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The Night is just beginning

Vocal artist and composer Mariana Sadovska has traveled through the remote regions of rural Ukraine and eastern Europe for many years, searching for ancient songs, legends and rituals. Her performances bring together archaic voices and contemporary sounds, amplifying the echo of unknown worlds in the musical here and now.

In 2014 everything changed in Ukraine. Aggression in the Donbas region escalated to war. People are killed, forced to flee their homes, separated. In 2014 - 2016 Mariana traveled along the front lines in eastern Ukraine with aid transports, giving benefit concerts. Based on her journey and encounters with people in these forgotten corners, she has created a unique musical story, a solo performance which combines her singing and vocal experiments with field recordings, electronic sounds, folk songs and the poetry of war.

Vocals, keyboards, electronics: Mariana Sadovska. Sound design by Stefan Bohne. Artistic collaboration and support of Jörg Ritzenhoff, André Erlen, Virlana Tkach. Poetry by Serhij Zhadan and Lyuba Yakimchuk .

Special thanks to Iryna Kriuchenko, the founder of folk ensemble “Zahraiyarochka” from Volnovakha.

“The Night Is Just Beginning” was premiered in December 2016 at the Ukrainian Museum in New York and was produced by Yara Arts Group.

"The concert is a journey you are being led through by the singer Mariana Sadovska, who combines a tourist guide, a captain, and a stewardess in one person. “Welcome on board, please take a seat, fasten your seatbelts - you are about to embark on a trip to the East”, announces the Cologne based singer; and the flight begins carrying you through the emotional turbulences. Her songs, accompanied by her flying and at times hypnotic piano play, tell you about love, fear, fury, and intense passion. The show called “The Night is Just Beginning” is performed in one breath with no breaks between the songs; it is a short but very powerful programme that pulls at your heartstrings."
Steffen Tost.

"The art is helpless in the face of a war; because it doesn’t feel like singing, because the music and one single woman are powerless against it all. That is why the songs reach out through the words, whisper, recordings of women’s voices, for whom singing was a part of their being; reach out and become silent. That is why Mariana’s quiet and feeble story of the eastern front where there have been no changes for a long time is a story of not knowing how to make art about war, how to sing about war, and if it is possible at all. She begins, but the music tears apart; and in these shreds and pieces that are the echo of Mariana’s songs, which are usually energetic and powerful, is the deepest truth and sincerity about the own helplessness that she does not try to wrap up in glamour and beauty. "
Luba Ilnytska

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