“Closer to the Serbian”? Ukrainian Song and the Mental Mappings of Music in the Russian Empire

In the late nineteenth-century Russian Empire, Ukrainian folk song was enlisted by both Ukrainian and Russian nation-building projects. This paper discusses various views on Ukrainian song in the Empire’s musical discourse, which, given the emphasis on folk song as a vehicle for national identity, depended greatly on their authors’ concept of nationality. Moreover, as Russian critics and composers were propagating the principle of “strict diatonicism” as a fundamental principle for Russian music, the fact that Ukrainian song was found to be more “chromatic” affected how historical actors judged its authenticity, distinctiveness, centrality, and significance. The concepts and practices of folklorists and composers can, therefore, help us understand the mental mappings of music and nationality within the Russian Empire.