Recently Anton Kopytin, the winner of the “Voice of the Country” project, has come to the office of our newspaper. He considers his stage success as a great responsibility. He is only 31, and he has already realized the principle of a real man: he has planted trees and worked the land, he took part in building of his house, and now he and his wife are raising two sons and a daughter. Kopytin told The Day how he travelled across Ukraine with a choir and got to know the real country without stereotypes, how Donetsk changed before his eyes, what the country doesn’t know about this region, about his long way to the nationwide stage, and his future of a singer, and of a Ukrainian in a united country.
“People in my surrounding have always believed in me and encouraged me to do something in this direction, like going to a talent show and showing that you are worth of something, that you can do more. But something prevented me from doing this all the time. Past year, when the war began, my wife and two children gathered the minimum, our dog and a car, and went to Kyiv. We could not leave the dog – the small red chow-chow was our first ‘kid,’ since then we have been calling him ‘Dotsia’ (Little Daughter). And here in Kyiv I started to look for a job everywhere. I took all the tools I needed with me: the welding machine, the perforator, which I used in my own house. As a head of the house, I had to have a profession. So, I took up all kinds of jobs in the capital. I received a call from the ‘Voice of the Country,’ when I was working at a construction site. People who were working near me asked in surprise, ‘Do you also sing?’ That’s how everything began.”
You sang a classical Italian crossover, “Con te partiro” at “deaf” auditioning. On the Internet there is also a recording of you singing the legendary song “Caruso.” Isn’t this quite a professional repertoire for just a general worker?
“I gave eight and a half years to the music school. I learned to play the violin, accordion, and pipe. After school I entered the Chernihiv Music School, where I studied for four years, but I was expelled from the fourth year of studies because I had missed too many classes. When I was 13, my father fell ill and was a bed-patient for a while. So, I had to earn my living, though my mother did her best to help me. When I was a full-time student, I also had three jobs besides studying – in the Chernihiv Oblast Philharmonic Society, where I worked as a master of ceremonies, I sang in the professional municipal choir and in the church choir of the oldest cathedral of Ukraine [Anton means the Transfiguration Cathedral in Chernihiv which was built in the 11th century and is considered the oldest stone church on the territory of former Kyivan Rus’. – Author]. I consider myself a spiritual person and I know that God is guiding me. Besides, almost all of the students of musical educational establishments are offered to work in church choirs. This is a good practice for certain subjects.”
Was that your first encounter with the choir singing?
“My parents were – and my mother still is – religious people, they also sang in church choirs, therefore we have a kind of a dynasty in terms of this. My father had two higher education diplomas. The first one was medical. Then he accidentally got to an auditioning to a music school – he made a company for his friends. During the hearing analysis they asked him what intervals he heard, but he admitted that he didn’t know any. But when he sang the notes that they were playing, they accepted him immediately. He started to learn everything from the beginning, because he didn’t have a music education, but he was called a ‘walking encyclopedia,’ because he absorbed knowledge like a sponge. I cannot remember any question, which my father would leave unanswered. I asked him what melody was playing, and he told me what symphony it was and even which part of it.”
So, you had a classical upbringing?
“Yes, my parents are teachers, so they were raising me in a conservative way. I’m thankful to them for making me see the general human values, maybe even religious ones; this has helped me in life.”
What about your historical education? What was your environment like in Donetsk?
“I have heard Russian language since childhood. My mother was born in Chernihiv, and my father was born in Staline, which later became Donetsk. Then I lived in Chernihiv, a city with the richest history in Ukraine, so I couldn’t but know the history of the country. When I was asked at the age of 16, what my nationality was, I always replied: Ukrainian. At that time nobody said that Donetsk was not Ukrainian. This is a very multinational region. There are many Tatars, Armenians, and Georgians residing there. But they never focused much attention to this, it is now that we have this division, when everyone must decide something for himself. I, for one, have made this decision long ago. And my children were born Ukrainians as well.”
Most of Ukrainian mass media didn’t highlight this multinationality, but they were continuously pedaling the topic of the “Russian world” in the Donbas. Is this another myth?
“Ninety percent of people from my surrounding were scattered throughout Ukraine after the war begun: some of them went to Kyiv, others – to Lviv, yet others – to Cherkasy. Based on this, I make a conclusion that in Donetsk most people are Ukrainians.”
After the events that have taken place over the past year after you moved to the capital, has your vision of Ukraine changed?
“I have had a brilliant experience of learning Ukraine, when I was studying in Chernihiv. Owing to my supervisor, we went through the whole country with a choir, had many concerts, lots of myths were shattered during that period of time. I consider Chernihiv a cradle of Ukraine, Kyivan Rus’. Unfortunately, the city is Russian-language for the most part, but it’s still Ukrainian. Back in the time of my studies, there was a popular myth on Lvivites’ intolerance to the people who speak Russian, but my first trip to Lviv shattered these stereotypes. The same in Donetsk. A woman lived in my street. As it turned out later, she came from Chernihiv oblast, my compatriot. And when last April all those processes began, like the escalation of the situation, she came up to me and said in Ukrainian, ‘Banderaites will come and they will beat us.’ I said, ‘You are a Ukrainian. How can you say this?’ These are myths. I think we were deceived. Everything started with myths. Donetsk and Kyiv have nothing to fight for. I’m not speaking about Moscow, Russia, I’m speaking about two Ukrainian cities.”
But these processes were not spontaneous. What prerequisites of these processes did you see?
“We were among those who followed the events in Kyiv. I was on a tour in the capital during the Euromaidan, so we went to Maidan Nezalezhnosti with our whole family. It was the anniversary of the Orange Revolution, and we felt that something was beginning. Every morning we woke up and watched the news – that was a gulp of fresh air, to understand what was going on and what would happen next. And when we started to speak with someone about the way the situation would unfold, everyone asked us in surprise what we were talking about. We couldn’t understand how people could live in the same state with us and not be following what was going on in the capital.”
Is your house in Donetsk undamaged? Did you plan to come back, if so, under what conditions is it possible?
“Yes, the house is undamaged, and I would gladly return to Donetsk. No matter how good I feel in Kyiv, my home is there. But I understand that I will be able to return there under one condition only, if Ukraine is united and there is Ukrainian power there. After my position they won’t let me leave peacefully. Many of my friends went there to see their homes. I have a desire to go home and spend at least one night within my native walls. But everyone says that you feel disgusted when you come back. There is no Donetsk we used to know, this is a different city with different people who look differently. I felt that in Mariupol. I gave six years to this city, I found my beloved wife there. It was always special for me, it reminds me of Odesa. It used to be a city full of life. Now people are hiding their eyes.”
What kind of feeling it is when you lose home? Hasn’t Kyiv become a new home for you?
“Not yet, but I am glad that my children feel this. This is the most important thing. And I’m thankful to God that my children never heard any shelling. I’ve been told many stories how people were leaving Sloviansk or Donetsk with children, then they went to the sea to recreate, and children, when they heard fireworks, hid under the tables. This is terrible, when children react in such a way to someone’s festivities.”
How do you explain to your children what is going on in the country?
“As it is. When we came, my wife asked our children not to tell that they are from Donetsk. But the children came to the playground and said, ‘We are from Donetsk, there is shelling there.’ And everyone was paying attention to them, asking, whether they had seen anything. Our elder son is following everything that is going on. He watches news and asks me, ‘Is this Donetsk?’ I say, ‘Yes.’ And he keeps answering, ‘When we come back to Donetsk, then…’ Anyway, this is a good experience to see Ukraine for him.”
How do you see your country and your place in it in the future?
“I wish it to be peaceful and prosperous. Ukraine has got everything to be happy. Ukraine has got the best lands. I spent my childhood in Donetsk oblast, I worked since early childhood with land and I saw how fertile the soil is there. As for me, we have the best black soil in the world there, everything grows there besides potatoes, but it is very tasty. When my parents planted a seedling, they tied it to a branch. And later both trees flourished – the seedling and the branch. Ukraine has got gas and oil, if we take the territory of the united sovereign Ukraine, which was declared in 1991. We only need it to have a good host, who would feel pain for his people and want his country to prosper.
“As for my prospects, we spoke with Tina about this after the ‘Voice of the Country’ show. After the project ends, people very soon lose interest to you, new people come. Therefore I need to do everything not to get lost in this space. I think I will be successful with such coach as Tina. Now I’m considering the concept of a song, about going back home, to the east. At least I will be singing for people. They are Ukraine’s biggest treasure.”
