Press “Delete” on the Russified “Hey Marusia” propaganda version of Ukrainian folk song: “Rozpriahaite, khloptsi, koni” (Розпрягайте, хлопці, коні; English: Unsaddle the horses, boys)
Now is the time to press “Delete” on the Russified “Hey Marusia” propaganda version of this Ukrainian folk song. One can no longer be a bystander and wait for the “right time” to initiate an educational mission to decolonize lingering Soviet era propaganda and restore authentic to Ukrainian cultural identity.
Ukrainian folk choirs, community festivals, sing-alongs, and Zabava bands must do the right thing and cease to be an innocent propaganda agent for decades of Russian disseminated cultural appropriation and exploitation. The Russified official State sanctioned normalized propaganda version of this folk song was given credibility to being an authentic Ukrainian folksong through historic coerced inclusion into the repertoire of the Veryovka Ukrainian Folk Choir.
Ewa Thompson, Professor Emerita of Slavic Studies at Rice University, in a December 21, 2023 interview for Forum for Ukrainian Studies has this to say regarding the colonizer, Russia, stealing the voices of Ukraine.
“Colonialism also means political exploitation. Russia stole their voices; it was only Russia that could speak for them in the international arena… What does a nation-country need to do to decolonize its territory? … They have to stop allowing the colonizer to tell the world about them.”
In 1943 the Council of People’s Commissars in Kharkiv created The Ukrainian Folk Choir of Ukraine. It was politically tasked to combine folk songs, music and dance traditions in the context of the “happy” Ukrainian SSR with accessibility to all into the service of nationalism. Its director, Hryhoriy Veryovka completed the assembly of his folk chorus talent with a total of 134 members: 84 singers, 34 orchestra members, and 16 dancers.
To appeal to the Ukrainian diaspora in Canada at a world-wide showcase, a significant cultural propaganda tour heralded Veryohvka’s appearance at Canada’s Expo 1967.
“Performances of Ukrainian artistic groups, first of all, of the Ukrainian National Choir named after Hryhoriy Veryovka, received applause… for some journalists it was unclear why Ukrainian artists sang Russian songs.” p. 143, Krukovsky, Vitaliy. 2020. EXPO–1967 in Montreal: The Struggle for Ukrainian Sovereignty. Kyiv, Ukraine: Taras Shevchenko National University
In my view, on subsequent tours of the Veryovka Choir to Canada and abroad, the infusion of Russified Ukrainian folk songs in the service of Soviet cultural propaganda was most evident in the Choir’s rousing finale rendition of “Rozpriahaite, khloptsi, koni” with its added “Hey Marusia” chorus.
The Russified officially sanctioned cultural propaganda version of this song revised the original folk lyrics and music. Original lyrics reference the romantic hero of the song preparing to leave to fight for freedom with his Kozak brothers understanding his girl cannot commit to love because of the fear that he could be killed. He leaves the village a gift of a freshly dug well as he departs to fulfill his patriotic duty. In the Russified version our hero, rejected in his courtship, simply sings that this rejection is not a problem because he has another younger girl who will accept him. The audience is left with the impression of a shallow opportunist and not a patriotic hero.
An audience pleasing tavern-like up-tempo distinctively cultural identifiable Russian folk-sounding military musical refrain “Hey Marusia” was also added to the lyrics. Its syncopated lead into the “Raz, Dva, Try Kalyna (One, two, three red cranberries)” section has no equivalent musical construction or melodic structure relationship to Ukrainian folk music. The song was further degraded when the “Hey Marusia” refrain was supplemented in performance with “celebratory tavern whistling” and a male and female chorister stepping out of the ranks to over-act out a silly eye-rolling flirtation. It was the kind of musical infusion that would earn a propagandist points for successfully demonstrating: “See, Ukrainians are a happy peasant lot when you add the Russian superior folk music flavour to bring their base culture to a natural fusion as Little Russia.”
For some reason the melody of this particular authentic Ukrainian folk song had long struck a chord with Russian musicians. The first record of it being appropriated from Ukrainian folklore is a 1915 version arranged as a march titled: “March of the Siberian Regiment”. In 1935, the “Hey Marusia” refrain version was permanently included in the international touring repertoire of the Alexandrov Red Army Ensemble.
I surmise that bureaucratic Commissars of Culture were elated to have a “hit folk song” that performance after performance was greeted with standing ovations that supported the Russification of the subservient culture and deceptively passed itself off as an iconic authentic Ukrainian folk song.
I experienced this cult of the “Hey Marusia” version folk hit song variation personally in 1969 when attending a performance of the Alexandrov Red Army Ensemble at the Edmonton Gardens in Alberta. Despite protesters from Ukrainian Canadian cultural community organizations and nationalistic youth groups outside of the venue, this concert was well attended by the diaspora because the advertising stated there would be authentic Ukrainian folk songs and dances from the “homeland”. Attendees stood in ovation with thunderous applause nostalgically identifying with this “authentic Hey Marusia” Ukrainian folk song — unfortunately deaf to the subversion of Ukrainian culture.
Jumping forward to 2023, 54 years later, I attended the Ukrainian Pysanka Festival in Vegreville Alberta where a female quintet from Veryovka Choir performed under the name: Magic Voices. I attended three Grandstand performances where the Veryovka Magic Voices presented high quality, artful and culturally significant song repertoire excerpted from operas and folklore under the direction of their attending 20 year choirmaster Zenovii Korinets. It truly was a “magical” Ukrainian folksong experience except on the third Grandstand show. The seductive muse of audience applause, no matter at what cost to integrity, brought the Magic Voices to sing “Rozpriahaite, khloptsi, koni” complete with the “Hey Marusia” refrain. The Grandstand attendees in 2023, as those in 1969, went wild with applause. I was dumbstruck that in the renaissance of Ukrainian culture and patriotic identity accelerated by Russia’s terrorist invasion of Ukraine, the Veryovka choirmaster had demeaned the Magic Voices to include this counterfeit icon of Soviet subservient cultural propaganda in the evening’s repertoire.
Despite this example of losing one’s cultural compass and playing for applause all hope is not lost. I salute those folk choirs and Zabava bands that have taken the lead and in the last few years set the example of no longer performing the “Hey Marusia” version. I particularly salute those folk choirs who never sang it.
It is the collective responsibility of all of us to permanently erase the remaining presence of this infectious “Hey Marusia” pseudo folkloric version of Soviet propaganda from our repertoire and not normalize it in Ukraine and in the diaspora.
It is my view that somewhere: “Stalin is still smiling!” It’s time to “Delete” this smile.
