Keri-Lynn Wilson is the founding conductor and music director of the Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra. The ensemble was created in 2022 in the immediate aftermath of Russia’s full-scale invasion as a bold initiative to defend Ukraine’s cultural legacy as the country fights for its freedom. It brings together leading Ukrainian musicians from inside and outside the country and is a collaboration between the Metropolitan Opera, the Polish National Opera and The Ukrainian Ministry of Culture. The orchestra’s honorary patron is Ukraine’s First Lady, Olena Zelenska.

The UFO assembles each summer and its three international tours have so far taken in some of the most prestigious concert halls, as well as some of the great cathedrals, of Europe and the United States. These include the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Lincoln Center in New York City, the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, St Paul’s Cathedral in London and Saint Eustache in Paris. The 2024 Beethoven Ninth Freedom Tour celebrated the symphony’s 200th anniversary with a unique version of the work featuring its inspirational choral cry of freedom, “Ode to Joy,” sung in Ukrainian and included a concert, symbolic of the struggle against oppression, in the Gdansk Shipyards in Poland, birthplace of the Solidarity Movement. 

The Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra will tour again in the summer of 2025. Details to be announced in the Spring.

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