It wouldn't be a great exaggeration to say that Gaitana is unique on Ukraine's sound scene. She's definitely one of the most talented and versatile performers to come up in the young country's fledgling music industry. And when it comes to dance music, she's arguably the best.
The 25-year-old singer's uniqueness is rooted in her past: born in Kyiv to a Ukrainian mother and African father, she moved to the Republic of the Congo when she was only six months old. At five, her parents had divorced, and she returned to Ukraine with her mother.
During her formative years in Congo, which Gaitana now describes as "a little piece of paradise," she spoke French and Congolese. Now, she only claims fluency in Russian, Ukrainian and English, which is a source of irritation to her father, a telecommunications businessman in Brazzaville, whom she has traveled to visit over the years.
Gaitana's interest in music began early. "I was always a musical kid," she says, "when my parents saw that their child was singing, (they thought): "Well, the kid is singing, so let her sing." Incipient performances consisted of dancing at home to Diana Ross using a comb as a microphone. Michael Jackson and Paula Abdul were also among her favorites, Gaitana recalls.
Back in Kyiv, however, the little girl with stars in her eyes was equally passionate about table tennis, playing on a team and receiving state support until she was 12. It was at this age that she entered an all-girl's secondary school, where she was offered to join a music ensemble.
"I was sitting there waiting for my girlfriend, and he (the ensemble director) asks 'Do you want to sing?'" Gaitana recalls. She soon forgot her childhood dream of becoming a ping pong champ. Gaitana considers this a turning point in her life. Ironically, the exotic songbird never studied music at school.
Instead, during her teens, she obtained a wealth of on-the-job experience. For example, she got a chance to perform at Kyiv's Palace of Ukraine concert hall as a member of another ensemble, was given saxophone lessons by Ukrainian jazz man Yury Shiyan, and appeared several times on the TV show "35 Minutes of Jazz."
When it came time to go to college, Gaitana's choice was in keeping with her eclectic style - she studied theology with Protestant missionaries and sung in the church choir. By the age of 18, she was developing her skills and reputation performing at Kyiv nightclubs.
To date, nightclubs are Gaitana's venue of choice, "because for a long time I worked in clubs, and so I am used to the contact with people," she says, "I know how to get people on the dance floor." Her repertoire also includes a collection of ballads accompanied by an acoustic guitar, which shows a more melancholic side of her personality. Throughout her development, Gaitana has played with a variety of musicians. The first band she played with was called Over Time.
What she doesn't like, however, is singing in a hall where the audience just sits in their seats and watches, which she thinks is a hangover from Soviet times. "It's a very strange feeling at these concerts, because I never know, I can't figure out during the first couple of songs what is going on with the audience," she explains.
When people move, they relax and so does the singer, says Gaitana, who one time had some of her lyrics written for her by another Ukrainian singer. Because she never learned to write music formally, she just sings a song into a dictaphone and then develops the accompanying music together with her band. For the past several years, she has been working with a group called Unity, which is from Donetsk.
Two years ago, Gaitana signed a contract with the Ukrainian recording label Lavina Music, whose president, Eduard Klim, is her producer. He's a real businessman with a sharp mind, says the singer. Before striking a deal with Lavina Music, she was considering a deal with Sony Music Russia, but rejected their offer because they wanted her to make a commitment for several years. Gaitana wanted to keep her options open. For now, Lavina, which handles Ani Lorak, VV and Okean Elzy, is big enough.
So does Gaitana have her hopes set on Ukraine's music industry? "It seems to me that there are no longer a lot of people here in Ukraine who are prepared to invest big money into show business," she says. If they do, they will want to be sure that the investment is sound. One of the reasons for local investment jitters is piracy, which prevents companies from earning a profit. In Ukraine, money is made on concerts, but in the West, these are just promotions for albums, which really make the money. "Give me some money now, for example 10 million, and where would I invest it? I am not sure whether I would invest it in show business."
Instead, Gaitana is investing in herself. "The preparation period is very important. Show business is just starting for me. Everything is just starting." So the singer begins her day with a morning workout. "Physically, I can't not exercise," she says. Then she heads off to the studio for a recording, rehearsal, interviews, etc. Gaitana doesn't live Monday to Friday, and weekends are usually booked up with performances. So when does she get a break? Three, sometimes four weeks, in the summer.
"This is the kind of work that you can't call work. It's more like my favorite hobby," she says. Even summer vacation is no time to be wasted for Gaitana. This is when she travels. "It isn't work or vacation," but a change in setting. Besides the Congo, she has traveled all over Europe, including Italy, France, Portugal and Turkey. She has also performed in Europe, and has a concert planned in London this month.
All the same, Gaitana has her down time. When she's in a bad mood, she unplugs the phone and closes herself off from everyone. "Sometimes I wonder how one can live one's whole life with one person if one wants to be alone," she laments.
Currently, she has a steady boyfriend and wants to get married and have a lot of kids, but "for now I am still enjoying life and getting the most pleasure that I can from my current situation," says Gaitana. When she does tie the knot, she will still insist on her privacy. For her, the ideal situation would be two houses, two apartments or at least two bedrooms next to each other, like "big Muslim families. They know how to make a home," she says. "Even my best friend can't just drop by without calling first."
This isn't to say that the sexy songstress doesn't have a homey side. She even cooks Congolese food, buying the ingredients from Africans who travel back and forth to Kyiv. She is also keen on fitness, riding a bike everywhere "to see a lot and get to where I am going on time."
And of course there is music. Gaitana likes listening to Prince and Erika Badul. She thinks crooners like Enrique Iglesias or Eros Ramazotti are "too sweet."
And what about future plans? More concerts and more albums, she says. In the last year, Gaitana has won three awards, including Ukraine's Golden Gramophone for her song Alone & Barefoot, voted the best song of 2004. Notwithstanding lost earnings, she is not even particularly bothered about her material being used by someone else, "because similar motifs are everywhere - on radio, in English, in Japanese - and everyone is singing something from someone else... In our country it's not yet realistic to file a lawsuit for someone using similar motifs."
And for better or worse, Ukraine is her home, as well as that of her friends, career, relatives and mother. It must not have been easy sticking to her dream during the economic hardship of 1990s. Her mother, who is now a seamstress, had to earn money working as a street vendor.
Africans are "relaxed" and "musical," constantly singing and dancing, she says while recalling her father's homeland. Maybe Gaitana inherited enough of these qualities to get her through the tough times.
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