Her email arrived on an ordinary Tuesday morning in September, but nothing about its contents was ordinary.

“Dear Ms. Deborah Henson-Conant,” it began, in the careful English of someone writing in their second language. “My name is Iryna Lytvynenko and I am an artist of the Academic Orchestra of Folk and Popular Music of the Ukrainian Radio (Kyiv city).”

As I read on, Iryna painted a picture of her world—a world where music had become an act of defiance. She told me about the bandura, Ukraine’s national instrument with its 65 strings and deep cultural significance stretching back to the Middle Ages. She described her orchestra, a remarkable ensemble founded in 1929 that had somehow survived Stalin, World War II, and now Putin’s bombs. For their 95th anniversary, she dreamed of performing my harp concerto “Baroque Flamenco” – not on harp, though. 

But then came the heart of her message: “I am addressing you on behalf of myself and the Ukrainian musical community, which found itself in extremely difficult conditions due to the war in Ukraine.” She wrote of artists creating music “in conditions of rocket fire, lack of light and heating.” She was asking—hoping—that I might grant free permission to perform my piece.

I was deeply moved and … Iryna’s was the fourth email that week asking me to waive the licensing fee for a “Baroque Flamenco” project. Of course I wanted her to play it — I wanted all of them to play it – each project was different and wonderful. But those licensing fees are essential to help offset all the costs of developing, arranging, notating, publishing and distributing my music for others to play.  I felt completely stuck.

Iryna’s final words stayed with me: “We all understand that music is an important tool for keeping spirits up and restoring hope in such difficult times.”

Here was a 20-year veteran musician, in a city under siege, reaching across the world to ask if she could play my music to keep hope alive. And the one thing stopping this was the orchestral licensing fee, essential to my work – and a stumbling block to hers.

But her email changed everything. It became the spark for what we now call The Legacy Bridge Project— a program that pairs musicians who can’t afford licensing or coaching fees for my music with sponsors who want to make a difference. Together, they bring music into the world that wouldn’t exist otherwise. And they support both my composing and her performance.

Legacy Bridge is now part of ‘DHC Legacy Project’: Learn More | Donate Here

Meet Iryna: A Voice from Kyiv

Iryna Lytvynenko’s email arrived with the quiet dignity of someone who refuses to let war silence her art. Writing from Kyiv as bombs fell around her city, this 20-year veteran musician had a bold proposition: she wanted to transform my harp concerto “Baroque Flamenco” into a celebration of her own instrument: the bandura—Ukraine’s 65-string symbol of culture and resilience—an instrument that has survived centuries of upheaval. It wasn’t just an adaptation she was proposing—it was a symphony of creative solidarity. 

Music in a War Zone

Iryna’s request carried the weight of an entire artistic community under siege. Behind her polite words lay a desperate reality: musicians performing between air raid sirens, composing by candlelight, rehearsing in bomb shelters. This wasn’t just about one performance; it was about using art as resistance against despair.

She was asking my permission to adapt “Baroque Flamenco”. She wanted needed it to celebrate her orchestra’s 95th anniversary with something that had never existed before. And she didn’t have the funds for the licensing fee. This was the exact difficult situation that would soon spark an entirely new idea: what if the gap could become a bridge instead of a chasm?

Thus was born the DHC Legacy Bridge  

An Old Friend Steps Forward

We cobbled the Bridge logistics together over the weekend and sent out the story in my ezine the next week.  Within an hour of I got an email from my longtime friend Dan Beach saying, “I want to fund the Ukranian project!” Dan had been searching for a way to make a meaningful difference—something personal and direct. Without hesitation, he jumped in, making the project possible. This was the Legacy Bridge in action—a passionate music lover with means choosing to support both the performer and the composer.

From Adaptation to National Television

The project flourished beyond expectation. Iryna successfully adapted “Baroque Flamenco” for bandura and her unique orchestra featuring banduras, kobzas, cymbals, and accordions alongside traditional strings and winds. The performance was filmed, and last month it was released on Ukrainian National Television.

During the rehearsal process, Iryna shared photos and videos that revealed the intricate artistry behind the adaptation.

In the video clips below, watch Iryna demonstrate how she created the virtuosic cadenza section of the concerto, adapting harp techniques for the bandura.

The adaptation required creative problem-solving. The next photo shows the special ‘nails’ she wears on her fingers for playing, which created an unexpected challenge: “I can’t imitate the guitar in the intro (so I connected an orchestra and a Kobza instrument that looks like a guitar) and also play a lot of glissandos because they keep flying off my fingers,” she explained with characteristic humor.

For the concert version, she shortened the cadenza for practical reasons, but promised the full version for the recording—”there you can pause and look for your nails!”

See the final performance that aired on Ukrainian National Television.

Please leave comments for Iryna at YouTube, and like and subscribe to her new channel.

Why This Changes Everything

This story represents something rare and meaningful on many fronts. One of them is the historical significance of her choosing a Harp concerto to adapt for Bandura.  For centuries, harpists have been the ones to adapts concertos written for other instruments, because so few concertos were originally composed for harp.

Iryna created a striking reversal: a concerto originally written for harp being adapted for another instrument—Ukraine’s national bandura. Even more remarkable, Iryna adapted not just the soloist’s part but she adapted the entire orchestration for a combination of folkloric and standard orchestral instruments. It sounds great and it’s so much fun to watch standard orchestral instruments together with the traditional instruments of Ukraine.

This project perfectly embodies my personal mission as both musician and human: create works that connect people in deep and meaningful ways, making music that’s accessible, adaptable and that gives performers a creative platform for unbounded self-expression. Dan’s generosity didn’t just fund a performance — it enabled a Ukrainian artist to claim space for her national instrument in the international classical repertoire, proving that when we build bridges between those who can support and those who create, we don’t just make connections. We make history.

Stay tuned from more stories from the Legacy Bridge Project. 

Next: The French Music teacher who wanted to give his students the experience of sharing the stage with a master performer.  To get updates on new blogposts and performances, join my mailing list. 

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