Oleksandr Koshyts is an outstanding conductor, choirmaster, and ethnographer, one of the key figures of 20th-century Ukrainian choral culture. He knew folk song perfectly and raised Ukrainian choral performance to a world level.
His chief feat was leading the Ukrainian Republican Kapelle, which the government of the Ukrainian People's Republic sent in 1919 on a great concert tour of Europe (it later toured the Americas in 1922–1924) as the “musical diplomacy” of the young state. It was in these concerts that the world first heard “Shchedryk” by Mykola Leontovych — which later circled the planet as the Christmas “Carol of the Bells.” Finding himself in emigration, Koshyts tirelessly promoted Ukrainian music abroad to the end of his life. Thanks to him, Ukrainian song became the voice of the nation in the world.
