Ukrainian Soldier and Composer Yevhen Petrov In the Podcast After the Pause #3

Dzvenyslava Safian

50 mins ago

The podcast After the Pause is dedicated to Ukrainian military musicians. The guest of the final episode of the first season is Yevhen Petrov — a Ukrainian composer and serviceman. A year after the start of the full-scale invasion, he was mobilized into a military orchestra. Today he works on arranging and instrumentation for military musical ensembles.

This conversation is not about combat experience. Instead, we talk about how Yevhen combines service with creativity and what helps him remain in his profession in conditions that have radically changed the lives of Ukrainian artists.

The author and initiator of the podcast, Dzvenyslava Safian, spoke with Yevhen. We are publishing the written version of this conversation.

What did the decision to mobilize feel like for you? Did anything change in your music or your perception after you became a serviceman?

The decision was made, probably like for most people. I went to the military recruitment office, and from the training center, once they learned about my specialty, I was sent to an orchestra. The only “decision” was that when the state calls on you, you have to work with that reality.

Do you have time to write music? I know that in 2023 your piece “Gravity” was performed, which, as I understand, was also written in 2023. How much opportunity is there to write and engage in creative work?

Earlier I was used to being able to dedicate some time purely to a composition, without distractions and fully immersing myself in the process. Now, probably, that doesn’t really work.

As for whether my attitude toward the work process and music has changed — honestly, I haven’t noticed anything special. The war didn’t start yesterday, and I’m not inclined to romanticize or dramatize it in any way. I participate in it according to my abilities. And like all Ukrainians, I’m waiting for victory and doing everything to make it come as soon as possible.

In your pre-war civilian life, were you working as a freelance composer?

I always tried to be independent. At a certain period, when I moved to Kyiv in 2015, I tried to work on orchestration. And, in principle, I often managed to cover my expenses through orchestration so I didn’t have to work elsewhere. At the beginning of the full-scale invasion, I worked in an ensemble of the National Guard. Around autumn 2022, my contract ended.

And accordingly, I found myself in the role I like — a free artist, a free agent. But this role is appropriate for peacetime, not wartime. For the state, it means you are essentially not officially attached anywhere.

When I was in Lviv, I taught theoretical disciplines. There is a Baptist Theological University in Lviv, it is at college level. I taught theoretical subjects there, and my students later even entered the conservatory.

Then there was a lot of different experience: I worked as an accompanist, then I had to work as a realtor, courier, and legal consultant. When I came to Kyiv, I faced the fact that expenses there were much higher, and what I used to cover them with was not enough. There were periods when I worked three or four jobs, twenty hours a day. And of course, at that time, you could think about creativity only while public transport and holding onto a handrail.

There was the Myroslav Skoryk symphonic competition in 2021 (Lviv Philharmonic), and the chamber opera competition at the Lviv National Opera, which you won. Can you say that real compositional realization happened to a sufficient degree? Were there opportunities for that?

I received my first competition prize in Zaporizhzhia, around 1998. And a year later in Lviv. By the way, the head of the jury there was Oleksandr Kozarenko, who later became my professor at the conservatory. And there was a seventeen-year gap between competitions. The next prize I received was at a competition organized by “Collegium Musicum,” where I got third prize (2016).

Practically the entire period of conservatory study and post-conservatory life was very turbulent. Honestly, I sometimes had thoughts: is it even worth doing this? Maybe composition is not for me? But participation in competitions and jury reactions — the fact that your music is noticed — gives a certain impulse and confirms that it is still worth being in this profession. Then came competition recommendations, opera competitions, festival performances.

You are originally from Kryvyi Rih. Did you study an instrument at a music college there, or was it also composition? And how did it happen that you later went to Lviv to enter the conservatory?

My instrument is the domra. My introduction to music began with a church orchestra. And, I studied at a physics and mathematics lyceum in Kryvyi Rih. My parents and environment pushed me toward continuing in the physics-math direction rather than music. But I had already started writing music. I began writing my first pieces even before I knew musical notation. I literally asked older people to write them down in notebooks. At some point, one of my parents said: “Okay, if you really want it that much, you can try to enter music college.” I had literally one month left before entrance exams, and I successfully prepared and entered Kryvyi Rih Music College for domra.

And then there was a teacher of theoretical disciplines who noticed that I had a good ear, was good at writing dictations, analysis, and that I won theory competitions. This was teacher Vadym Rakityanskyi. To this day he remains one of those key people who influenced what I do. With him I won my first composition competitions.

Were you already engaging in contemporary music or avant-garde back then? Where did your musical tastes come from in your youth?

In fact, we had no composition department at all, nothing like that. It was my teacher’s personal initiative. He simply noticed me as a capable student. After we started studying, he even developed a desire to work with other students. Many people from my circle later studied with him and entered conservatories as composers. For example, Yevhen Braha. We studied together, he entered Mykola Dremliuha’s class. Nadia Kurinna received second prize at the Skoryk competition where I got third and Kolomiiets got first. She was a year younger, and later we studied together in Kozarenko’s class at the Lviv Conservatory.

As for how we studied, honestly, the teacher gave me complete freedom. We could meet after classes. For example, classes ended around 4 PM, and we could sit until 10–11 PM. And we talked not only about music, but about philosophy, art, religion. That inspired me a lot. Those conversations often turned into the desire to compose.

As for contemporary music, I don’t remember us encountering it seriously until the fourth year. Before the modern music history course, for me “contemporary music” meant Rimsky-Korsakov or Debussy. Then the course began with the Second Viennese School, and it felt like an explosion.

I remember the teacher made an experiment: we listened to Webern, “Variationen für Orchester,” and she said: “Put your watches away. Just listen and observe what happens to the music.” After the piece ended, she asked us to estimate how much time had passed. Some said three minutes, others thirteen, others twenty. That approach allowed us to experience music not as schemes like “A then B,” but as personal experience.

You haven’t yet talked about the Lviv Conservatory. In biographies it is often written that you studied in the classes of Kozarenko and Skoryk. How did that combine?

For two years I studied with Skoryk, and then two years later I came to Kozarenko for orchestration. For me it was useful because Skoryk represented one approach. Some may like him as a teacher, others may not. But if you approach it consciously, you can take strengths from any teacher. I remember coming to Kozarenko after Skoryk’s lessons and talking about my doubts, saying I didn’t always understand what to do next.

But Kozarenko also had a very individual, emotional, free teaching style. He could literally tear up the sheet music and say: “This is no good.” But despite that, we never had conflicts. I saw it as part of the working process and am very grateful for that experience.

When I came to him, he held an administrative position related to research work. He wrote academic texts, supervised research, helped students. I also wanted to write academic work. But Kozarenko didn’t really support that idea.

So you wanted to enter postgraduate studies? And did you consider staying in academia as a teacher of composition or theory?

Honestly, I never liked teaching. It was boring and uninteresting to me. But I did have practice, and after the conservatory I taught for a year at a Baptist college I mentioned earlier. I also had a personal “triangle” of disciplines I read a lot: theology, psychology, and philosophy.

At different periods one was more interesting, others less. Now theology has faded somewhat, while philosophy and psychology remain. I wanted to find a topic that would truly fascinate me and write a study for myself, from internal interest. But I also saw how my friends worked: taking topics they didn’t like, struggling for years, writing thesises, while their real interests remained on the margins.

After the conservatory, in 2016, I entered the Ukrainian Catholic University in the philosophy faculty. But financial difficulties arose. It required paying as for a second higher education while living in Lviv. So I went abroad to work, and the studies effectively didn’t continue. I studied for a year, one or two semesters, and withdrew my documents.

Then I also wanted to enter the University of Lviv for a second degree. I even prepared for a while, attended consultations. But again financial struggles — and that idea disappeared too.

How did the Gaude Polonia scholarship program fit into this? What was that experience like?

I really wanted to continue what didn’t work out with university, to continue intellectual development and move forward. After Gaude Polonia I even applied for postgraduate studies in Kyiv. I got in — on a contract basis, I think, but then changed my mind.

Regarding the Polish program, it was a very good experience. I had a supervisor, Zbigniew Bujarski. And in conversations with him I felt like I returned to those long evenings with my theoretical teacher: philosophy, art, music, meaning. These were very free intellectual dialogues with a person who seemed to be far ahead in thinking.

What I started writing in 2008 was only completed thirteen years later. The piece waited for me, and in 2021 it was performed by a symphony orchestra.

Would you say your main area of compositional interest is orchestral music? You also wrote a chamber opera. What is most interesting for you, and how do you work with material?

For me the orchestra is probably the most natural environment. When I’m asked to write for a small ensemble, I feel I have to slightly “break” my compositional thinking. When I sit in front of a score, I perceive it almost like a sequencer: many tracks, many possibilities. The fewer “tracks” there are, the harder it is for me to think in my usual way. The more instruments, the more like a composer I feel.

When working, I remember a period when I literally used a roll of wallpaper: I laid it on the floor and constructed the form of the piece. One of the first parameters I define is duration. I need to know the boundaries immediately. That’s why I like the genre of symphonic miniature.

For me it’s a very practical format: I set parameters, say 7–12 minutes, and already see the piece as a whole. Then I start filling it with masses, layers, different textures. It’s not so much a linear unfolding as it is a canvas. I stand in front of it, already see the image, and start filling different parts of the space.

In his latest interview, Kozarenko said about his work: “I said my part of musical truth that I was obliged to say. It is small, but mine.” And the scary question for composers: what is your musical truth? Your works have interesting titles like neologisms — “Barvoformliu,” “Z’yava.” Behind them, and in “Gravity” and others, there are concepts related to natural or geometric phenomena. Do you think about these ideas?

When I look back, I realize that at first it was intuitive, and now it is more structured. Because of my interest in philosophy, psychology, etc., I see that all my works are different sides of one concept.

I have a kind of internal model that I would like to someday describe scientifically. I work on it daily, it’s like my daily dose of dopamine. All my works are moves within this system, different facets of it. “Barvoformliu” occupies one place in the system, explaining one element. “Z’yava” shows another. “Gravity” does the same.

So music for me is an attempt to express this model through musical means. Music is a language. My impulse is to express another side of this internal construct. Even commercial work often contains my ideas , even when it’s a commission.

Do you think about the listener when you write? Do you leave dramaturgical “hooks”?

Yes, this is very important. I don’t like intentional mystery or postmodern fog. I try to be as concrete as possible. If something doesn’t work, it’s not because I wanted to be mysterious, but because I failed to clearly implement my idea.

I think about the listener in the sense of conveying my vision so they can understand at least part of the model within me. If they engage with it, I consider the task accomplished. The best thing is to simplify while still conveying depth.

How did you perceive your responsibility as a composer in terms of how music is presented today? Whether it speaks about the war or not—and should it? Can music say something about this situation that words cannot?

As for Gravity, it explores a particular concept. It can be understood on several levels. The first is the physical understanding of gravity. There is a massive object that attracts other objects entering its orbit. Once caught within that orbit, they begin to move around it—roughly speaking, in circles or ellipses.

This was something I wanted to convey through orchestral means. There is a particular theme—for example, I used a theme derived from the Ukrainian folk dance Hutsulka—and I worked with axes of placement, both vertical and horizontal. All of this demonstrated how an object, a mass, or a trajectory becomes deformed under the influence of gravity. In other words, there is initially an intact theme, but under the action of an external force—gravity—it begins to deform, change, and transform.

Another layer is cognitive. Just as we perceive gravity in a physical sense, it can also be applied to the way we think. We may encounter a certain concept or idea. We may read a philosopher, and their ideas begin to reshape and reorganize the entire internal framework of our worldview.

There is yet another level—a geopolitical one connected to Ukraine. There is a powerful imperial gravity that has exerted influence over us for many years. And there is an impulse to free oneself from it, to escape its orbit.

The piece contains moments that are not explicitly stated, yet this aspiration is embedded within it. For example, in the second movement there is a chorale that alludes to the song Plyne Kacha, which was heard during the Maidan protests. Presented in the wind instruments, it can be perceived emotionally as a kind of requiem. The principle remains the same, but it can be viewed from different perspectives: cognitive, geopolitical, or astrophysical.

In the new work you are writing now, could one say that it consciously or unconsciously contains musical and extra-musical impressions as a document of its time? In other words, does it include something that directly points to the war taking place today? How do you think it may be perceived in the future, both in Ukraine and abroad?

In principle, the approach is similar to that of Gravity: I establish a single underlying principle, but it can be viewed from different angles and filled with different meanings. As in Gravity, there will be a physical principle at its core. In this case, it is flight. These elements will be presented in such a way that the thematic material familiar to us can be observed from different perspectives. One of these perspectives is the inner centre.

How do you feel about the “cultural front”? Does music say anything about war, or should it?

I don’t see anything wrong with the term. But we are in a sensitive situation where many words are emotionally charged. If we can avoid unnecessary tension, it’s better.

Art expresses the internal processes of a society. If a sufficient mass of experience accumulates, along with enough people capable of reflecting on and interpreting it, then something new will emerge—something the world has not seen before. We are already beginning to see interest in this experience as a unique phenomenon, one that may become important even for countries that have not lived through it themselves. It speaks to resilience, innovation, and other qualities that I would rather not formulate in overly academic terms. More broadly, culture and art are ways of expressing what is embedded within a society and within a nation as a collective construct.

When a new experience emerges and can be communicated through the language of art, literature, or any other form of expression, we are almost certain to create something new. What matters is not only that we possess this experience, but also whether we are able to convey it and make use of it. If the necessary conditions exist—whether technical or organizational—it can be realized through artistic practice.

Some people express it through literature, others through visual art, and others through music. It is ultimately the same experience, articulated through different languages. In that sense, yes, things will change. And if we process this experience thoughtfully, we will be able to present ourselves as an artistic community with a unique and distinctive perspective on the world.

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With the support of German-Polish Foundation of Cooperation

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