benefit concerts

Since then, the band has won a number of Russian music awards and been awarded humanitarian citations for their creative and charitable work. Shevchuk and his group also regularly travel throughout the CIS and other former Soviet republics giving benefit concerts. In the spring and summer of 2002, 10 out of 11 concerts the band played were benefits for various social and cultural organizations. The band has reached an ever-growing audience in the US and Europe, and in the first two decades of the 21st century have traveled frequently throughout the world, playing concerts and gaining new fans. Shevchuk’s music and lyrics are not only influenced by traditional Western rock music, but also by the entire scope of Russian folk, classical, and religious music. In many respects, Shevchuk’s initial years of struggle as an underground musicians shaped his and, by extension, the band’s philosophy toward their art. The question of the music’s marketability was never part of the song writing process as there was no market in which to compete but only an allegiance to the purity of artistic expression.