangements of the full divine liturgy for mixed choir (1931), the divine liturgy for three women’s voices (1948), and other religious texts, as well as a wide range of folk songs and carols. He wrote Narysy do istoriï ukraïns'koï tserkovnoï muzyky (Studies in the History of Ukrainian Church Music, 1968) and biographies of such composers as Fedir Yakymenko, Dmytro Bortniansky, and Maksym Berezovsky. A collection of Matsenko’s autobiographical articles, articles about him, and letters to him was published in 1992.

Roman Savytsky Jr.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 3 (1993).]