Alexey Torgunakov, a Russian ballet dancer who performed as a soloist for the Bolshoi Theater, and Alisa Makarenko, who is a well known Ukrainian choreographer and dancer, joined forces with Polish musicians to start the ARTISTS FOR PEACE campaign. This was a response to an appeal from Ukrainian artists to get support for the victims of the ongoing war.
On the 4th day of the war, producers Karo Glazer and Michał Rosicki responded to an appeal from friends sheltering in the Kyiv metro and in Lviv City Center for support. Within a few hours they had a team of artists willing to help. Soon, the campaign ARTISTS FOR PEACE had begun, and the song “Hand in Hand” was born.
“Together with Michal, we felt that we couldn’t just sit and do nothing. The appeal was directed at us and we couldn’t pretend we hadn’t heard it. We both have friends in Ukraine as well as in Russia. We had to react and so we went to work in our MAQ Records Studio. How quickly things developed was beyond our wildest expectations and nobody refused to help us!” – said Karo Glazer. “It was the fastest production we had ever taken part in. We knew that time was of the essence”, added Michał Rosicki.
ARTISTS FOR PEACE ORCHESTRA features amazing virtuosos like Marcin Gałażyn (accordion), Dominik Strycharski (flutes), Ania Broda (hammered dulcimer), Miguel Czachowski (flamenco guitar), and teenage artists playing four hands on the piano. It’s a fabulous mix of sounds from the East and West. At the same time, two fantastic dancers accepted an invitation to join the campaign. Alexey Torgunakov, who escaped Moscow through Kaliningrad at the beginning of the war, was able to come back to Poland to perform with Alisa Makarenko, who has been living in Poland for nine years but has family that decided to stay in her hometown of Kherson, Ukraine. On the twelfth day after writing the song, the beautiful video was shot at the Academy of Fine Arts in Katowice by the talented cinematographer Piotr Pawlus, who completed the video in Odessa while it was being bombarded.
The symbolism of the heroic dance in the face of the propaganda and conflict between the two nations shows us that love, peace, and co-operation is the only language we should be using today. The project was done on a non-profit basis thanks to the help of some wonderful people, friends, and institutions who gave their time, energy, and even money. The project keeps gaining momentum every day. During the filming of the video, we started working on making a short documentary in which we can hear artists sharing conversations about their motivations to participate in the ARTISTS FOR PEACE campaign.
Watch “Hand in Hand”
https://youtu.be/TkHXOCFNHxU
Download the song in wav
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BH7sDmdzhstoWvbmkCssnwM-sgiyAQQ4/view?usp=sharing
Stream “Hand in Hand”
https://bfan.link/Karo-glazer-hand-in-hand
Download the photos and CD cover
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1lKt-sWGNXrMRSdRxjxmL06UQjvsDtSpP?usp=sharing
KARO GLAZER – http://www.karoglazer.com
MICHAŁ ROSICKI – http://www.bruelsound.pl
ALEXEY TORGUNAKOV -https://www.torgunakov.com
ALISA MAKARENKO – http://www.alisamakarenko.com
PIOTR PAWLUS – https://www.piotrpawlus.com
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CONTACT: www.artistsforpeace.pl e-mail: [email protected]
