Yagody

There is a song for every moment in a person's life, says Zoryana Dybovska, who founded Yagody in 2016 in Lviv, western Ukraine, with students from the theatre faculty. The four of them travelled through various Ukrainian oblasts to track down the musical traditions of the people there. From this inexhaustible number of songs about life, Yagody create their own exciting sound, supported by guest musicians on drums, guitar, accordion or the drymba, a Jew's harp of the Hutsuls from the Carpathian Mountains. Yagody released their debut album in 2020, followed by major appearances such as at the medieval festival "Tu Stan!" in Lviv in 2018 and at the Lodžie Worldfest in Jičín, Czech Republic, in 2022. As Yagody are at home in the theatre, they realise their musical ideas for the stage according to dramaturgical principles; a concert is like a performance in one act. When an emcee announced the as yet nameless band at their first concert, he spontaneously called them 'Yagody', which means 'berries' in German.

Yagody's unmistakable repertoire consists of gripping songs from Ukraine, but also from neighbouring countries. The musicians thus have access to an incredibly diverse world of melodies, rhythms and themes. A concert with Yagody is a ritual. It is listening to the inner self. There is the breathing of the wind in the field, a sound like the voice of our ancestors. The listeners are enveloped in living energy and musical trance. A dance of voices in the pulse of humanity. Yagody's songs are like love letters from the past that have not yet arrived. Yagody is undoubtedly one of the most charismatic Ukrainian folk bands!

Band video