New orchestra goes on tour on Ukraine’s ‘cultural front’

KIEV

Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February, the air raid sirens disrupt Svyatoslav Yanchuk’s concerts, forcing musicians and audience members to seek refuge underground.

“When the alarm stops, we can return to the stage. When it lasts more than an hour, the concert is called off,” said Yanchuk, a percussionist with the Odessa Philharmonic.
But in August, Yanchuk will finally be able to play without interruptions on an international trip with the newly created

Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra.

Along with dozens of other musicians, Yanchuk will be on a tour of Europe and the United States, which started in Warsaw this week.

The orchestra, assembled from musical ensembles in Ukraine and Europe, is the brainchild of Canadian conductor Keri-Lynn Wilson, whose grandparents were from Ukraine. Wilson was in Warsaw when the war broke out.

“As I witnessed the refugees streaming into Poland, I had a dream of uniting Ukrainian musicians in an artistic force to help them fight for their freedom,” she said.

The project quickly took shape with the support of the Polish National Opera in Warsaw and Metropolitan Opera in New York.

Despite never having played together before, the orchestra came up with a concert program in just 10 days.

The concert starts with Ukrainian composer Valentyn Sylvestrov’s Symphony No. 7, a homage to the victims of the war.
There is “no Russian music.” according to orchestra members, whose lives and careers have been turned upside down by the war.

“Russia has geniuses but whatever comes from Russian culture is on hold for the moment,” said bassoon player Mark Kreshchenskiy.

Kreshchenskiy and his brother Dmytro, a violist, played for the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra in Russia for eight years and were there when the invasion began.

Ukraine has stopped all fighting-age men from leaving the country under martial law in case they have to be drafted, but some orchestra members have temporary permission to do so.

“I was able to see my 10-year-old daughter again after five months of separation because she is a pupil at the Gdansk Opera” in northern Poland, said Dmytro Ilin, from the Kyiv Philharmonic.

Once the Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra tour is over, Ilin will return to Kiev along with percussionist Yevgen Ulyanov.