A Helping Hand
With a passion for singing and a joy of performing, St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Church choir is always up for a concert on the agenda — especially when it involves giving a helping hand.
The Annual Concert of Koljady, a benefit concert in support of Dzherelo Children’s Rehabilitation Centre in Lviv, Ukraine, was launched by conductor Zhanna Zinchenko in 2006. Dzherelo Centre, founded by parents and concerned individuals as a nonprofit, charitable organization, provides consultation, rehabilitation, education and counselling for children with special needs, as well as support services for their families. Before Dzherelo Centre opened its doors in 1993, few children in Ukraine with special needs were allowed to go to school. Dzherelo works to change this legacy by helping these children reach their fullest potential as visible, functioning members of society.
Held the last Saturday of January following Vespers, the Concert of Koljady, now an annual parish event, was the brainchild of Ms Zhinchenko and her passion to not only bring the joy of song and music to a wider public, but to also use the occasion to pay it forward. To date, thanks to Ms Zhinchenko’s initiative, the Parish Choir has raised more than $50,000 for Dzherelo Centre.
Although it may have been primarily parishioners who initially attended the concerts, thanks to a long history of livestreaming, the Concert of Koljady audience is now worldwide and much to the delight of Ms Zinchenko and the choristers, includes the children, their parents and staff of Dzherelo Centre. Not even a global pandemic could stop the Concert of Koljady in January 2021. Adapted to an online format and hosted live by choir member and former Canadian Ambassador to Ukraine, Roman Waschuk, the 2021 Concert of Koljady featured prerecorded elements of choristers performing as a socially distanced group outdoors, as well as highlights of past performances, including video recordings from the January 2020 tour of western Ukraine.
Throughout the years, the children of Dzherelo Centre have shown kindness and generosity to the choir, forwarding many thank you gifts, including artwork and Christmas ornaments of their own creation, via Zenia Kuspheta, longtime parishioner of St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Church and a co-founder of Dzherelo Centre. One year, receiving handmade necklaces from our children (as choir members like to refer to them), women choristers made it a tradition to wear them during annual Concert of Koljady performances.
Although many individual choristers have visited the Dzherelo facility individually over the years, the choir had always aspired to sing for the children, their parents, and staff on their home turf. Finally, in January 2020, the wish became a reality. After so many years from afar, the St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Church Choir performed a special concert at Dzherelo Centre. A deeply moving occasion, the visit and brief concert for our children was a dream come true. We hope to visit again soon!
In 2014 and 2015, an especially tumultuous period in Ukraine’s recent history, donations from the Concert of Koljady donations were shared three ways: Dzherelo Centre, Ukraine’s Revolution of Dignity Maidan coordinating teams, as well as support for the life-saving Individual First Aid Kits (IFAK’s) destined for the country’s frontline soldiers defending the Donbas region against the Moscow-based separatists. The choir’s video greeting, expressing support with the activists in Independence Square and soldiers at the front, was shown from the main stage of Independence Square, Kyiv.
