Jamala presents an album of Crimean Tatar songs

Ahead of the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of the Crimean Tatar Genocide, marked on May 18, Ukrainian Crimean Tatar singer and songwriter Jamala presented a collection of ancient songs of her people in the album Qırım, UNIAN reported.

Jamala worked on the album with composer and arranger Artem Roschenko, sound producer Serhiy Krutsenko, and over 80 folk and symphonic musicians.

Jamala worked on it for many years, but the project was suspended at the beginning of Russia’s full-scale war on Ukraine. The album was already brought to the mixing stage but remained under fire in the Kyiv region. These songs could have never been heard.

“Fighting for the truth has never been an easy matter. Probably, that is why work on Qırım took years of my life. With this album, I have realized my big dream – to show the whole world that despite any attempts to rewrite the history of Crimea, we will not let the truth be forgotten. And it is hidden precisely in folklore, in these incredible storylines that the Qırım diaries reveal to us,” Jamala said.

After the home presentation with the National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine on the stage of the National Opera, these songs will be played live for the first time in Liverpool, together with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra.