Mykola Vilinsky

Who was Mykola Vilinsky?

Mykola Vilinsky was a Ukrainian composer and a professor at the Odessa and Kiev Conservatories.

He was descended from a Ukrainian family of hereditary nobles. He was a cousin of musicologist Alexander Ossovsky and singer Ksenia Derzhinskaia.

Vilinsky founded the Ballade genre of Ukrainian piano music. He was a student of Witold Maliszewski at Odessa Conservatory, graduated in 1919. Before the Conservatory Vilinsky studied law at the Imperial Novorossiiski University, graduated in 1912. In 1926 Vilinsky was appointed as a professor at Odessa Conservatory. Professor at Kiev Conservatory since 1944. Musicians such as Emil Gilels, David Oistrakh, and Yakov Zak, among others, studied his classes on special harmony and polyphony.

M.Vilinsky composed symphonic suites, cantata, chamber music, virtuoso ballade for piano, piano miniatures, songs, arrangements for choir of Ukrainian, Russian, Moldavian folk songs. Mykola Vilinsky's students included Konstantyn Dankevych, Oleksandr Bilash, Oscar Feltsman, David Gershfeld, Anton Mucha.