For pianist Vadim Neselovskyi, Ukraine war adds urgency to his most personal work

https://www.npr.org/2022/06/15/ [login to see] /for-pianist-vadim-neselovskyi-ukraine-war-adds-urgency-to-his-most-personal-work
During his first few years in the United States, as a virtuoso pianist and composer studying at the Berklee College of Music two decades ago, Vadim Neselovskyi was often asked about his origins. "I would say, 'I'm from Odesa,' or even 'I'm from Russia,' " he recalls, "because nobody knew what Ukraine was."

His evocative new solo piano suite, Odesa: A Musical Walk Through a Legendary City, enters the world at quite a different moment. Mostly recorded in 2020, long before the current Russian invasion, it's an elegant love letter to his father, a Ukrainian Jew who was dying of cancer as Neselovskyi composed the music. Because it's also a portrait of the culturally rich city of his youth, currently the target of a Russian naval blockade, the album has other reasons to resonate in a poignant key.