Vasiliy Kovatsenko

Vasiliy Kovatsenko is a jaw harp maker from Saratov. In 2018, he shared first place in the musical-instrument-making category of the regional “Craftsman of the Year” competition with Saratov garmon maker Oleg Aristarkhov.

The maker’s account

The maker’s account is reproduced in full. Phrases such as “at present” and “in the near future”, along with other relative references to time, relate to the period when it was written.

I became acquainted with the jaw harp in October 2009. I was at a festival, and one of the guests was sitting by the fire and playing this instrument. The jaw harp immediately captivated me with its unusual sound and friendliness. Somehow, I was able to begin producing sounds almost immediately.

About a week later, I bought my first jaw harp. It was an Altai instrument by Minakov and Kazantsev. At first, I played almost constantly, in every spare moment.

Since then, I have owned about a dozen instruments. They have included dorombs, a Glazyrin jaw harp and Khakass instruments.

At some point, I wanted an instrument with a particular sound, and my hand reached for a file. Two instruments were ruined as a result, but the desire did not disappear.

I met Sergei Litvinov online and invited him to visit. In the course of a single day, Sergei explained the fundamentals of jaw-harp making to me. That became the beginning of my path towards an instrument of my own.

My goal is not so much to copy instruments that interest me as to create that particular instrument: my own, one that is close to me in every respect.

This is not entirely a good thing, because at present every new instrument turns out differently in some respect. But the period of radical experimentation is probably over. I am already close to finding my instrument.

My present goal is to combine the characteristics of different instruments that I particularly admire: the stability and solidity of Yakut instruments with the tunefulness and melodiousness of European ones. I also want to achieve a flawless appearance.

In the near future, I plan to switch to food-grade stainless steel in order to make the frame more rigid. This should allow me to narrow the gaps, improve the sound and protect the instrument from rust.

At present, my collection contains six instruments. I regard two of them as standards to aspire to: Pyzhov’s “Leader 85” drymba and Litvinov’s medium-sized jaw harp.

Those are the two instruments I play most often. I never manage to keep any of my own: I sell them or give them away.

At present, jaw-harp making is more of a hobby to which I devote 8–12 hours a week. This results in three or four instruments a month. I do not pursue high production volumes for several reasons:

1. I do not want to take too much time away from my family and children.
2. I do not want jaw-harp making to become routine.
3. I prefer quality and do not want it to turn into quantity.

I do not play any other musical instruments because my musical memory is fairly poor)))) The jaw harp allows me to play “from the heart”, improvising constantly without forcing myself. I tried learning the guitar, and it turned into a nightmare: six strings, lots of frets, ten fingers—what goes where, and what do you use for it? A complete horror, in short)))))

I am a marketing designer by profession, and manual work was a revelation to me. Before this, I was interested in making historical leather footwear, which is where the leather case for my instruments originated.

I listen to music almost constantly. It is mainly folk, folk metal, thrash and doom. I particularly like the characteristic rhythms of those genres.

Over time, I brought together a jaw-harp community in Saratov, began organising workshops for beginners and did what I could to promote jaw-harp culture. There are about fifteen to twenty active jaw-harp players in Saratov. We try to meet, although it does not happen very often.

I would advise everyone who owns one of my jaw harps—and jaw-harp players in general—not to try to play quickly. In my opinion, one should play slowly, allowing every sound and every overtone to pass through oneself and be understood.

Additional information

The subsequent development of Kovatsenko’s instruments shows a gradual transition from early experiments to an established construction. By 2016, the maker had switched to titanium-containing stainless steel. At the end of that year, he changed the reed geometry and material, its proportions and the way it was mounted. The reeds became more responsive, while the sound became longer-lasting and deeper.

Kovatsenko later refined his low-pitched instruments separately and developed a range extending from very low to high registers. He continued to apply the experience he had gained from making historical footwear to the production of leather cases, marking them with the instrument’s note and his personal symbol.

Based on materials from Oberton Pro; the competition result was confirmed by the Chamber of Crafts of the Saratov Region.

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