Polina Tarasenko

Polina Tarasenko was born in 2001 in Kherson in the south of the Ukraine. Already at the age of five she began to make music, first of all on the drum set of the children’s jazz group of the Palace for Young People’s Creativity in Kherson led by Semen Ryvkin who also taught her saxophone, trumpet and trombone. As a member of the Dixieland-Band she regularly took part in concerts in the Ukraine and abroad. Already at this time she combined jazz and classical music. After the death of her first teacher in 2011 Polina met on the internet the Russian trombonist Alexander Nyankin who was living in Taiwan at the time. He taught her via Skype and prepared her for the Rotary music competition in Moscow in 2013 where she won two prizes. After this Polina Tarasenko was invited without an audition by the director of the Gnessin-Spezialschule für Musik to study trombone  and also saxophone, trumpet, composition, piano and organ. In 2015 she was chosen as the best student at the Gnessin-Spezialschule and completed her studies there with a high commendation in 2018. At the moment she is studying with Jonas Bylund at the Hochschule für Musik, Theater und Medien Hannover.

She has been granted scholarships by several foundations including the “Yehudi Menuhin Live Music Now Hannover” and the Mozart Gesellschaft Dortmund.

Pictures: ©️ Monika Lawrenz, Philippe Schwarz