Tina Karol is perhaps the only Ukrainian singer who has managed to
combine Ukrainian army morale and peace-keeping experience with a meteoric
musical career - and a winning smile!
Tina Karol was born on the 25 January 1985 in the far North of Russia
- in the town of Orotukan, Magadan to a family of ethnic Ukrainians.
Tina's parents were engineers. The day she was born it was very cold
- the temperature was about 50 degrees below zero!
When she was 12, Tina began singing professionally. Her managerial
abilities and skills as a producer came to light during her years of
her study at the famous Kyiv State Glier Higher Music College. As a
young student, Tina created her own band, which was totally self-supporting.
As part of her studies at musical school, Tina had to take part in
'academic concerts', in which each student had to give a fully-fledged
performance for the teachers. Usually such concerts are not very lively,
because the professors prefer to evaluate the performances in silence,
professionally, and reservedly. But Tina's student concerts attracted
her friends and other people who had heard about her and wanted to see
her perform. Tina's performances tended to end in rapturous applause,
which was a bit annoying for the teachers. They didn't consider such
recognition acceptable.
But it was Tina's energetic nature that brought her to the world of
aviation soon afterwards. Today, she studies at the Kyiv National Aviation
University and is the soloist of the Armed Forces Song and Dance Ensemble.
In 2005 Tina Karol carried out peacemaking missions to two of the world's
trouble spots - Iraq and Kosovo. The singer performed to international
peace-making contingents in Baghdad and Al-Kut (Iraq), and it wasn't
only Ukrainian soldiers that applauded her; American, Georgian and British
troops also responded enthusiastically. In Kosovo, the Ukrainian singer
was invited to Paris by French peacemakers. Because of these performances,
the Ukrainian Minister of Defence decorated the singer with a state
order for peacemaking missions.
Now Tina Karol has an opportunity to realise her precious dream - and
support talented children all over the world. She wants to help those
children who are gifted but lack wealthy parents and, thus, the opportunity
to improve.