Kalush Orchestra

The Kalush Orchestra won the Eurovision Song Contest in Turin in 2022 with the song "Stefania". With the unforgettable performance of their song, the band became the face and voice of a nation that had been attacked a few weeks earlier by its powerful neighbor Russia and bravely stood up to this invasion. The song is dedicated to the mother of frontman Oleh Psiuk, but many people saw much more in this song and often interpreted the mother sung about in the song as a metaphor for Ukraine. They were confirmed by the music video released the day after the ESC, in which mothers in military uniforms carry children through the ruins of war in Ukraine. Formed in 2021 as an extension of the hip-hop band Kalush, named after the founder's hometown, Oleh Psjuk, the Kalush Orchestra combines rap with folk motifs and Ukrainian traditional music. Since winning the ESC, the Kalush Orchestra has toured Europe and the USA and reaches millions of people worldwide via streaming. With "Changes", they have now also released a song in English for the first time. After Alyona Alyona last year, a band from Ukraine will once again symbolically open the concert series on the main stage of DAS FEST in 2024.