On Sunday, July 27 from 6 to 8 pm, A World of Music host Greg Rossel welcomed Anna Dovhanych, a foreign exchange student from Ukraine attending high school in Blue Hill. Anna shared a range of music from her country, from traditional wedding songs to contemporary rock and pop, including several of her favorite artists. She even received a text from her parents back home, where it was 2 am! You can listen to the entire program here.

In Anna’s own words: My name is Anna and I came here to Blue Hill from Ukraine. Because of the terrible situation – the war at my home, it was very dangerous to stay there. There were almost no lessons at school, because there was a lot of air raids, which forced us to go to the bomb shelter and pray that the rocket would not hit our city. Here I study at GSA and I’m going to my senior year and I’m really excited about it. Here at school I can get a good education and in the future I plan to go to college to study architecture to help rebuild Ukraine in the future.

And from Greg (who has been hosting A World of Music for 36 years): Music can be a measure of resiliency of a nation’s culture and Ukraine has it in abundance. WERU was honored to have Anna here both as a new community member and an ambassador – bringing her knowledge of the music and also personal stories of her nation under siege yet still strong in the face of adversity.