Vopli Vidopliassova on stage: from a Belfort cassette to a 40th-anniversary tour

In June 1991 Vopli Vidopliassova played the Eurockéennes festival in Belfort, France. An unidentified Frenchman taped the show on a Maxell cassette and gave it to the musicians, according to English-language Wikipedia. That tape became Abo abo, the band’s first official release: 14 songs running about 37 minutes. The shortest lasts under two minutes, the longest a little over three.

Four musicians played on the recording. Oleh Skrypka sang and played accordion and rhythm guitar, Yuriy Zdorenko took the lead guitar parts and sang as well, Oleksandr Pipa played bass and Serhiy Sakhno drums. The track list includes “Buly denky”, “Veselkovyi tvist”, “Chervoni koni” and the title song “Abo abo”. The band later re-recorded some of these songs in the studio for Kraina Mriy, Fayno, Khvyli Amura and Buly denky. The opening track, “Demony”, has never appeared anywhere else officially.

Thirty-five years later the band recorded a session for the radio station KEXP. It was filmed on 26 January 2026 and released on 24 March. Skrypka sang and played bayan, trumpet and guitar. Beside him stood Oleksandr Lozovsky on guitar, Mykola Usatyi on bass, Benjamin Baert on drums and Oleksandr Hordieiev on harmonica. The studio heard five songs: “Carmen”, “Tantsi”, “Kateryna”, “Den narodzhennia” and “Vesna”.

The band marked its fortieth year with a tour. In December 2025 Vopli played Liberty Hall at the Entertainment Quarter in Sydney. The listing called it the band’s first live show in Australia. In January 2026 the musicians played in North America.

On 15 January they took the stage at The Cedar Cultural Center in Minneapolis. The evening was called Malanka and celebrated the Ukrainian New Year. Ukrainian Village Band opened. Founded in 2007, it plays traditional and modern Ukrainian music at celebrations and weddings and runs an Ivana Kupala ethno-festival. At every concert in the series Skrypka led a charity auction. The same month Vopli appeared at globalFEST in New York’s Lincoln Center. A reviewer called the band the headliner of the night and listed arrangements of Ukrainian folk songs, holiday songs, two Gershwin numbers and the musicians’ own songs in the set. Many Ukrainians filled the room, by his account.

The organisers of the Laima Rendezvous festival in Jūrmala announced a crossover programme for Vopli with the festival’s orchestra: an opening-night show on 24 July 2026 at Dzintari Concert Hall. The announcement lists venues where Vopli have played before: WOMAD, Montreux Jazz Festival, Sziget and Rock am Ring. The organisers describe Skrypka as vocalist and accordionist and as the founder of the Kraina Mriy festival.