Elena Ivanovna Yakubovskaya’s richly illustrated book is comprised of three essays, an afterword, and two appendices: Ustyansky District map, and a list of used manuscripts preserved at the Folklore and Ethnographical Center of N.A. Rimsky-Korsakov’s St. Petersburg State Conservatory.
This monograph presents a unique study of the song performance tradition in Ustyansky District, as recorded by folklore expeditions of the Conservatory in the 1970s-1980s, covering the “triangle” between the Ustya, the Vaga, and the Northern Dvina Rivers. The publication contains not only a description of the recorded authentic materials, which include more than seventy different lyrical songs, but also reflections on the process of their collection and analysis of their melodic peculiarities, accompanied by musical notations. The research is based on the collectors’ notebooks with recorded texts and descriptions of rites, as well as their personal fieldnotes. The latter often include drawings, such as landscapes and examples of local architecture, portraits of colleagues and performers, commentaries, and reflections on the recording process and materials. The extensive work of folklore collectors reveals various singing schools in different areas along the Ustya River. This helps define the boundaries of the local repertoire's spread and specific traditions in their performance.
According to Yakubovskaya’s statement in the preface, the primary goal of the research was to elucidate the performers' understanding of their art and song content, presenting it as a comprehensive system. For the expedition participants, the singers were not only keepers of a rapidly vanishing, vast repertoire but also a source of learning the vocem populi. The informants shared their thoughts on life and the country’s history, and recounted personal stories rich in wisdom grounded in centuries-old spiritual values. One of the singers’ expressions could be used as an epigraph to the book, because this motto could be a good example of the villagers’ vision of life: “Girl, take your time doing your needlework because no one will ask how long it took to complete, but who made it” (90).
In the preface, the author also mentions the specific features that emerged in folklore field collecting, characterized by increased attention to the performer as a creative personality, and the outcome of this during that period, namely, in the movement of folkloric and ethnographic music groups in the country. For example, Yakubovskaya mentions performances by the expedition participants at rural community centers.
The first chapter presents the perspective of folklore collectors on the discovered culture of preserved songs and the process of ascertaining local performance traditions. The collected material includes wedding rituals, short humorous songs (chastúshkas), Christmastide party dances and songs (with dance notations and photos), carols, recruits’ songs, ballads, art-song style pieces, and circle dance songs. Although the expedition's main goal was to record the wedding tradition and a variety of lyrical songs, the “byproduct” of the work resulted in collections of rites of agricultural calendar holidays, religious and place legends, folktales, hagiographic folk narratives, party games, jokes, proverbs, sayings, and dialect vocabulary. Some expedition members focused on material culture artifacts, such as the traditional clothing and the architecture of wooden houses, where each interior detail had a sacred meaning. The extensive text and music-recording work was combined with an attentive look into the song structure and content, as well as the assigned roles for age-related and gender-related groups performing throughout the wedding ritual stages and youth parties. The dialect terms used in songs, along with their corresponding singing styles, were also documented. For example, a dólgaya (long) song with syllabic chants and a bride’s song with úkhaniye (laments) show the specific performance style tied to a song genre.
The success of the expeditions reveals the collectors' absolute determination to gather as much varied material as possible. One of the reasons for such intensive work was the importance of preserving the fast-disappearing tradition of authentic folklore, owing to the advanced age of the performers and urbanization. It was accomplished despite the harsh winter conditions during some expeditions (1978), such as long off-road travel in temperatures as low as -22° F. Despite a large amount of work, teaching the Conservatory students how to record folk music was an integral part of the expeditions. Their learning process included acquiring recording skills and learning to identify the appropriate psychological approach to the performers by understanding their attitude towards singing.
The second chapter, “The Art of Singing and Philosophy of Life in the Performers' Expressions,” analyzes the singers’ thoughts on the songs and singing. The chapter contains observations on the psychological role of singing, such as helping to cope with sorrows and to overcome difficulties, and fostering a sense of community closeness. This can be based on the performers’ belief that everything in a song is true: “All life is love, and there is no song without this” (123). The collectors also noticed a special respect towards the skillful performers, and the joy of listening to them to the extent of experiencing goosebumps due to the spiritual excitement borne by collective creative singing. In the same chapter, the author characterizes the performance style of most songs, namely, as an ensemble two-voice base of heterophonic character with a leading singer’s peculiar role.
The third chapter, “Tradition of the Performance of Lyric Songs,” presents the researchers’ view on local styles of singing determined by their distribution in three zones of “local musical dialects” observed along the Ustya River (135). Yakubovskaya analyzes different aspects of performance, e.g., family ensemble vs. soloist style, and the division of songs into older and more modern “layers” of repertoire. She also points to the “female” and “male” groups distinguished by style singularities in music and lyrics. By comparing variants of a single song using music notation, analyzing syllabic rhythms, and examining the coordination of syllable length and accent, the author identifies the more ancient part of the repertoire and explicates the features that distinguish the facets of performance style, which can be collectively referred to as an “artistic canon.” She concludes that varied intonation stereotypes demonstrate a high degree of individualization in local singing traditions (138). This chapter is followed by the Analytical Tables, with thirteen examples of musical notations used to study local song performing traditions.
The last unit, “Instead of an Afterword,” contains the author’s reflections on the philosophy of life expressed through the folklore songs presented in the form of lyrics, melodies, and performers’ expressions about their art. Yakubovskaya emphasizes that the experience of recording folklore songs during the expeditions helped the participants understand the essence of the performers’ spiritual life and peasant values. These were formed through hard work for “daily bread” and the preservation of the traditions to celebrate religious holidays. They also fostered permanent intercommunication within the peasant community, in which personal and group singing were integral parts.
Yakubovskaya selects songs to highlight her observations on the “concept of a path” (229), stemming from the feeling of movement reflecting the concept of human life as a path. It is created by combining text, melody, rhythm, intonational patterns (in “male” songs, they can be like oratorical elements), and vocal techniques. As the author suggests, the unique role in this formation belongs to a peasant’s musical mentality, which exists within a specific local landscape, as described in the lyrics, and a symbolic one created through singing and felt by the performers as an inner movement. The latter is shown in the singers’ terms using numerous verbs of motion, and words like krutói (literally “steep,” meaning fast tempo) and pológy (literally “gently sloping,” i.e., slow tempo), and zýbat (literally “rocking,” i.e., emphasizing separate sounds).
Yakubovskaya’s book presents a unique “alloy” of narrative about the folklore collectors’ experience, a detailed analysis of the singing traditions of the Ustya River region (both lyrics and music), numerous notations, and reflections on the philosophical depth of the recorded songs. It can take its rightful place among research works on Russian and Eastern Slavic folklore and musicology.
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[Review Length: 1311 words • Review posted on October 3, 2025]