Sunday solidarity

I occasionally happen upon remixes by South African musician and producer The Kiffness, which tend to be of short bits of viral audio/video (like this cat or this cat or this drill sergeant). This time, he’s remixed, with the singer’s permission, a Ukrainian folk song sung by Andriy Khlyvnyuk, who left his U.S. tour with his band Boombox to return home to fight against the Russians in Ukraine. The Kiffness has promised that “all royalty earnings from this video will be donated to humanitarian aid for the Ukrainian armed forces.” The Music Man reports that you can also buy the song on Bandcamp and profits will be donated to the Ukrainian crisis.

The song’s title translates as “Oh, The Red Viburnum in the Meadow,” and was written in 1914, according to Red Tree Times, “to honor the Sich Riflemen, a Ukrainian military unit that fought in WWI. The red viburnum or kalyna berry referenced in the song is a national symbol of Ukraine, representing the blood roots and connection to the homeland.”

Hopefully this mess will all be over sooner rather than later, and, as the song says, “And we, our glorious Ukraine, shall, hey – hey, cheer up – and rejoice!“

8 thoughts on “Sunday solidarity”

I can’t envision any way the Ukraine War ends well for Putin. Not that I care about his well-being, but I worry about how much suffering he causes others–in Ukraine and in Russia–before the situation is resolved.

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blooper0223 says:

March 20, 2022 at 9:02 am

Same. I also worry about those here who idolize him; we’ve seen what happens when reality intrudes on them.

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Thank you for posting a song which is new to me. Although I have been a musician for fifty something years now, I have never heard that song before.

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blooper0223 says:

March 20, 2022 at 1:14 pm

I think I may have heard it once before, but it was a long time ago.

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I listened to that first “cat” link and immediately sent it to my son. We both love and have cats and the mix intrigued me. The Ukrainian song and the terrible situation over there moved me to tears. That guy has a great voice, imho.

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