ALYOSHA

Alyosha. Ukrainian singer, songwriter and compozer.

Real name: Olena Topolya

Year of beginning of her career: 2009

Occupation: singer, songwriter, compozer

Genres: pop, folk music

Albums: 5

Country: Ukraine

Little Girl – “Leshka”:

When a girl is born into a family with two older brothers, she has to be a boy for a little while. That's exactly what happened in the family of the future Ukrainian singer ALYOSHA. Her brothers were practicing martial arts, and she helped them with their training, and she also sold fish that her father, a policeman, loved to catch. The boys gave Olena the nickname Leshka, often shortened to Le, which would later influence the choice of her stage name. While at school, the girl took up vocals and sang in a choir, and continued her singing career at the Kyiv National University of Culture and Arts, pop vocal department.

First success

The singer's first major success was her victory at the Yalta 2006 international song contest. Two years later, she received the first prize at the Songs of the Sea competition in Sevastopol. And in 2009, she signed a contract with Catapult music, and that's when she needed a childhood nickname, which turned into the stage name ALYOSHA. In the same year, Alyosha's debut song "Snow" was broadcast on all Ukrainian radio stations, and later a video was filmed for the song. It is noteworthy that Alyosha writes the lyrics and music of her songs herself. The singer is also the author of several compositions by Nastya Kamenskikh, Natalia Mogilevskaya and the Kamenskikh duet with Potap.

Participation in Eurovision

Among other things, ALYOSHA wrote the song "To Be Free", with which she won the National Selection for the Eurovision Song Contest 2010. Singer Maria Sobko received the same number of points as ALYOSHA. Therefore, the jury had to make a special decision on who would represent Ukraine at the contest. That year, ALYOSHA won the right. However, immediately after the results were announced, Alyosha was accused of plagiarism. The chords of her song were similar to Linda Perry's "Knock me out". In addition, Alyosha's song had been available for download on Amazone for about a year. All this violated the terms of participation in the contest. Therefore, Alyosha had to urgently look for a new song. And it became the song "Sweet People", written in collaboration with the famous producer Boris Kukuba. This hot hit in every sense became a call to protect our planet, and the singer took the honorable 10th place in the competition.

Continuation of the music career

Immediately after participating in the Eurovision Song Contest, the singer began working on her debut album, which was released in 2010 as "A World Outside Your Door", after which she received awards and prizes. After such a successful work, the creative work "Точка на карте" was born, the work on which lasted almost five years and consists of two albums and has 30 songs, the eponymous song from the first part of "Точка на карте" has about 5 million views on the YouTube platform. The next creative project of the singer was the album "Маленький секрет", which was released in 2017, one of the most successful tracks on the album was the Ukrainian-language song "Калина", the lyrics and music to which Olena wrote herself, and for this composition the singer received several prestigious music awards. In 2019, the singer gave concerts in 20 cities of Ukraine as part of a tour called "Поруч". In the same year, the singer, together with Vlad Darwin, released the album "Золота середина", which included 8 songs in a duet with Vlad, including "Цілуй і вбивай", "Пірнай" and "Торнадо".

Alyosha Today:

At the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the singer's husband Taras Topolya, the lead singer of the band Antytila, stood up for Ukraine as part of the territorial defense, and Olena and her three children went abroad. Now the family is reunited, Taras is touring with charity concerts, while Olena is in Ukraine. For her volunteer work for the good of Ukraine, the singer received the Golden Heart Award from the President of Ukraine.

In 2023, at the Eurovision Song Contest, organized jointly by Ukraine and the UK in Liverpool, Alyosha performed the song "Ordinary world", together with Rebecca Ferguson, this performance had a special meaning for all Ukrainians and touched many in the audience.

Recently, in an interview, the singer said that she plans to change her stage name to her real name: Olena Topolya. 

Albums by the singer:

2010 – “А World Outside Your Door”

2015 – “Точка на карте”, Ч. 1

2015 – “Точка на карте”, Ч. 2

2017 – “Маленький секрет”

2019 – “Золота середина”

Awards:

2011 – Award for the song "Смысл жизни" (duet with Vlad Darvin), "Golden Gramophone" (Ukraine)

2011 – Award for the song "А я пришла домой , "Golden Gramophone" (Ukraine)

2013 – victory in the nomination "Duet of the Year" (with Vlad Darwin), "YUNA"

2017 – victory in the nomination "Mom of the Year", "Viva! The most beautiful"

2017 – Award for the song "Калина", "Music Platform"

2017 – Winning the Chervona Ruta nomination for the song “Калина”, «M1 Music Awards»

2018 – Winning in the "Hit of the Year" nomination for the song "Калина", “Golden Firebird”

2018 – “Best Song” award, for song "Калина", Music Platform

2019 – “Best Song” award, for song "Dama", Music Platform

2019 – was included in the Rating, Woman of the Third Millennium

2020 – award “Best Female Artist on Radio”, Top Hit Music Awards