Pop music in Ukraine: Ukrainian songs played more often, but still lag behind Russian (09/04/05)

Pop music in Ukraine: Ukrainian songs played more often, but still lag behind Russian

by Zenon Zawada
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - Relationships, urban life in Kyiv and drugs are topics often explored by Green Grey, a successful Ukrainian rock band that has been performing for more than a decade.

This summer, their music turned political when they decided to launch a campaign, "Nashe Pravo" (Our Right), to address what they view as new wave of discrimination against Russian-language artists and performers.

Since the Orange Revolution, they claim that the government has denied them performances because they sing in Russian.

"Currently in cities, musicians must obtain permits to hold concerts in the main squares," Andrei Yatsenko, the band's guitarist and spokesman, said in late July. "However, a telephone ring arrives with the instruction to not allow concerts featuring Russian-language groups, and we lose the performance."

At an August 23 press conference, Green Grey announced it was denied a performance in Yalta, as well as on the maidan during the Independence Day celebrations.

With the launch of Nashe Pravo, the Ukrainian popular music scene has reached a cultural crossroads in which the fulcrum of cultural influence may be shifting from the Russian language to Ukrainian.

Though Ukrainian-language artists say they still struggle to get their music played on Ukraine's commercial radio stations, the growing number of successful stars such as Ruslana, Okean Elzy, Tartak and Maria Burmaka makes it apparent that the role of the Ukrainian language in the nation's popular culture will only grow.

Ruslana achieved international recognition when winning Eurovision 2004 and Okean Elzy has commercial success through the sale of its albums and a recent sponsorship deal with Ukraine's biggest cellphone service provider, UMC.

Now some of the country's Russian-language artists feel threatened.

"We want to become a mouthpiece for the Russian-speaking population," noted a Green Grey press release. "The rights of those who stood on the other side of the maidan barricades are systematically being infringed upon. Even musicians feel this. We want for them to return our rights."

It's not all that bad for Russian-language singers, however. Russian-language pop music continues to dominate Ukrainian radio airwaves.

Russian-language music videos far outnumber Ukrainian-language videos on music television networks in Ukraine, although admittedly both languages are far outnumbered by English-language videos.

Ukrainian pop singers insist their genre, or their "format," still needs government funding and support because not enough commercial radio stations and music producers are helping them.

New statistics support their concern, and reveal that while Green Grey may face rejection from the concert scene, they certainly should harbor no worries about having their songs played.

Of 16 radio companies, only Nashe Radio managed to play Ukrainian-language music as at least half of its selected songs, according to figures released on September 1 by the National Council on Television and Radio.

The council began monitoring the 16 national radio companies during a two-week period in August.

Half of Nashe Radio's songs were in Ukrainian during the second week of monitoring, and only three other radio stations had more than 10 percent of their music in the Ukrainian language.

Okean Elzy lead singer Sviatoslav Vakarchuk took part in a July 21 press conference to announce a new government-sponsored project, dubbed "Ukrainian Format," the goal of which is to help provide publicity and other support to aspiring Ukrainian pop musicians.

They need only fill two requirements: their song must be in Ukrainian and it must rock. In other words, it must be of a high quality.

The problem for Ukrainian pop is not only an issue of support or lack of support of Ukrainian musicians by official structures, radio stations and television, Mr. Vakarchuk said.

"The problem is that there is a huge gap between the taste of television watchers, radio listeners and those who buy compact discs and the taste of those who control the situation in show business," he said.

"And until that gap narrows, or until it disappears on its own, there will have to be artificial methods of support," he explained.

Four of Ukraine's biggest radio stations launched the project, including Radio Liuks FM, Yevropa Plius Ukrayina, Hit FM Ukrayina and Ruskoye Radio Ukrayina.

Radio Liuks' Lviv General Manager Roman Andreyko said the idea for Ukrainian Format came when his 12-year-old son told him that his classmates don't listen to his radio station because its format was all Ukrainian songs and it didn't play any Russian-language hits.

Mr. Andreyko helped launch the pilot project in Lviv in April, when the radio stations selected eight talented musicians.

Another goal of the project is to promote the concept of a Ukrainian format of poplar music that is commercially viable, said Mykola Tomenko, the vice prime minister for humanitarian affairs.

Often, Ukrainian radio station managers told government officials they didn't understand the concept of a radio format, which Ukrainian pop music could not support, Mr. Tomenko said. The "Ukrainian Format" project will make Ukrainian-based formats viable in the future, he said, and allow for the possibility for new national stars and popular performers to be born.

"These kinds of integrative models in which new performers and singers are tightly connected with radio and television is the only case in which a solid Ukrainian mass culture can emerge," Mr. Tomenko said. "We are proud of the academic culture and folk culture, but still we have problems with Ukrainian popular culture."

The four radio stations will play the music produced by the eight selected musicians. They also held a "Ukrainian Format" concert in which they performed on European Square on Independence Day - the same opportunity denied to Green Grey.

Whether or not the government is discriminating against Russian-language singers, Nashe Pravo is not Green Grey's first political statement. The group openly endorsed presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovych last year.

Government critics complained that another Yanukovych supporter, Ani Lorak, suffered political retribution when she was denied the opportunity to compete in Eurovision 2005. Voting by phone, Ukraine's music fans selected Gryndzholy, famous for the Orange Revolution song "Razom Nas Bahato," who fared poorly in the worldwide competition.

However, a band's political allegiance isn't necessarily determined by the language it sings in. Skriabin lead singer Andrii Kuzmenko shocked his fans last year when he endorsed Mr. Yanukovych. The band was one of the first successful Ukrainian-singing bands, hailing from the Lviv Oblast.

Green Grey insists they're not playing politics, though they boast of their relationship with the pro-Russian Social Democratic Party of Ukraine (SDPU), which they said supported the band during its August Nashe Pravo concert series in Crimea. They denied receiving money to promote the campaign.

Mr. Yatsenko has also made political statements, including rejections of NATO. The group's lyrics are provocative, with lines such as, "It's not necessary to teach others how to live, first learn how to live yourself. You can't make us over as yourselves, just like freedom and the sun above."

They promised the song's accompanying video, set for release on September 1, will be "very strong."

Mr. Yatsenko said he supports such projects as the Ukrainian Format Independence Day concert to help Ukrainian-language artists, but after seeing it he said it was "awful," especially considering that young musicians so inexperienced were allowed to perform on the national stage.

He said he was dismayed also to see a foreigner singing English on stage, namely Yulia Tymoshenko's future-son-in-law Sean Carr.

The members of Green Grey can speak Ukrainian, but the band will never sing in Ukrainian because it's too late to change their format and "our fans would laugh at us," said Dmitrii Muravitskyi, the band's vocalist.

The band said it isn't against the Ukrainian language, but its members are against the government forcing the country's Russian-speaking regions to use the Ukrainian language, particularly in schools. They want the Russian language to have equal official status with Ukrainian.

While they won't sing in Ukrainian, Green Grey doesn't have a problem recording songs in English, one of which were featured on their last album. They said they did it to expand their audience.

Incidentally, one of the lines in Green Grey's "Nashe Pravo" song refers to the bells of St. Volodymyr's Cathedral in Kyiv: "I used to fall asleep, listening to bells of St. Vladimir's Cathedral; This is our country, this is our city, this our right to decide."

Whether Green Grey was aware of it or not, St. Volodymyr's Cathedral is now the seat of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate.

And, of course, its services are held in Ukrainian.

Correspondent Vladyslav Pavlov contributed to this report.

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