Listen up: Ukraine’s president Zelensky has first classical release
NewsThe British vocal ensemble Sansara is releasing a single by Ukrainian composer Natalia Tsupryk with words by President Vlodymyr Zelensky.
All proceeds go to Aid for Ukraine.
You see it here first.
Zelensky’s verse reads:
Our land was sown with bullets and shells
No enemy was able to take root here
No shackles can bind our free spirit
We are free people who have their own path.
I’m finding it increasingly difficult to accept these kind of contributions as art.
Isn’t this just propaganda with the aim of transporting a political, nationalist or patriotic message?
There are also many unsung songs by other leaders.
“You’ll never stand alone…”
Why can’t we just pray for peace and freedom on Earth and give neo-nationalism and global alliance haggling a break.
You are creating as false dichotomy. Much art is propaganda. In fact, nationalist music is by it’s nature propagandistic. But everyone I know would call Mussourgsky’s “Pictures” and Smetana’s “Moldau” and Copland’s three famous ballets art. Those who understand art surely accept that it is able to hold multiple messages in balance and tension within a single work. You may not like the message, but don’t be so near-sighted as to label it as non-art.
Yeah, but using direct quotes of leaders is not exactly subtle and is reminiscent of the worst forms of appropriation of art through political conviction.
How about Copland’s “Lincoln Portrait”? Or any other number of pieces using the words of Lincoln… Or Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man”, written in 1942 and based on a speech by then Vice President Henry Wallace – clearly a piece of political propaganda in the midst of WWII. But also great music.
No objections if separated by history, but quoting currently ruling politicians is just like all that Lenin and Stalin realism of the 20th century.
So…using texts by the current Dalai Lama would not be acceptable? You may say that he’s not a politician, but in fact he is in a very significant sense. Or using texts by refugee children from the Syrian war are not acceptable? Those texts ARE political, and I can only assume that even though refugee children don’t appropriate to themselves all the badges of a politician, their pleas and poetry set to music would be unacceptable.
I fully agree that this is all propaganda and of worse kind – disgusting!
Silentium!
That’ll have Putin shaking in his boots….
What a nonesense comment and full of blindness of reality!
Gosh Putin must be trembling in fear at this.