Kyiv orchestra plays poignant ‘Ave Maria’ amid children’s hospital ruins after Russian missile strike

16 July 2024, 17:15

Kyiv orchestra plays poignant ‘Ave Maria’ at Okhmatdyt children’s hospital

Following an attack which destroyed Okhmatdyt children’s hospital, an orchestra gathered to make music in the building’s ruins.

Last week there were moving scenes of music at the site of the horrors of war.

On Friday, the Kyiv Classic Orchestra gathered to play in the ruins of Okhmatdyt children’s hospital in central Kyiv.

The musical tribute followed a Russian missile attack which hit the hospital on Monday. Moscow had launched an aerial assault on targets in cities across Ukraine during morning rush hour. The facility was the largest children’s medical centre in Ukraine, specialising in children’s cancer treatment.

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Two adults were killed in the hospital attack and 16 people were injured, including seven children.

According to Andriy Yermak, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky’s chief of staff, the strikes claimed a total of 36 lives across the country, with 140 injured.

Footage shows the musicians and conductor Herman Makarenko five days later in the hospital ruins. Together they played ‘Summer’ from Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons and Schubert’s ‘Ave Maria’, a prayer to the mother of God. The orchestra titled their performance ‘Requiem for the deceased’.

The orchestra usually performs at The National Opera of Ukraine and The National House of Organ and Chamber Music of Ukraine. It’s not the first time the players have made peaceful protest in music. On 9 March 2022, as Russian forces advanced on Kyiv, the orchestra played a short concert in the capital’s Independence Square.