Ekaterina Batrakova - interview: about career and future plans

The Fuzz Music correspondent spoke to the rock singer who is gaining fame Katya Batrakovawhose songs have been (and still are) repeatedly in the top recommendations of major streaming services.

- You started out as a pianist with an academic repertoire. Was it a conscious choice? Did you enjoy practising and what did you achieve?

- It was a conscious choice, I have a classical education (Gnessin Moscow State Music School + Maimonides Academy), I am still involved in academic music, I keep in shape, I give concerts, sometimes take part in competitions, and I teach. I still do it with pleasure. There was a period when I was actively involved in organising concerts and festivals. We did a number of concerts with my team dedicated to Russian composers, and I even played Kuryokhin at one of them (smiles).

- How did rock come into your life? Wasn't it at first in conflict with classical music?

- It came in at the same time, ahahaha! I started listening to rock, thanks to my older brothers - they used to put cassettes back then, then discs with new music at that time - almost at the same time when I started piano lessons. I'm hardly going to open America, but a good half of academic musicians listen to good rock

- What moment do you yourself consider to be the starting point of your career as a rock singer?

- This is a rather complicated question. Most likely, after performing my own songs at Oleg Garkusha's "Garkundel". I came alone, with minuses, and without the support of musicians - though Yura (Ivan Turist) was sitting in the hall, cheering for me. It was scary, but it was the first step and an amazing experience.

- How has your style, presentation and image changed over time? Were there artists and bands that influenced them in any way?

- The pitch has changed and continues to change towards a heavier sound. A lot of the first songs are quite romantic. And most likely everything will keep changing, it's normal for a human being, we change. The only thing I will always stick to is sincerity towards the listener, love for what I do and simplicity.

 - I know that you communicated with the famous Ivan the Tourist (Yuri Saltykov) and he gave you some advice. Can you tell me what these recommendations were and how they were useful to you in your life and creative work?

- We are friends, I am happy to have such a wonderful talented person in my circle. I won't share my advice, of course (smiles). I'll just say that Yuri's outlook on life and creativity helps me to move on, with a smile, despite many difficulties. The support of older comrades, the sharing of experience is a rare thing, and therefore expensive (laughs).

- Sergei Kurekhin, who gracefully bridged the gap between academic music and rock, concerts and performance, underground and mainstream, has also had a great influence on you. Do you think there are figures of a comparable scale nowadays, and do they influence you in any way?

- There aren't any and there won't be. There will be others. The scale of Kuryokhin's personality is grandiose, but he lived in his time, where he was needed. We should not forget that Sergey Anatolyevich's talent was also in his ability to ORGANISE people, quite complicated, into a unified system, even if only for a short time. Symbiosis of such personalities on one stage... yes, this is very much lacking nowadays. I remember Alexei Aigi used to give concerts in the Bolshoi Hall of the Conservatory, with musicians who worked with Kuryokhin and an academic orchestra. I have never seen so many burning eyes in the BZK in my life, it was amazing! Kuryokhin's music is so charged with positivity and goodness, some kind of mad love of life, that it takes your breath away.

- Previously your band was called Wizardcrow, but now you perform as BATRAKOVA. What was the reason for this rebranding and how has the style of the project changed?

- Conditioned by my decision. The stylistics of the project didn't change much, some improvements, some inclination towards art more, towards reflection. Rock is not just three chords and protest. Rock can be art, just like Salvador Dali's paintings or Garcia Lorca's poems, for example. Rock can be about love, about humanity.

- You consider your "totem" talisman to be a crow, but the EP "On the Verge" was released under the sign of a fox (nine-tailed, I understand?). How do these two symbols combine?

- The fox on the cover of the first album symbolises the people who inspired me to create. By some strange coincidence, they had everything to do with foxes - nickname, favourite animal, totem, nickname in life and so on.

- "On the Edge" is a cohesive conceptual story about battling inner demons. Why such a theme and what events in your life influenced this story?

- Perhaps if I started to list the events and things that have happened to me over the past few years that have been cleverly packaged into my songs, a book would not be enough. Songs were a way to live, to understand, to tell about it, to write music. As we go through trials, we become wiser. Or just gain experience.

- Do you manage to keep this conceptuality in your live performances? And how does the live sound differ from the studio sound?

- In different ways, sometimes it works. Sometimes it's very hard mentally - to experience many songs all over again. Live sound is always better, because there is an exchange with the listeners, it's always an element of novelty. And improvisation is not cancelled (smiles).

- I know that you also have a cover versions programme. Can you tell us more about this aspect?

- Yes, I do. I shoot my favourite songs on the piano, sometimes with vocals, sometimes without. I enjoy guitar solos, which can't sound authentic on the piano, so I have to invent something new, techniques, passages, solutions of some kind. I used to even do concerts where I played only covers, people would come to sing "Kisha" and "Auktsyon" when it wasn't mainstream (laughs).

- What releases are you currently working on? Will they be conceptual too and what will your fans hear in them that is fundamentally new?

- Now I'm working on a new album, it will also be conceptual, but the sound and themes will be very heavy and unusual, and the lyrics will be closer to sci-fi. But it's not for sure (laughs).