Andriy Khlyvnyuk is a Ukrainian musician who left his tour in the USA to return home and fight in Ukraine. He recorded a video singing a Ukrainian folk song called “й у лузі червона калина” which translates to “a red viburnum in the meadow”.
With Andriy’s permission, The Kiffness, a music producer and YouTube personality from South Africa, remixed his passionate performance and the results are magical. The Kiffness upload the song to their YouTube channel sating, “As promised, we agreed that all royalty earnings from this video will be donated to humanitarian aid for the Ukrainian armed forces.”
You can listen to the song on all major streaming platforms by clicking here, you can also buy the song on Bandcamp and profits will be donated to the Ukrainian crisis.
It’s reported that the Andriy, 42 and part of the band band “Boombox”, dropped his children off at their grandmothers house and returned to fight in the war in Ukraine.
Boombox was formed in 2004 by Andriy Khlyvnyuk and Andriy “Fly” Samoylo, they released their first studio album in 2005. The album is said to have only taken 19 hours to record.
Songs in but Russian and English appear on their albums and singles although their music is predominantly Ukrainian. They have toured all the major cities in Ukraine and have also toured in Europe, Canada and the USA. The band stopped performing in Russia after the 2014 annexation of Crimea.
Andriy’s story is another heroic tale coming out of Ukraine at this very difficult time. A video of a young Ukrainian girl singing “Let It Go” from the Oscar-winning film Frozen has taken the internet by storm. Her name is Amelia and she has dreams of singing on the big stage to large audiences.
The video was uploaded by Marta Smekhova to Facebook on the 3rd of March and has racked up over 105k shares in just a few days. The video was captioned with a long heart felt text written by Marta which we have translated into English, “seeing in one of the Kiev bomb storage, how children draw bright pictures in half-darkness, I, of course, couldn’t silently pass by…stopped, praised, offered to do a little exhibition to somehow decorate this not so happy place…painted together – a boy and a girl…the girl turned out to be so friendly, so talkative…”
Marta continued, “She told me that besides drawing, she loves to sing… and whispered shared her dream that she wants to sing on a big stage in front of the audience…so what’s the matter ? – I’m saying, – now we’re organizing… do you see honey how many people are here? that’s what you sing for!!! It’s loud, I won’t be heard, – worried… well, how not to worry? This is the first performance in front of an audience… needless to say worried for nothing.. from the first word in the [bomb shelter] came complete silence… everyone put their business aside and listened to a song by this girl who was just beaming light…”
“even men couldn’t hold back the tears.. Video made with permission of the girl’s mother… promised that many people will see her! Amelia really wanted this.. I showed this video to people in different cities of Ukraine, it was seen by foreigners in different parts of the world! Amelia, your singing left no one indifferent! look, Russians, against whom you are fighting! Only a coward can fight against civilians, take away childhood from defenceless children! You let your children go to the stew, making them into cannon meat… and our children radiate light, and even in a raw dark basement it does not blink, but ignites even brighter! And our children are applauded by the whole world!”
Idina Menzel, who played Frozen character Elsa and sang the original track, posted a message in support: “We see you. We really, really see you.”