I have noticed an interesting trend in Ukrainian political music so far. The songs that are being produced and sung are not all in Ukrainian, which is what I would have anticipated, seeing as these songs are overwhelmingly patriotic in nature. I have found patriotic Ukrainian songs sung in English and Russian (in addition to Ukrainian), which at first struck me as odd, but after remembering that Ukraine is a multi-lingual nation with reasons to publish their political songs in languages other than Ukrainian, it made more sense. One of the songs that I found in Russian is called Вставай (Stand up), and not only is the message overwhelmingly patriotic, the music video evokes traditional images of Cossacks and Ukrainian peasants. The song is about the struggle between Ukraine and Russia for Ukrainian sovereignty, and the music video begins sometime in the past in a peasant village. A group of Russian soldiers ride into the village on horseback and terrorize the village, killing young children, implying rape of women, and burning down the entire village in the process. A traditional Ukrainian Cossack comes to the rescue, but is unable to save the entire village. The final scenes of the video take us into present day Ukraine, with the lead Russian soldier from the village (dressed in present day clothes) versus the Cossack (still in Cossack attire). The two fight in the streets, and the Cossack is able to kill the Russian, but ends up dying from a stab wound. A young boy passing by picks up the Cossack's sword, which has a message of "stand up, fight" printed on it.
Obviously, this is a very strong propaganda song for Ukrainians, as it shows Russians as long time antagonists to Ukrainian sovereignty and way of life. The fact that this very Ukrainian song was sung in Russian was confusing to me at first, but I think it was done purposefully to reach some of the Russian speaking population in Eastern Ukraine, where the fighting is the most intense.
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