When she sang the Ukrainian national anthem, people stopped what they were doing and stood at attention. Olha came dressed in a mint-colored Vyshyvanka. This past August, hundreds of Ukrainians gathered in a churchyard in Boston to celebrate their Independence Day. You planted goodness in souls, like grains in the soil. You walked through thorns to reach the dreamed-about stars. Some lines, like the last ones in the song "My Ukraine," bring her to tears. "The words and music move through me and take me back to Ukraine." "When I'm singing, I see pictures in front of my eyes," Olha says. It's now in the children's playroom, where she practices and sings with her sheet music from Ukraine. Verbitsky and Kachura arranged to get the piano for Olha's birthday. Soon after, Olha found a free piano advertised on Facebook. When mother and daughter arrived at Logan airport in Boston, Verbitsky was there to greet them and take them home. They connect me with my motherland, culture and my roots." "The Ukrainian works are very important to me. "I have a lot of different Ukrainian and Russian music, but when I fled, I took only the Ukrainian arias," says Olha. They also carried a few items with sentimental value: Olha's mother's 50-year-old Vyshyvanka, a traditional Ukrainian embroidered shirt Zlata's favorite stuffed animal, a turtle and - most important for Olha - as much sheet music as Olha could stuff inside. In it they put toiletries, clothes and shoes. Olha and Zlata carried one small suitcase. In May, mother and daughter were on a 14-hour bus journey from Khmelnytskyi to Warsaw. Within a few weeks, Olha's application was approved. Men of military age still have to remain in the country, so Ihor would stay in Ukraine. When Verbitsky heard about it, he immediately called Olha, encouraging her to apply. citizens to sponsor Ukrainians to come to the U.S. In late April, President Biden announced the Uniting for Ukraine program, which allows U.S. Olha's husband, Ihor, who plays tuba, could not join them men ages 18 to 60 are as a rule not able to leave because they may be needed for military service. They now live with the family of Olha's sister in Sudbury, Mass. Jodi Hilton for NPR When Russian forces targeted a city near her home, opera singer Olha Abakumova and her daughter Zlata, now 8, left Ukraine. eight years ago and now lives in Sudbury, Mass., with her Ukrainian-born husband, Sasha Verbitsky, and their two young sons. Today, Olha and her daughter are living in a leafy suburb of Boston with Olha's sister, Liliia Kachura, and her family. They soon learned that Russia had attacked the nearby city of Lviv, where Olha had made her debut at the Lviv National Opera almost a decade ago. But one starry and particularly quiet night in March, they heard an eerie whistling sound. Olha and Ihor were determined to remain in Ukraine even while many of their neighbors fled. A month later, it reopened and the orchestra kept having concerts, raising money for the war effort. The Khmelnytskyi Philharmonic Orchestra, where they both worked, initially closed after Russia's invasion. If a missile were to strike, the bathroom seemed like the safest place in their ninth-floor apartment. Jodi Hilton for NPR Olha Abakumova brought her most treasured sheet music, including a copy of the handwritten score given to her by her concert master in Odesa, where she was a vocal instructor and performer.Įarlier this year in Khmelnytskyi, western Ukraine, Olha Abakumova, an opera singer, and her husband, Ihor, a tubist, put their then-7-year-old daughter Zlata on a pile of blankets in the bathtub to sleep.
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