Mandyczewski has been mentioned a few times in passing on this forum. Depending on which source you read, he was Austrian (Eusebius Mandyczewski), Ukrainian (Євсевій Мандичевський/Evseviy Mandychevskiy, or Romanian (Eusebie Mandicevschi) - and no reason why he couldn't have been all at once. He was born in Chernivtsi (google it if you want to see photos of a beautiful city), the capital of the Bukovina region which over the centuries has repeatedly changed hands between the Polish-Lithuanian Grand Duchy, Moldavia, Hapsburg Austria-Hungary - and now split between Romania and Ukraine (and previously USSR). A large part of his output seems to have been liturgical and chamber/solo piano. However I have come across a few works of his for full-scale chorus+orchestra. From the youtube links below, it seems there is (was?) an annual "Mandyczewski-Days" Festival in Chernivtsi, so it's possible that more works may appear as time goes on. The first one below is attractive, and with an opening overture.
Cantata - У Буковому краї (also called В краю Буків) / In the Land of Buk (can also translate as In the Land of Beech Trees - from which Bukovina gets its name) - has a rather good orchestral overture:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwZMsmMsmzQ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwZMsmMsmzQ)
Шкільна кантата / School Cantata:
https://youtu.be/5zkYg7CVbn4?si=7daKs2J4f3eVMaET (https://youtu.be/5zkYg7CVbn4?si=7daKs2J4f3eVMaET)
Cantate "Der Harmonie Gewalt" (1882)
https://youtu.be/4aRcEikuztM?si=2GlVscOPLa8bBmWW (https://youtu.be/4aRcEikuztM?si=2GlVscOPLa8bBmWW)
Hans Gál, whose teacher Mandyczewski was, wrote this about him:
QuoteIn 1957, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of Mandyczewski's birth, Gál wrote of his teacher in the following terms:
If I were to say who, including my immediate family, had had the deepest and most enduring influence on my development, then without a moment's hesitation I would name my teacher, Eusebius Mandyczewski. Of what I learned from him, his teaching, however important and fundamental it may have been, was the least part. The main thing that he gave to his student was himself, his attitude, his unfailing truthfulness, his artistic and human integrity. Anyone to whom this was inaccessible remained aloof from him, and he from them. At the age of eighteen or nineteen one is too young to grasp these things consciously and they only became clear to me much later. But what the young person certainly sensed instinctively from the first moment was the authority of an unconditional belief in the active power of what the spirit of the Great and Immortal had created in the course of the centuries. He taught the skills in the only way in which they should be taught, through example and instruction, according to the method of the Gothic architects' guild. I never saw a text-book, just as I myself could never use a text-book in my teaching.
If the teacher's first objective was the transmission of skills, he never forgot the end for the means: to learn to find oneself through the free working-out of form. It was for him a matter of course that that could only take place on the basis of a single, unshakeably firm basis: that of unconditional truthfulness. 'Anyone who is not confident of answering for every note that he writes at the Last Judgement should not even begin',—perhaps he never uttered this sentence but it was the core of his teaching. He had neither understanding nor patience for the false, the contrived, for things born of idleness, fashion or a craving for publicity. He had just as little patience in his occasional judgements of people whom he rejected on principle. 'What do you mean', he used to say, 'he is just a rogue', or else 'a big-head'; and that for him was the end of the matter. The surprising thing was his natural amiability towards such people. He was on his guard against rogues and big-heads, but I never saw him behave towards such a person with anything other than gentle friendliness. It was enough for him in dealing with the rogue phenomenon to know that it existed, that he belonged to the necessary world order and that one merely had to distance oneself from him personally in order not to be contaminated by him; and what was true of people was also valid for actions or utterances of whatever kind.
If there is an aristocracy of existence and of the spirit, then Mandyczewski possessed it in greater measure than anyone else I have known. This nobility of the spirit was stamped on his face, in the perfectly beautiful, peaceful, contemplative features of a person who is firmly anchored in his own internal world and whom life has made into a stoic. After a serious operation he replied smilingly to a doctor who had asked him if he had any pain: 'I knew that it would not be pleasant.'
Measured against the enormous richness of his ability and his knowledge, he published little, with the exception of his participation in the great Complete Editions of the classics—Schubert, Haydn, Brahms. His encyclopaedic knowledge, supported by an unfailing memory, was placed at the disposal of anyone who wished to make use of it. The thick volumes that he could have written never came to pass, because he never felt the need to communicate what he knew in any other form than through personal contact. The unforgettable profit belonged to all those who enjoyed the good fortune of being in contact with him.
In any case one should not forget that even the wisest of the wise, Socrates, did not leave behind any books.
This text and more to be found on the Hans Gál website (https://hansgal.org/hansgal/2).
The first work I have listed above is a substantial piece, 90 minutes long, and I am liking it a lot. Rich, melodic and "full-bodied" (the sound quality is poor, it's a live youtube recording, but that's no reflection on the music).
Thanks for giving me the opportunity to hear something by Mandyczewski, Christopher. I've often seen the name and wondered what his music might sound like. I do agree, the big Buk cantata is an enjoyable, sonorous piece, albeit without much individuality.
I see that there is a CD of his Lieder:
(https://d1iiivw74516uk.cloudfront.net/eyJidWNrZXQiOiJwcmVzdG8tY292ZXItaW1hZ2VzIiwia2V5IjoiODA1MDAxMi4xLmpwZyIsImVkaXRzIjp7InJlc2l6ZSI6eyJ3aWR0aCI6NDMyfSwid2VicCI6eyJxdWFsaXR5Ijo2NX0sInRvRm9ybWF0Ijoid2VicCJ9LCJ0aW1lc3RhbXAiOjE3NjUyMDY5Njl9)
https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8050012--mandyczewski-lieder-gesange-and-waltzes (https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8050012--mandyczewski-lieder-gesange-and-waltzes)