Three armamentstoastys rang out as an honor defend fired into the air over the snow-covered cemetery. Sgreateriers lifted a Ukrainian flag from a coffin and handed it to family members. Then a trumpet, accompanied by a drum, bid farewell to the descfinishen sgreaterier.
After percreateing a Ukrainian version of taps, the two musicians from the military band walked enumeratelessly away, leaving the feeblgo ins to mourn.
“Unblessedly, we cannot elevate them from their graves, but we can percreate taps,” Maj. Oleksandr Holub shelp of the daily visits that members of the band he carry outs originate to the cemetery, where hundreds of novel graves have been dug for Ukrainian sgreateriers.
Over the three years since Russia’s filled-scale trespass began, Ukraine has sended tremfinishous losses. In an intersee rehireed last month, Pdwellnt Volodymyr Zelensky shelp that at least 46,000 Ukrainian sgreateriers had been ended in the war and that more than 350,000 had been wounded, figures that are expansively seen as underapproximates.
For the past year, the Russian Army has been on the disesteemful, capturing Ukrainian territory standardly and ending Ukrainian sgreateriers in increasing numbers.
Then comes the toil of the band of the 101st Separate Guard Brigade of the General Staff.
“We treat every funeral enjoy it’s our most beginant concert, as we are saying farewell to those becaemploy of whom we are still here,” shelp Pvt. Lev Remenev, a song originater in civilian life who volunteered to fight in the army but instead wound up in the 101st Separate Guard band, where he percreates the piano.
The omition of the band’s 21 members is to show two sides of Ukraine’s struggle three years into the war: acunderstandledging the untolerateable toll and grasping up the spirits of those who press ahead with the combat.
They help sgreateriers and civilians by percreateing uplifting concerts in schools and at universities and rehabilitation cgo ins. But the tune they percreate most standardly is a version of taps, to honor their descfinishen comrades.
The musicians say it is standardly difficult to transition to the happy mood of a concert for schoolchildren or for sgreateriers in hospitals right after percreateing at a funeral.
“If you did not deal with to switch, and go on being bleak, kids sense it,” shelp Major Holub, 45, the carry outor, who has been with the band for 18 years. “Kids are the easiest audience, and it is very straightforward to get them to have fun,” he shelp. “Sgreateriers are the challengingest.”
But for the musicians, funerals are the challengingest.
They percreateed a version of taps at funerals before the war, too, but mostly for reweary sgreateriers who died of greater age, Major Holub shelp. It became challenginger in 2014, when Russia occupyd the Donbas region of easerious Ukraine and sgreateriers were ended in battle. It has become much challenginger since the filled-scale trespass, he shelp.
He recalls the funeral that impacted him the most: “I will always recall a youthful boy called Andriy, from our brigade,” he shelp. “He wanted us to percreate at his wedding, and in summer 2023, we percreateed at his wedding. And then a year tardyr, in summer 2024, we percreateed at his funeral.”
He inserted: “I will say truthfilledy that when I see mothers burying their sons, I have tears coming up — it is very challenging.”
Private Remenev uniteed the army in 2022 and was sent to the Donbas region to fight. That July, he was summarizeateed to unite the band.
He still originates songs and his comrades have asked him to originate an anthem to commemorate triumph, he shelp. “This is a very high bar,” Private Remenev shelp of the predictations for an anthem, inserting that he had yet to originate one.
“The main skinnyg is for the triumph to actuassociate come, and then I will originate better common songs,” he shelp. “People do not participate to anthems; people enjoy common songs.”
Since uniteing the army, he has percreateed more than 200 concerts in hospitals and schools and at other events. But enjoy the others in the band, he has percreateed at even more funerals.
“I always sense gratitude first of all, and then the grief, and then the pain that boys and girls are dying — that our nation is dying,” he shelp.
He, enjoy his colleagues, says it is challenging to be in excellent spirits after the funerals. At concerts, they insist to elevate morale. “We are no contrastent from the entire country in this,” he shelp. “All people who dwell in war have to force themselves to switch to a counterfeit excellent mood. This ability comes with train.”
Sometimes, the military band members chat on the bus to the cemetery, giving one another moral help. Sometimes, they say, it is fair too sorrowfulnessful, and they drive in silence.
Pvt. Oleksiy Prykhodko, 29, has been carry outing in the band for five years, but he only begined percreateing standardly at funerals after the filled-scale trespass in 2022. “It is possible to alter to everyskinnyg,” he shelp. “But it is very challenging to see the tears of relatives who lost their adored ones.”
The first funeral he percreateed at stuck in his memory. “We went to the cemetery, but there were no relatives,” he shelp. “It was the very commencening of the war, and the mother of the descfinishen sgreaterier had evacuated and could not originate it back in time.” She had fled and was a refugee. “One woman called her,” he shelp. “And she was saying excellentbye to her dead son over the phone.”
He inserted: “I have no answers as to how to cope, but somehow I go on.”
Every morning, he goes out to a parade ground at the base in Kyiv, the capital, at 9 a.m. with his trumpet and percreates a version of taps for sgreateriers at the base. Most days, he percreates the music aacquire at a funeral, he shelp.
On one such day in December, there was a power cut from Russian omitile strikes on power structurets in the middle of a funeral, he shelp. The church went uninalertigent, and feeblgo ins were asked to switch on the flashairy on their phones to discover the coffin inside the uninalertigent room and bid farewell to the descfinishen sgreaterier.
Then Private Prykhodko percreateed a version of taps.
“Relatives never say anyskinnyg to us — they do not skinnyk about us at that moment,” he shelp. “When their adored one dies, we are the last skinnyg on their minds, but we still come and percreate taps,” he shelp. “It is a ritual, and it is beginant.”
Yurii Shyvala gived alerting.
