‘Every third’

On the instruction of the President of Belarus, a unique requiem concert was shown at the Palace of the Republic last week — it was seen by residents of Minsk and all regions across the country

The investigation of the criminal case on the genocide of the Belarusian people during the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945 shows the true scale of the tragedy that occurred on the territory of our country. While earlier it was said that every fourth person died during the war, the evidence collected from 2021 to 2025 clearly indicates that every third person perished. In memory of the heroes and victims of that terrible time, the Every Third project was created.

The requiem concert featured both well-known musical compositions of the Soviet period and new compositions by contemporary Belarusian authors such as Valery Shmat, Anna Seluk, Yevgeny Oleinik, Anna Blagova, and more. The project director is Vladislava Artyukovskaya, the artistic director of the State Youth Variety Theatre. The script writers are Vladislava Artyukovskaya and Anna Seluk. The following companies took part in the preparation of the requiem concert: Music Media Company LLC, the state institution Palace of the Republic of the Belarus President Property Management Directorate, the Defence Ministry, and the Culture Ministry. Informational documentary materials were prepared with the help of the VoenTV television company, the Vayar military information agency of Belarus’ Armed Forces, and the Prosecutor General’s Office.

Deep and honest 

The general producer of the requiem concert, Anna Lukashenko, revealed the background to the project on the air of the First Information TV channel, “The project was created last year in honour of the 80th anniversary of Belarus’ liberation from the Nazi invaders.

We wanted to reflect through it everything that had happened in those terrible years on the territory of our country: the events at the front, the ghetto, the burned villages, and how people lived after the war.

We had to somehow fit all this into a form understandable for the viewer, so that it would be watchable, deep, and honest. I think we have succeeded.”
Initially, the concert was prepared for showing at the Victory Museum on Poklonnaya Hill in Moscow. However, after the successful première, the organisers received a request from the President Administration to showcase this project to Belarusian viewers. 
According to the producer, the trigger for the project’s return was not only the response from the audience, but also the alarming events abroad — in particular, the dismantling of monuments to Soviet soldiers in Poland and the Baltic countries, “We see that they are trying to rewrite history, to make people forget it. The demolition of monuments is one part of this plan.”

Kirill Stasko

80th anniversary of Great Victory is sacred holiday 

The Every Third requiem concert left no one indifferent. It mentally transported the audience to that distant time, more than 80 years ago, to the dreadful years of the Great Patriotic War, when the war rolled over every Belarusian family. As Igor Sergeyenko, Chairman of the House of Representatives of the National Assembly and the authorised representative of the President in Vitebsk Region, noted before the concert, despite all the horrors of the war, the policy of mass extermination of the Belarusian people carried out by the fascists, our people did not submit — over 370,000 people fought in partisan detachments alone, “In fact, every family, every woman who saved the wounded, helped the partisans put up resistance. No country in the world had such scale of anti-Hitler resistance to the enemy as Belarus.” 
When speaking about the requiem concert, project director Vladislava Artyukovskaya stressed that this is a unique dramatic project for Belarus, “This is not just a concert — this is a dramatic theatrical production. The Great Patriotic War touched every Belarusian family.

When I look at these horrific images, I understand: we need to pray that this will not happen again, and, of course, bow at the feet of those who stood for peace. For us, Belarusians, these are not mere words. The 80th anniversary of the Great Victory is a sacred holiday.”

Let them hear, see and think 

The performers who took part in the Every Third requiem concert were no less emotional about this production than the audience. Thus, Anna Blagova, a participant in the project, holder of the Francysk Skaryna Medal, composer, remarked in a conversation with journalists that the creators of the Every Third project are truly the heroes of our time. They are people who carry the historical truth, passing it on from generation to generation, trying to preserve what our grandparents and great-grandparents cherished, for the sake of which they fought. The production script made the audience applaud standing, cry out of empathy and, of course, think about how important peace is. One of the emotionally charged performances was the song Until the End by Andrei Tyamchik. “This song is about the high moral and volitional qualities of people who fought for their Homeland to the last drop of blood,” the singer pointed out. “The song lyrics call for preserving memory, for remaining a human being until the end. As a man, a citizen of my country, I have someone to take an example of courage from: my great-grandfather reached Berlin.”  

Yegor Yermalitsky
Kirill Stasko

WHEN A PERSON KNOWS THEIR ROOTS, THEY BEGIN TO LIVE DIFFERENTLY 

The audience was able to immerse themselves in the atmosphere of the war years and recall the heroic deeds of our ancestors even before the touching performances on the stage. Various exhibitions — Genocide: Documents and Eyewitnesses Testify, Fates Folded into Triangle, For Tomorrow on the Whole Earth, Bread — Invisible Force of Victory — did not go unnoticed for a minute. Visitors were able to not only see newsreels, look at photos, write a triangle letter to their loved ones, but also try bread that was produced during the war — including the bread made from pressed sugar beet, and sawdust that the invaders fed to prisoners of concentration camps. People tried bitter war bread and carefully wrapped it in a napkin to take home, to show it to their children and grandchildren. This topic is sacred for each family. 
It was possible to familiarise oneself with the feats and fates of Belarusian partisans at the exhibition of the same name, presented by the Belarus Segodnya Publishing House and the National Archives of Belarus. The exhibition is a unique Internet project, which contains data on hundreds of thousands of partisans and underground fighters of Belarus. You can find information about your hero using an interactive board. The project made information stored in the National Archives available to a wide range of people. 

WORD TO THE AUDIENCE 

‘Goosebumps’ 

Yekaterina Sarmyashko, an employee at the Housing and Utilities Ministry, admitted that the concert gave her goosebumps, and she could hardly hold back her tears, “My now deceased grandfather went through the entire war. I only met him as a child, but I still remember how he did not want to talk about the war. As my mother later explained to me, my grandfather lost a lot of friends then. Such concerts are very important for our children, future generations, so that those events never happen again on our land!” 

‘This is what a patriot should have in their heart and soul’ 

Vesta Murach is a member of the Eaglets. Heirs of Victory! military and patriotic club. She can shoot an assault rifle and knows hand-to-hand combat techniques. Despite her steely character, the girl spent the entire requiem concert in tears. She confessed that she was deeply moved and had never experienced such strong emotions, “When I was watching the performance, I was thinking about what it was like to live in those years. It was so scary. It’s impossible to even imagine. Today, we must resolve all disagreements peacefully and live in harmony.”  
The schoolgirl is sure that the memory of the Great Patriotic War is something that a patriot should have in their heart and soul, “We must not forget about it. I feel proud when I think about how our grandfathers and great-grandfathers selflessly defended our Motherland. It is very valuable that they are my ancestors.”  

Mother’s heart sank 

Nadezhda Dyagileva, a cultural organiser at the Energia health-improving centre in Beloozersk, noted that every day, there are fewer and fewer witnesses to the atrocities of fascism, which means that we must pass on their commandments to the youth, “My two grandfathers fought in the war. We sacredly keep their history in our family. Today’s concert simply tore my mother’s heart apart. I tried on the pain of losing children, the inhuman torture, and could not hold back my tears. The painting Aggression by Mikhail Savitsky depicting a girl running away from the fascists caused fear and horror. Everyone needs to see this.”

Based on materials of sb.by