Aneta Charitonova: From Russian Roots to Czech-Sung Electro-Rhythm and Blues Music

Aneta has Russian roots from her parents, but as she claims, today she would rather run away from them. Actually, she doesn’t even know what it’s like to be Russian, because she was born in Brno. With the beginning of the war in Ukraine, she stopped using Russian symbols in her visual and musical work, and her attitude towards the entire conflict is thus more than clear. Now he is mainly focused on work.

In March, she went on an intensive tour and is preparing a second studio album with her unusually Czech-sung electro-rhythm and blues music.

A tour is an essential experience. Did anything surprise you during it?

It was a big chase with a lot of responsibility, but thanks to my team it was great and everything turned out the way it was supposed to and thankfully without surprises. There were also many funny situations every day. The jokes grew, gaining weight with each new situation, day and reference. I found it ironically funny on the tour that one experiences perhaps the most beautiful moments full of all kinds of emotions at once.

When I record it on camera and then look at the recordings, it feels like I’m doing a dream job and it’s true! Despite all that, it’s incredibly exhausting and the human body is really working above standard throughout the tour.

How do you translate your electronic music into live performance?

Great. I myself was surprised that the pieces from the album could actually be played exactly the same with the band. It is mainly the merit of my Champions, as I call them, the band Champion Sound.

I have a big band. There are eight of us with me. The composition is almost classic: drums, electric guitar, bass guitar, keyboards with electronic pads and Radimo, who acts as a band leader and DJ. He plays material that we can no longer play, and he plays saxophone and flute. We are joined by two more female backing vocalists.

It was with your first music album Och bodu big, I want to be Aneta Charitonova from 2020 that success came right away. Not only did you receive the Apollo Award, but you also received Anděl for the clip Bylo nebylo.

I honestly feel like it’s coming back to me a lot more now, with distance. I didn’t pay much attention to it because I didn’t really know what it was about.

And when I think about it, the memories of the difficult period at the beginning of the war in Ukraine, with which the award ceremony coincided, resonate much more in me. I experienced that a lot, and rejoicing somewhere at a handover party was rather unimaginable. But now it’s always really nice when someone mentions my win somewhere, just like Anděla.

The album has a special title, you want to be Aneta Charitonova when you grow up. Are you already her?

I think yes. But at the same time, my life is constantly changing so much that I could also say that I will never be her. Every other record could actually have the same name. Every now and then I write a new chapter in my book.

You only released the record on vinyl, why?

It is the most beautiful medium. I am proud of the packaging design. It stands in my room and makes me happy every time I see it. This is also why the LP is ideal. It has a large sleeve that you can play with and get more out of it than maybe a CD or cassette. Plus, vinyl has the magic of ritual for me.

Composer Petr Bakla said about vinyls that along with the physical carrier, one also buys concentration…

It is true. Not only focus, but also explanation. Booklets often contain lyrics, other information and also visually complement the artist’s idea of ​​the entire record. A physical carrier gives people the ability to deliver more than just music.

When will we hear your new album?

Sometime around summer. I don’t give myself an exact deadline, because I don’t want to do anything because of a deadline.

I probably wouldn’t have such an emotionally diverse life. Music helps me get in the mood, but also helps me get out of tune. I would definitely read more, be more grounded, go out more without music. I sink deeper into myself in silence. When I hear music, I concentrate on it, I analyze…

You alternate languages ​​in the texts. Which one is native?

Thanks to my parents, my native language is Russian. My roots are Russian and I won’t run away from them, even if I want to lately, because now there is a feeling of guilt associated with them. I was born in the Czech Republic, I grew up here, and this is how I feel and what I know. I don’t know what it means to be Russian, I know what it means to be me.

My parents came to the Czech Republic shortly before I was born, they didn’t speak Czech yet. So they spoke Russian to me, and my sister and I only learned Czech in kindergarten. But now I speak it better than Russian. I can also speak English and have been learning French for a year and a half. That’s what I’ve always dreamed of.

Is language also a musical instrument?

Definitely yes. Must be.

Do you take this into account when writing lyrics?

Yes. However, it is often binding and can prolong the writing process for even a year. That’s why I’ve been trying to stop doing it lately. It also led to a situation where I hummed, for example jadydombadum, from which she wrote down only the vowels and then matched them with real words. I really don’t want to go there anymore.

This complex system disgusted me a little, precisely because it was so difficult, but by simplifying the system I found my way to it and I enjoy working with it, bending it, shaping it…

Did you start a fashion blog, when did the first songs come out?

First there was music and writing lyrics. I wrote the first text with a melody at the age of eight at the piano while on vacation with my grandmother in Russia. The blog didn’t come until about a year later. I recently realized that thanks to him, I am now able to manage my own website.

Do your first musical attempts still make sense to you?

Actually yes. After some time, I returned to them and found out that I wrote the most heartbreaking and dramatic text of the entire work in those eight years. I thought that was funny. At that time I was still writing in Russian. Then I switched to English, but I still didn’t know much. In the end, I settled primarily in Czech, and I stick to it.

Do you write the lyrics, compose the melodies, take care of the visuals, do you really do everything?

Today, I think it is important to control things comprehensively. I’m primarily trying to be a singer and lyricist, but more and more I’m enjoying learning about production as well.

Feeling, intuition. I’ve never really followed trends, quite the opposite. In short, I won’t release a thing I don’t feel. Initial inspiration comes in different ways. I was shaped by r’n’b and pop rock, later hip hop and jazz, soul and funk from the 1940s onwards. So I know what I draw from and my music acknowledges it. But actually, in every genre, I find those 15 seconds that I like, thanks to which I listen to the whole song.

Are you still composing at the piano?

Not much, more on the guitar, which eventually became my main instrument. At the moment, I mostly stick to production, so I compose demos myself in a computer program.