Leonid Butenko

Honoured Art Worker of Ukraine, PhD in History of Arts, and Professor of the Nezhdanova Odessa National Musical Academy. He is a member of National Union of Theatre Workers of Ukraine

Years of life: (1948—2018)

Leonid Butenko has been Principal Chorus Master of the Odessa National Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre since 1974.

He has taken part in staging a number of cantata-oratorio pieces, different concert programmes and more than 100 classical productions, such as  Aida, Un ballo in maschera, Il trovatore, Rigoletto by G. Verdi;Lucia di Lammermoor by G. Donizetti; The Queen of Spades, Iolanta, The Maid of Orleans, Eugene Onegin by P. Tchaikovsky; Boris Godunov, Khovanshchina by M. Mussorgsky; Don Giovanni by Mozart; Carmen by Bizet; Tosca, La bohème, Madam Butterfly by Giacomo Puccini; The Tsar’s Bride by M. Rimsky-Korsakov; Aleko by S. Rachmaninoff, Catherina by M. Arkas; A Zaporozhian Cossack Beyond the Danube (Cossaks in Exhile) by S. Hulak-Artemovsky, Natalka Poltavka by M. Lysenko, etc.

The highlights of Leonid Butenko’s work as a choirmaster are the world premieres of the pieces by contemporary Ukrainian and foreign composers. We can name Cyril Kozhemyaka by E. Yutskevich (1982); Just One Day by M. Karminsky (1987); Viy by V. Hubarenko (1984); True Love by L. Kolodub,War and Peace by V. Ovchinnikov (1987), as well as productions from Ukrainian classical music art, such as Sir Kotsky by N. Lysenko; Barvinok by V. Filippenko and others.

  Leonid Butenko is also a scholar in the field of choir singing. He has written more than 40 scientific works, in particular, a number of books and articles. He is the only author for the course book called Singing in an Opera Chorus that is used in higher educational institutions. Mr. Butenko is a Specialized Board Member of the Nezhdanova Odessa National Music Academy. The Board makes decisions as for awarding applicants with the PhD degree (Candidate of Sciences in Ukrainian classification) in the History of Arts