Photo 1 “Spiritual heritage” Creative lounge named after I. Kozlovskyi

 Address:  50b, Khreschatyk str., Kyiv. 

Phone: +38044 239 73 34

Creative lounge, named after the great Ukrainian opera singer Ivan Semenovych Kozlovskyi (1900-1993) was founded in 1994, the year of immortalization of memory of the great tenor. At the beginning of 2000th the apartment in a house that survived the destructions of Khreshchatyk Street during the WWII was turned over to the Creative lounge. Repairs of the apartment continued for a several years. However, in spite of reconstruction process, during 5 creative seasons there were 60 charity performances and 15 TV programmes within the project "Meeting at the Creative lounge named after I. Kozlovskyi" made jointly with the "TRK Kyiv" TV channel. In 2006 the gold voice of the great singer was reproduced from the records archive of the Ukrainian radio and 2 cd’s "Ivan Kozlovskyi - forever with Ukraine" were released.

  Ivan Semenovych Kozlovskyi was born on March, 24 (11), 1900 in the village Maryanovka, former Kyiv province, in family of a peasant. He graduated from the Kyiv teaching seminary, and in 1919 – from a musically-dramatic school. Starting from 1916 he was travelling  with mobile opera troupes in Poltava and Kharkiv. In 1925 became a soloist of the Sverdlovsk theatre and in 1926 he was welcomed in the troupe of the Moscow Bolshoi theatre and was a soloist there till 1954. The repertoire of Кozlovskyi consists of more than 50 opera parties: God's fool in “Boris Godunov” by Musorgsky , Lenskiy in  “Eugene Onegin” by Tchaikovskyi, Volodymyr Galytskyi in “Prince Igor” by Borodin, Tsar Berendey in “Snegurochka(The Snow Maiden)” by Rimsky-Korsakov, and many other. Among his parts also are Lohengrin in opera “Lohengrin” by R. Wagner, count Almaviva in „Seville barber“ by Rossini. From the beginning of creative activity and to the last years of life Kozlovskyi was performing in concerts, mainly with the programs of Russian romances, Russian and Ukrainian folk songs, chamber lyric poetry of the Russian composers (Glinka, Dargomyzhskyi, Tchaikovskyi, Rakhmaninov). During his last years he was singing and recording Russian sacred music.

In 1938-1941 Kozlovskyi was the organizer and artistic leader of the State ensemble of opera in Moscow, and was performing operas in concerto version. He became the People’s artist of the USSR (1940), the Hero of Socialist Labour (1980).

The voice of Kozlovskyi is a high (lyric) tenor of beautiful and very individual timbre.  Like other artists of the “old school”, the singer was in a high degree artistic.

When Kozlovskyi became 54, he left the stage of the Bolshoi theatre, but continued to sing (he was performing solo concerts till the 80-years anniversary). Nobody knows what was the exact reason he leaving the theatre. Possibly it could be because of the frequent restrictions from the ruling top: "Do not sing this one". For example, he was strictly forbidden to sing Ukrainian song “Oi, u poli krynychenka” at the opening ceremony of the Kyiv House-museum of the Ukrainian poet Maxim Rylskyi . And in 1960 officialdom destroyed 400 gramophone records with a Christmas carols which was a long-waited project of the singer! Kozlovskyi also dreamed once to listen to opera "La Scala", but he was barred from exit from the country - possibly, because of his elder brother, a singer, who immigrated to USA.

Ivan Semenovych did not break his bond with Ukraine. He made records of the Ukrainian repertoire, was performing with the orchestra of folk instruments, annually was coming to sing on the grave of Taras Shevchenko in Kaniv, was playing on tours to Ukraine.

 The great singer passed away on Decembers, 24, 1993 and was buried on the Novodevichiy cemetery.

Photo 2  The Great Hall of the Conservatoire,1987. The last performance of I.S. Kozlovskyi	Photo 3 Ivan Kozlovskyi  - aria of Lenskyi	Photo 4 Ivan Kozlovskyi  and Galyna Pysarenko