Krut

“This could be my last interview because right now we have rockets … Many of my friends, my manager, my bandura master crafter and my boyfriend are all on the frontline and they are in hell right now.” That was an interview Maryna Krut did with Rolling Stone in March of 2023. Happily, it was not the last interview the bandura-playing singer and songwriter gave. 

Equally happily Krut will be bringing her songs, interpretations, and testimony to Vancouver this summer. Born in western Ukraine, Kurt started playing the bandura, the national stringed instrument of the Ukraine (a 65-string cross between a harp and a guitar), at the age of eight. First was traditional music but, like many teenagers, at fifteen she began to rebel. “I dyed my hair pink, painted my nails black, wore leather jackets and started to play the bandura in a more modern, jazzy and funky way while mixing in pop vocals.” 

Now she is culturally ambidextrous or perhaps multifaceted, performing a wide variety of styles. She is in the forefront of a revival of Ukrainian national culture and in using that culture as a tool of resistance in the confrontation with Russia. 

– GC