Evgeniya V. Khazdan
Candidate of Art Criticism, ethnomusicologist. After graduating from St. Petersburg Conservatory, where she studied composition under Vladislav Uspensky, she undertook her postgraduate course at the Russian Institute of Art History under the academic supervision of Igor Macijewski. In 2008, defended her Dissertation “Nigun as a Phenomenon of Traditional Jewish Music Culture” at Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory. Prior to March 2014, she worked at the Organology Department of the Russian Institute of Art History. From 2014 to 2019, E. Khazdan was an independent researcher.
E. Khazdan is a member of the Union of Composers of Russia, a music critic, the author of more than 150 scholarly articles. Her academic interests include the music tradition of Eastern European Jews, particularly synagogue cantillation, paraliturgical chants (Chsidishe nigunim), Yiddish songs, instrumental (klezmer) music of Ashkenazi Jews. She is the author of the chapter devoted to Jewish traditional music in the volume “Jews” (2018, series “Peoples and cultures”). A number of her articles is dedicated to the works of composers— members of the Society for Jewish Folk Music in Petersburg/Pertograd, to the history of study of Jewish musical folklore in the USSR, and Jewish themes in the music of Russian and Soviet composers. In 2014, she has published a book “Something Could Be Said, Something Would Be Kept Silent” on the work of the St. Petersburg composer Sofia Levkovskaya.
Since 2017, Evgeniya is a participant of the project “Conceptualization of Music in Abrahamic Traditions: History, Theory, Practice.” E. Khazdan has edited various music editions and collections of academic articles on ethnic music including the book “From the World of Oral Tradition: Collected Reflections” by Izaly Zemtsovsky (2006). In 2008–2012, she was engaged in publishing the journal “Vremennik Zubovskogo Instituta” and until December 2018, she was involved with publication of the journal “Opera Musicologica” of St. Petersburg Conservatory. She is also the compiler and the editor of the collection of works by Valentin Vinogradov “Places of Worship of Russian North: The Topics of Shrines” (2019).
