“It was a great blessing in my life that Vadim was the first music teacher I met at Berkeley College of Music. It was very impressive to see how passionately he was teaching students by gathering all the energy that was underneath him. He always said, ‘You have to write your own song, you have to find your musical color’ in every class.” Jazz pianist Bae Young-young remembers Professor Vadim Nesselovsky. At a house concert called ‘Vadim’s Friends’ held at Advart in Hannam-dong, Yongsan-gu, Seoul on March 8, Bae played the piano for Professor Vadim. And he held up a sign praying for peace in Vadim’s homeland, Ukraine.
In addition to Bae, Jazz pianists Jung Eun-hye, Park Jin-young, and Kang Jae-hoon, who were students of Vadim, participated in the ‘Friends of Vadim’ performance on this day. In a video letter, Vadim said: “It is important for those who are suffering in Ukraine to feel that they are never alone and that many people in the world are with us. A performance like this gives them a lot of strength,” she said.
Advart’s studio where the performance took place is less than 100 meters away from the Ukrainian embassy. At the Belgian embassy next to the Ukrainian embassy, the councilor attended the performance, but the Ukrainian embassy was not able to attend because of the dire situation in his home country. Ukrainian ambassador to Korea, Dmitry Ponomarenko, thanked the artists who participated in the performance in a video letter and asked them to hold such an event at the Ukrainian embassy.
Choi Jong-ha, the president of the house concert as a jazz translator, accepted the request of the Ukrainian ambassador. On March 18, in front of the Ukrainian Embassy, the ‘Street Concert for Ukrainian Peace’ was held again. Video director Choi Ji-sun and sound director Jang Min-soo helped set up the performance at the scene. About 100 people, including Ukrainian embassy staff, stayed at the site even in the rain.
After the performance, jazz pianist Jeong Eun-hye said: “Vadim is the person who made the country known to me as Ukraine. After the Russian occupation of Crimea, she wrote and performed songs for Ukrainians, and performed many songs depicting her hometown of Odessa. Even before the war, he actively exchanged music and culture, such as collaborating with the Kiiwu Orchestra. The news of the war was so shocking. He hastily composed and performed a song called ‘Together We March On’ for Vadim and his country. Music is structured sound. All content such as meaning, emotion, and worldview is conveyed as it is in sound energy. I wanted to comfort the desperate and sorrowful hearts of Ukrainians who are trying to overcome the national crisis with music.”
House concerts and street concerts for Ukraine were carried out as a joint project of ‘Culture and Arts Emergency Action for Ukraine’ (hereinafter ‘Ukrainian LAN Action’). Ukrainian LAN Action is a Facebook group created on March 3, one week after Russia invaded Ukraine, and is a loose solidarity of cultural artists who pray for peace in Ukraine. As of March 23rd, 344 cultural and artistic artists are taking action to end the war in Ukraine and establish peace.
The purpose of the ‘Ukrainian LAN Action’ was to help Ukraine by doing what they could do in their respective positions. Soprano Chan-hee Jung made a video of her singing the national anthem of Ukraine and uploaded it to YouTube. Then, flamenco dancer Wonkyung Choi choreographed a choreography to inspire Ukrainians to this song, performed it, and uploaded a video. Gayageum player Sora Ha performed her gayageum song ‘Long live for a thousand years’ to pray for the well-being of Ukraine.
Planning and communicating with Ukrainians in Korea
Oh Yu-kyung, a former KBS announcer, made a video recitation of the Ukrainian national poet Taras Shevchenko and uploaded it to YouTube. Singer Son Byung-hwi, chairman of the Seoul Folk Crafts Federation, re-attached the song to a poem read by Oh Yu-kyung. Son said, “The progressive arts in the future should be able to touch each other’s hearts. Instead of focusing on domestic issues, we should pay attention to issues outside of Korea and take active artistic actions. I want to be able to share the value of ‘democratic Korean Wave’ to the world.”
In addition to this, various cultural and artistic artists participated. Photographer Jinseok Kim provided pictures taken in Ukraine, and calligrapher Soyoung Kim provided ‘Ukrainian’ calligraphy for use in Ukrainian LAN activities. Cartoonist Koh Kyung-il, a professor at Sangmyung University, drew cartoons praying for peace in Ukraine with the members of the Woori Manhwa Solidarity. The Donuimun Museum Village decided to display the cartoons they drew together during the antiwar exhibition.
‘Ukrainian LAN Action’ also communicated with Ukrainians in Korea. Grace Hong, who helps foreigners living in Korea, played a role in the middle and connected with Ukrainians living in Korea. I had a zoom meeting with Yevgeny and Nana, young Ukrainians, and informed them of Ukrainian LAN activities. They conveyed the dire situation in Ukraine and appealed for assistance.
Olena Shegel, a professor of Ukrainian language at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, decided to jointly plan a ‘Ukrainian Peace Concert’. It started with the idea of conductor Yang Seung-yeol. He said, “There are many good composers from Ukraine. It would be meaningful if Russian musicians in Korea played songs by Ukrainian composers and prayed for peace.” The ‘Ukraine Peace Concert’ is scheduled to be held at the Gyeonggi Art Center in Suwon from the end of April to the beginning of May.
Musicians from Ukraine, a cultural powerhouse, are also active in Korea. However, there are many cases where they stop their activities and return to their home country after hearing the news that their home country has been invaded. Dmitro, trumpeter Matvienko Costantin, and Leu Keller, viola player, who were active in the Seoul Pops Orchestra are seniors and juniors at the Kiiu Conservatory, but all have returned to Korea.
If Russian musicians participate in the ‘Ukrainian Peace Concert’, there is a song I would like to ask. It is a song called ‘Do Russians Want War? The lyrics of that song are: “Do the Russians want war?/ In the silence of the open fields and plains/ Ask the birch and the cottonwood/ Ask the soldier lying under the birch/ And their sons will answer you/ The Russians will war Do you want to.”
© EPN