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| Artwork based on me and Dakh Daughters band by Ukrainian artist Artur Kukhta created by purposedly for this exclusive interview |
01 - You're an all female band coming from Ukraine. What was your inner urge to create an awesome band like you did?
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We all are members of the “Dakh” Theatre in Kyiv, for many years (more than 10). Around 8 years ago, we, the female part of the theatre group, decided to create “Dakh Daughters”. That’s how it started
02 - When listening to your tunes it reminds me of a mix of Kurt Weil with Czech musician Iva Bittova.
Can you tell us what your influences are in music?
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| Lotte Lenya and Kurt Weill |
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| Iva Bittova |
We all are very different and we have very different musical and art tastes. And we mix it all in our art creation. Someone likes classical music, someone rock, someone pop, someone rap etc ...
The reflection of it all is inside our music.
03 - I know that you made several performances in the U.S.A and Europe. What was the feedback that you got from your audience?
We’ve had one big tour in the US and Canada. And many tours in Europe, specially France. The feedback is always great. Our music is globally universal, so people understand it and like it all over the world. And we appreciate it very much!
04 - Your videos are a bit eerie and with some Lynchian influences. Can you tell us a bit more about them?
The answer about Cinema influences will be the same as Question 2 - about the Music influences ) Our every video is a little artwork, just as a song/music number.
Often it is a collaboration with visual artists and art-cinema directors.
05 - While watching your performances, the image that's passed to me is you being like some pagan Greek Goddess telling a folklore tale with or without Kabuki theater masks. Knowing that you aren't only musicians but also actresses, how did you manage to create characters inside a performance while singing?
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| Artemis Godess |
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| Anthea Godess |
It all happens very naturally - our artistic images come from our theatre and life experience. Maybe, some of them are reflections of our theatre roles, some elements are brought from somewhere else. But it all is created specially for our artwork. We don't give the hashtag-names to our images, we let the audience enjoy it )
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06 - You also sing in different languages. Do you want to pass to your audience a multicultural message with this?
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Sure
07 - As I mentioned before you come from Kiev in Ukraine that always was Europe's barn. How do you see your country right now and its ancestral primordial raw power?
Kyiv - is very ancient city, capital of the ancient kingdom - Kyivan Rus', capital of modern Ukraine. With huge history and culture, older than in Europe. Everything is fine in here, good changes and transformations are coming.
08 - Can you please unveil a bit of all the band's members and how your personality is as women and artists?
We need to keep the mystery in the art. You can see the reflections of it all in our artpiece - performance, music etc.
09 - You're something fresh and new, while listening to your songs, It seemed to me like I was reading Lewis Carrol "Alice in Wonderland" and suddenly bump into "through the looking glass". Do you try to put your audience inside a hypnotic/trance séance by luring them with your songs, narrative and imagery?
We don't have this purpose as a separate purpose. But, probably the nature of music and theatre performance (and not only) are very tightly connected with trance. For every artist.
10 - I also know that in your performances you adapt several established writers. Can you tell us their names and how they influenced you in order for you to be able to convey your inner voice with a clear message to the world?
We work with a lot of writers and poets, classical and modern, international and ukrainian in our art. Here are some of them: Charles Bukowski, Taras Shevchenko, Joseph Brodsky, William Shakespeare, Lina Kostenko, Michael Semenko, T. S. Elliot etc. And, of course, our own author texts.
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11 - You're really talented women in musical and lyrical terms. Can you tell how many instruments do you play while creating your own songs?
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Thank you! We have around 15-20 musical instruments in our production )
12 - You've been together for several years. How do you manage to always produce something new?
Yes, we really have been friends and colleagues for a long time. Dakh Daughters exist for 8 years. All the time something is changing, transforming and it is the power of the change, which gives the inspiration for the new creation and freshness.
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13 - We live in one of the worst periods in mankind's history with Covid 19. Do you as a band miss the stage and do you've some surprises for your audience when you'll return to the stages on a worldwide scale?
We hope that soon the situation will change for the better! And we will meet with our people - our dear friends! And we will make a great show together, somewhere, for example at the supercool summer festival. And everybody will be happy and healthy! Be healthy and happy, friends! )
14. What are your main influences in arts and how did they help you in spreading your message?
Good theatre and music, classical and modern art, literature and poetry, song and dance, tragedy and comedy of the Ancient Greeks ... it all is close and interesting for our artistic personalities and it all is reflected in the art, which we create together )
y Tanya Hawrylyuk of Dakh Daughters
