Oleksandra Zaritska: Lead singer of band Kazka loves singing in Ukrainian, aims for ‘bigger, better’

Name: Oleksandra Zaritska
Age: 26
Education: law, Yaroslav Mudryi National Law University
Profession: Singer
Did you know? As a child, she took ballet lessons

The lead singer of the up-and-coming Ukrainian band Kazka, Oleksandra Zaritska, has always been a creative person. From her very early years, she liked wearing bright clothes, took dancing classes, and enjoyed being in the spotlight. She loved singing as well, but was too shy to do it in public until she took the plunge and performed at a celebration in high school.

The audience’s reaction surprised her. “I was shocked because the audience stood up and applauded,” she said. During her student years, Zaritska took her talent to a bigger stage by entering the vocal show The Voice of Ukraine. However, she didn’t get very far in the televised competition.

After graduating from Yaroslav Mudryi National Law University in her native Kharkiv, Zaritska turned back to music. She didn’t take singing classes – instead, Zaritska moved to Odesa, performed in pubs with a couple of bands and learned music by practice.

At one such performance in Odesa, Zaritska was noticed by a scout from the Ukrainian music label Mamamusic. Soon Zaritska teamed up with multi-instrumentalist Mykyta Budash. The duo presented their first single “Sviata (Holidays)” at Ukraine’s X-Factor music show in 2017 and made it to the fifth live broadcast show in the competition.

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“We wanted to experiment and find out if people liked (Kazka’s music),” the singer said. They did. The video of Kazka’s first performance at the show attracted millions of views and a lot of positive feedback.

After the show, the band released their first music video for the song “Sviata,” which now has over 19 million views on YouTube. Soon, Ukraine’s YUNA music awards named the band the “Discovery of the Year.”

In 2018, Kazka continued with firsts. After another multi-instrumentalist Dmytro Mazuriak joined the band, Kazka released their debut album called “Karma,” and gave their first solo show in Kyiv. The album’s songs are in an experimental pop genre, mixed with electronic rhythms and Ukrainian folk themes, and all the lyrics are in Ukrainian.

Zaritska says that she loves singing in Ukrainian and she believes that people enjoy folk musical themes, because they touch a nerve. “We really want to popularize Ukrainian songs,” the singer said.

One of the songs, “Plakala (Cried),” has been a real hit, with the audio version on YouTube now having 74 million views. Recently, it made history: “Plakala” made it into the Top 10 chart of Shazam, a global music mobile application, a first for a song in the Ukrainian language.

“Nobody expected such a success, but now we want to get bigger and better, so as to live up to the people’s love.”