Sasha Koltsova: "No previous generation has carried such a burden of responsibility for the future"

De-sacralize the image of the "successful russian citizen."

Don’t you think we need a whole new, stronger set of arguments to explain why culture is politics? The arguments that worked early on just don’t land anymore. Or maybe they were never explained clearly in the first place. When we say things like: “Culture and language are about national security,” or “Identity equals territory — the territory of people who choose to identify as Ukrainian” — I feel like those messages haven’t really been spelled out or repeated enough, especially in schools. It’s not enough to just hang flags and portraits of heroes. We need to show the long arc of our struggle. This isn’t our first war with russia. It’s not the second, or even the third. Muscovy’s, and later russia’s, imperial ambitions have been a threat to Europe for centuries. But I don’t think we’ve done enough over the years to explain that russia has always been a danger to Europe.

I feel like with teenagers, we need to de-sacralize the image of the “successful russian citizen.” They’re into boldness, rebellion — it’s part of being that age. Of course they’re going to push back. When we were teenagers, we rebelled against russian stuff and sang in Ukrainian. Now they’re doing the opposite. When I was 18 or 19, russia felt like: “We’ll outdo all these Mumiy Trolls.” That’s when Chervona Ruta (a permanent biennial all-Ukrainian youth festival of contemporary song and popular music – ed.) was taking off here, and we were all like, “No way we’re singing in russian.” Now teens are doing the reverse. 

But what makes someone cool to a teenager? You can actually break that down. There’s always a financial element. There’s also this idea of personal freedom, of pushing back against adults. And then there’s the aesthetic — call it glam, swag, or whatever today’s term is. It’s a vibe, a visual language that signals coolness and relevance. But all that can be broken into parts. And from a producer’s point of view, you can absolutely create a Ukrainian-language alternative — and at the same time break down the illusion of “cool russian teens” from those gangster TV shows. Who usually end up in jail, or become some “successful” russian cop. Look at who their cultural heroes are — like Morgenshtern and the rest. Their whole arc is: make money, flip off the adults, then, ideally, escape to Europe and buy a house there. That’s the hero’s journey. Because staying successful in russia? Who actually does that? Crazy people? To do what? Talk to who? Be friends with who? Even the “successful” russian has to leave. That’s the weak spot. No one’s out there saying how amazing life is in some Altai village with no plumbing. And if you go the pro-Putin criminal route, well, that’s a different “success story” — you end up unable to leave russia because you’re literally banned from entering most countries. I think that’s what we need to show teens. Like — sure, those guys might look cool, but in the end, they’re just cogs in some FSB-backed industry, living off crumbs handed down by russian oligarchs. If that’s your dream, dear Ukrainian teenager—bad news. You’re not getting into Bologna University, you won’t be working for a major European company, you won’t be helping rebuild your hometown. That’s a dead-end story.

For every one Ukrainian children’s song there are 50–100 russian-language ones

I’m still working on creating Ukrainian-language content for kids and just submitted my first ever grant application — for a collection of children’s songs. The application asked: why do you deserve this grant?

And when I was writing that for every one Ukrainian children’s song there are 50–100 russian-language ones, or 100–200 in English, French, or German, I realized — there’s your statistic. I mean, it still needs to be looked at and summed up, but really, everything that’s happening in Ukrainian children’s music amounts to literally 300–400 tracks.

The market is open, with millions of views. Imogen Heap — whom I absolutely love — recently recorded a baby song. And she’s a powerhouse in electronic music. She said that the biggest income she earns is from that children’s song — because kids just listen to it on repeat. I go around to all the Ukrainian artists and say: “Taras, you’ve got three kids now — why don’t you and Aliona release an album? I mean, who else if not you?” I even spoke to Anton Slipakov, said, “Listen, I know you can do this — you can write funny, cool children’s songs.” What’s his album called again? Babbling (Varnyakannya), right? I even pitched him a name for a children’s album. Know what it was? Project ‘Nya’.

I’m convinced that a lot of Ukrainian artists could — and should — just as a tribute to the new generation, make a children’s song in their own style.

Ukrainian cultural heroes dissolve into the broader resistance

I’m really interested in how to explain to the global cultural community that right now we’re not on equal footing — Ukrainian authors, musicians, and creators versus russian ones. What arguments can we make to Europeans, to Americans, to the world, so that they understand our culture is on the verge of physical destruction? Because our cultural workers — that’s just a few thousand people who are currently creating under war conditions: difficult, harsh, financially unstable, logistically tough. Why should they be the ones given a voice? And why is it time to let go of the idea that russian culture is somehow inherently good and beautiful? Humanism didn’t save the russian nation from launching military aggression against other countries. Because they always talk about russian culture as a humanistic one. How do we convey to Europeans that what’s needed now is a platform for a nation that’s being erased?

I hear young artists today complaining about the same things we used to complain about: low ticket sales, not enough people listening to their music. And I get it — many of them are going to be cut down just like our generation of musicians was, when we were in our twenties playing music in garages and rehearsal spaces. I remember how many bands just gave up and got regular jobs — because of the economy. And now it’s the same story: OTOY works in IT, LatexFauna was working in IT until recently, others have second or even third jobs. It’s nothing new, really. But when the size of the country is literally shrinking… I flinch every night when I see the news — "the enemy advanced here," "the enemy advanced there."

I get notifications at night, and I always fall asleep in a bad mood. It’s April now, and I’m watching the russian offensive from Sumy and Kharkiv regions. And I know that, right now, my friends — the band Hatespeech, for example — are getting mobilized into the Armed Forces. I’m literally watching Ukrainian cultural heroes dissolve into the broader resistance. To me, that raises a serious question. If there really are only around 10,000 people working in culture in Ukraine — even if you count all the theaters, the official art scene, then the unofficial one… We know how many rehearsal spaces there are in Kyiv. We know how many hours they’re booked. We know there are about 300 releases a month. We know what one label puts out, then another, then another. It’s all quantifiable. And all of that — plus the diaspora — that’s Ukrainian culture. These are very tangible numbers. And I see it clearly — one band goes to war, then another, then another. Fewer releases. Fewer concerts. Meanwhile, russian culture hasn’t let up at all. It just keeps pumping out content.

We should be the voice of freedom for the Turkic peoples of russia.

Take this Bashkir band, for instance. I monitored what russians were saying about them for the first week. At first — maybe the first two days — people were posting, “They’re not russians.” But the moment they saw others — people from Kazakhstan or elsewhere — talking about the liberation of minority peoples, they instantly changed their tune and started saying, “No, they’re ours.” It happened that fast. 

And I think in that arena, we’re falling behind. I can’t remember a major hit in the Crimean Tatar language since Jamala — and we could have had more. It would’ve been a strong statement at Eurovision, for instance, coming from Ukraine. But I’m not speaking here as a singer — I’m speaking as a cultural worker, a producer. And I think we’re falling short when it comes to cultural policy. We should be the voice of freedom for the Turkic peoples of russia. They’ve been under Moscow’s yoke for too long. They’re already losing their identity — there are fewer and fewer teenagers who speak their native languages. For them, it’s a matter of survival. And there are dozens of small languages — like in Yakutia and among other Indigenous peoples — that are already vanishing.

I adore Surzhyk.

I don’t correct people when they speak russian to me. I think it’s obviously impolite to respond in russian when someone addresses you in Ukrainian. It just shows a lack of understanding of the context. I really like it when I go to a coffee shop and people speak russian among themselves, but address me in Ukrainian as a customer. To me, that means: I know the law, I support Ukraine as a system, I am a professional. And that’s so nice, always. I love that people separate their private life — protected by law — from public life, where they recognize common rules and understand the danger russia poses. And that’s totally fine when it comes to people over 70. There’s no point trying to retrain someone at that age. But what I really love is when people make an effort and speak in Surzhyk. I adore Surzhyk. I think it’s perfect — because you hear someone genuinely trying, making steps toward the goal. And it’s always so organic. You catch these grandma words that are native to them, mixed with their other vocabulary. And still, it’s way better than someone trying to imitate the early 2000s russian intelligentsia style — that affected, pretentious manner of speaking. 

These days to be considered an intellectual, educated, European person, the Soviet cultural background just isn’t enough anymore.

You realize that our generation had this model of a russian “cultural hipster” — the kind who spoke in a deliberately literary style, studied in Moscow, spoke with that drawn-out "a" pronunciation (the so-called akanye), and so on. And it’s so dumb when our peers still imitate that during a time of war. We recently read: “Teenagers at Samosad were listening to russian music,” and there was a snippet of their chat. You read it and you can tell this person is trying to talk like a russian cultural hipster from the 2000s — back when russia had that small window of opportunity and tried to present itself as part of Europe. But these kids drop their hs, say sho instead of shcho, throw in random words… and they don’t seem cultured from either the Ukrainian or russian perspective. To russians, they’re just some khokhol (a derogatory russian term for Ukrainians)  trying to reach the level of a St. Petersburg intellectual. And I think what’s important now is to show what an educated Ukrainian person looks like — and contrast that with someone who only read party-approved literature translated into russian, and still considers themselves deeply intellectual through that tiny lens. You go into those old libraries and think: okay, half of this French writer’s works are missing, and this is a sanitized biography of Korolyov — of course, without the part about him being imprisoned. That’s the kind of literature they had — where our cultural heroes were cut down, stripped of the fact that they’d been in labor camps, and turned into model citizens. What you’ve got is castrated Scandinavian literature, bits of German literature, filtered for what the party wanted. And the people who read this think of themselves as the cultural elite. They talk to today’s Ukrainians — our generation — that can now read anything in the original, and still consider themselves superior. That’s wild to me. Like—you read only what the party translated for you. You traded scrap paper for detective novels.

I grew up in Kyiv. For me, even ten years ago, I’d sometimes get comments from older ladies like, “Why are you speaking Ukrainian here?” And I’d be so tired, I’d say — okay, you want to speak this language? Or that one? Want me to show you what my grandmother wrote in the 1920s, when she was in Kyiv, standing in church and hearing Ukrainian all around her? Let’s talk about your “intellectualism.” Where did your Kyiv apartment come from? Who was pushed out for you to get it? Who was deported? Who was brought in? And that’s always such a heavy conversation — trying gently to explain that these days, to be considered an intellectual, educated, European person, the Soviet cultural background just isn’t enough anymore.

They didn’t know they were poor, they didn’t know they were uneducated. They didn’t know that their education was outdated.

No previous generation has carried such a burden of responsibility for the future

I’m preparing a European tour with some replacements because we also can’t leave the country. And it will be small — most likely acoustic again. I might go with an all-girl lineup, with string instruments. We’re considering it, because otherwise it's very difficult to represent Ukrainian culture in Europe right now. Not to mention it should also involve fundraising. When Kate Nash from the UK says she’s doing a loss-making tour in America just because she wants to perform, I think — sweet summer child — you're on a loss-making tour? Meanwhile, I perform at every concert as the person running auctions. We've come to understand that it's a new profession. And we still have to bring back something for medical or military needs. You and I probably won’t live to see those perfect, cloudless times as artists.

But I hope to live a very long life and make many different kinds of music — because it’s simply necessary for my country. There need to be living representatives of the country who can say, “Good day, we’re from Ukraine. Ukraine exists. Ukraine is fighting. Ukraine needs support.”

Our audience has gotten smaller since the war began. Our listeners are leaving — they’re avoiding the war. Our listeners are losing their jobs and income. Our listeners are dissolving into other audiences abroad, trying to survive. Their children are forgetting Ukrainian. Our listeners are dying. Our listeners are in the ranks of the defense forces. Our listeners are Ukrainian citizens who are now in danger because of russian aggression. Have they changed internally? No previous generation has carried such a burden of responsibility for the future and such a burden of danger from russian aggression — with modern weapons, modern social media, and such an enormous flood of information. So, our listeners, who were always resilient people trying to support their culture, remain that way. But now, all their intentions have turned into concrete actions.

Translated by Anna Petelina