Sehin, Bohdan International Festival of Contemporary Music Warsaw Autumn

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born in 1976 in Borshchiv, Ternopil region, Ukraine; composer, manager of contemporary music projects. He graduated from the Mykola Lysenko National Music Academy in Lviv. He studied composition with Myroslav Skoryk, consulting on compositional issues with Oleksandr Shchetynsky, Je Beer, Arvo Pärt, Beat Furrer, and Yuval Shaked. He twice held the Gaude Polonia scholarship (2003, 2006). He studied with Zbigniew Bujarski in Cracow and Zygmunt Krauze in Warsaw. He also received scholarships from the Friends of Warsaw Autumn Foundation (2003), ZAiKS Andrzej Szczypiorski Fund for the Support of Creativity, Gulliver Connect (2008), and the President of Ukraine (2008–10). His music has been commissioned by the National Institute of Music and Dance (Poland), Polish Institute in Kyiv, and Deutsche Welle. His music and theatre productions have received numerous awards in Ukraine, Poland, and Bulgaria, and been performed, apart from his own country, in Lithuania, Latvia, Belarus, Russia, Armenia, Poland, France, Switzerland, Germany, and China. Sehin is a member of the National Union of Composers of Ukraine with considerable experience in international art festival management, including the Contrasts (Lviv, 1998–2006), Velvet Curtain (Lviv, 2006), and Kyiv Music Fest (Kyiv, 2009) festivals, and the Music of Youth International Forum (Kyiv, 2009, 2011, 2013).

Since 2009, Bohdan has been involved in numerous art projects in Ukraine. In 2009 he began coordinating projects for Ensemble Nostri Temporis, becoming its director in the following year. He is also the founder and artistic director of Ukraine’s first International Masterclasses of New Music COURSE (held every year since 2012) and the Ukrainian Biennale for New Music. Since 2012, he has been the business director of the Development of New Music project at the Myroslav Skoryk Lviv National Philharmonic and art director of Contrasts International Contemporary Music Festival. 

In 2019, he launched the concert series Pro et Contra. The New Music Scene at Lviv Philharmonic. In 2020, he initiated and implemented the anti-crisis project titled Sounds of Lviv Philharmonic, held during 2020 and 2021 and enjoying a wide reception thanks to online streaming of more than 100 philharmonic concerts. In 2022, Bohdan Sehin started a series of online concerts titled Ukraine 2022. The Muses Are Not Silent on Lviv Philharmonic’s YouTube channel in support of Ukrainian musicians who have stayed in Ukraine during the Russian invasion. Presently, Sehin and his family remain in Ukraine and do not plan to leave it. He writes music commissioned by foreign institutions and continues the Ukraine 2022. The Muses Are Not Silent project, which will remain a priority among his managerial activities until the war is over. 

Selected works: Blazhen muzh (Blessed is the Man), Psalm 1 for mixed unaccompanied choir (2000–3), Stabat Mater for mixed choir and symphony orchestra (2002–3), Why Is My Verse So Barren of New Pride (for Arvo Pärt) for countertenor, two tenors, bass and seven instruments, to Shakespeare’s Sonnet 76 (2003), Song of Orpheus for countertenor and string quartet (2006), “...meanwhile July is so (cruelly) beautiful...” for soprano and symphony orchestra to the poem July by Marta Podgórnik (2007), Irradiationfor oboe, violin and piano (2009), Without a Title for flute, cello and piano (2009), Gloria in excelsis Deo for mixed choir and symphony orchestra (2008–10), Icarus for ensemble (2010), vox devices, a happening for three performers and household objects (2011), As sailors enjoy the view of the earth... for organ (2011), Daedalus for flute, bass clarinet, violin and cello (2011), ZvukoIzolyatsia 1. Introduction. Intervention for ensemble and electronics (2011), Musikalisches Opfer (für Gustav Mahler) for oboe, French horn, double bass and piano (2011), ZvukoIzolyatsia 2. Outside for oboe, clarinet, bassoon, French horn, trumpet and live electronics (2012), Factory Workshop: 1, 2, 3, three electronic compositions (2012), Talos for string quartet (2014), Internal Continuity for prepared piano and audio recording (2014), Preparation, performance (with Olha Fraze-Frazenko and Ostap Slyvynskyi, 2015), Gamma Bootefor violin and piano (2015), Between East and West. Mystery of Birth, cyclical sacred vocal-instrumental work for four solo voices, mixed choir, string orchestra and organ to Latin, Greek and Ukrainian sacred texts and Sophocles translated into Polish by Nikos Chadzinikolau (2017), Fantasia Galiciana for seven accordions and symphony orchestra (2017), Song of Orpheus for countertenor and string orchestra (2006–17), Allelujah. Music for Holidays and Fireworks for mixed choir and symphony orchestra (2015–18), Shchedry Vechir (Generous Evening), version for mixed choir and string orchestra in memory of Roman Stelmashchuk (2018), Winter King, multimedia performance on Korg MS-20 Mini synthesizer after Ostap Slivynsky’s poems from the collection Winter King (2018), Icarus for ensemble (2010–19), Daedalus for ensemble (2011–19), Pause, sound design and live electronics musical composition for a theatrical production (2019), Melancholic Cantata in Honour of Lviv’s Mozart, musical-literary composition for reciting voice, melodeclamation, soprano, harpsichord, piano, organ, bandura, choir, orchestra and electronics (2021), Without a Title, version for violin, double bass and piano (2021), Song without Words, version for violin and string orchestra (2022), Kyrie eleison, version for cello quartet (2022).