Melnitsa (Мельница; translates as Windmill) is a Celtic folk rock group from Russia. Founded by Natalia O’Shea, whose stage name is Hellawes, the group’s current members are Aleksey Orlov (electric violin, violin, mandolin), Aleksey Kozhanov (bass guitar, acoustic guitar), Dmitriy Frolov (drums), Sergey Vishnyakov (electric guitar, acoustic guitar, backup vocals), Dmitriy Kargin (flute), and O’Shea […]

Natalia O’Shea (Наталья Андреевна О’Шей) performs self-composed Celtic folk rock in Russian. She has released music as part of the popular folk band Melnitsa (Мельница) and as a solo artist under her stage name Hellawes (Хелависа). She is also a linguist and a specialist in Celtic languages. Hellawes studied piano at music school, but her […]

Elena Pogrebizhskaya (Елена Погребижская), is a Russian singer, documentary filmmaker, and writer. Pogrebizhskaya was born in northwest Russia but has spent most of her life in Moscow. Her musical education consisted of music school and singing in a church choir. She started out as a television journalist, but in 2001 she began to concentrate on […]

Кино/Kino was one of the most popular Soviet rock groups of the 1980s and 1990s. Influenced by Western bands like R.E.M., The Cure, The Smiths, and Joy Division, Kino became a touchstone for Soviet and Russian rock, punk, and alternative music. Largely the brainchild of frontman Viktor Tsoi, Kino’s music was known for its accessible, […]

Brainstorm/ Prāta Vētra is a Latvian pop group. Originally formed in 1989, they have released a number of albums in Latvia, Russia, and internationally, singing in Latvian, Russian, and English. Renārs Kaupers (vocals), Jānis Jubalts (guitar), Gundars Mauševics (bass), Kaspars Roga (drums) and Māris Mihelsons (accordion, piano), met while still in school and started the […]

Alsou is a Russian singer of Bashkir and Tatar descent. Born in Tatarstan, the USSR, in 1983, she has lived in Siberia, Moscow, New York, and London and holds dual Russian and British citizenship. Professionally, she is known only by her first name. Her full name is Alsou Ralifovna Abramova. Her father, Ralif Rafilovich Safin, […]

Alla Yurievna Perfilova, better known by her stage name, “Valeria,” is from the small town of Atkarsk in the Saratov Oblast in Russia’s southwest. Raised by a family of classical musicians, she studied music her whole life. After graduating high school, Valeria moved to Moscow and entered the prestigious Gnessin Academy of Music in Moscow. […]

A Moscow native, Natalia Illinichna Ionova, better known as Glu’koza, was first a child actress working in television. Among other projects, she shot a few episodes of the still-popular kids’ show Ералаш (Jumble; Yeralash). She was discovered in 2002 by the record producer Maxim Fadeev on the set of the Russian war movie Триумф (Triumph). […]

Sataney Setgalievna “Sati” Kazanova, was born in a small village in Kabardino-Balkaria, which lies in Russia’s Caucuses Mountains, along the border with Georgia. When she was 12, her family moved to the regional capital of Nalchik, where she began to seriously study music. Sati continued her studies in Vocals at Kabardino-Balkaria College of Culture and […]