Contact us
Our team
Hi! We are the cultural agency kontrabass promo. Since 2018 we have worked toward a single goal — to champion great Ukrainian music at home, and more recently beyond Ukraine’s borders.
We have lived through very different periods along the way: from a time when local indie music drew no audience interest at all, through the pandemic and its online formats, to today’s peak attention on Ukrainian culture under a full-scale invasion.
Our directions
Shows
Concert promotion at every scale and in every format, produced and managed end to end by our team. kontrabass promo began with concert promotion in 2018, which is
why our expertise here runs deepest. Every season we choose artists we personally believe deserve attention, and we put on shows for them in Ukraine's major cities.
One point matters: we do not produce concerts to order. We work only with artists whose work speaks to us, knowingly accepting every risk and challenge that comes with it.
Booking
End-to-end live management for our artists. Our booking agents find promoters, events and festivals in Ukraine and abroad, secure the shows and make sure every agreement between promoter and musician is honoured. Our roster now holds more than 20 acts: The Unsleeping, Стас Корольов (Stas Koroliov), Kurs Valüt, Ницо Потворно (Nytso Potvorno), Hyphen Dash, Структура Щастя (Struktura Shchastya) and many others. Thanks to our booking team, our artists have played more than 100 shows since mid-2022, roughly a third of them in Europe.
Label
Management, support and promotion for musicians and their creative projects. We run distribution, pitching, production, video shoots and management, and at times we invest our own money into a project’s growth. We keep a professional PR team that promotes releases and advises artists on communications between releases. This division launched in early 2023 and already has a track record of delivered campaigns, strong results and positive feedback from artists. Among the projects using one or another of the label’s services: The Unsleeping, To Eternity, the feels, артилерія (artyleriia), shmiska, Alice Change, Andrii Barmalii and others.
Our story
2025
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Won Label of the Year at the Jäger Music Awards for the second year running.
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8 new artists joined the label: Vøvk, Leleka i Paporot, Сервант (Servant), Теорія розбитих вікон (Teoriia Rozbytykh Vikon), Проклятий Х**, Zlypni, Лівінстон (Livinston) and Lady Aphina. In parallel, 23 more artists joined distribution.
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Our catalogue grew by 177 releases and 443 tracks. The most popular new tracks of the year were «Замало любові» (Zamalo Liubovi, “Not Enough Love”) by Dakh Daughters (1,577,543 plays), «Люди» (Liudy, “People”) by Shmiska (1,315,580) and «Мереживо» (Merezhyvo, “Lace”) by Shmiska (798,311).
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Over the year we handled more than 120 inbound collaboration requests. kontrabass artists collaborated with Святослав Вакарчук (Sviatoslav Vakarchuk), appeared on screens across the Kyiv metro, made the shortlists of the country’s key music awards — Золота Зоря Лірум (Zolota Zoria Lirum), YUNA, Jäger Music Awards, MEGOGO Music Awards — and sold out their shows.
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We produced 42 concerts over the year. The biggest were the Пиріг і Батіг (Pyrih i Batih) show at the International Centre of Culture and Arts in Kyiv, The Unsleeping in Lviv, and two consecutive sold-out The Unsleeping shows in Kyiv (1,000 people). Donations collected at concerts totalled UAH 3,761,741.
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We delivered 64 bookings in total. Among the year’s biggest: 13 kontrabass artists at Atlas Weekend, and The Unsleeping at Faine Misto in front of 5,000 people.
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We delivered 56 PR campaigns for artists and projects, and systematically built out our PR, strategic communications, SMM and content production practice.
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We launched a sync licensing division and delivered 6 successful placements. Key projects include an Oschadbank advertising campaign, the series «Ховаючи колишню» (Khovaiuchy Kolyshniu, “Burying the Ex”) for SWEET.TV, the documentary «Велика патріотична подорож» (Velyka Patriotychna Podorozh, “The Great Patriotic Journey”), the series «Вітя» (Vitia) for Kyivstar TV, and an advertising campaign for Visa.
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We built international connections, notably through taking part in the WOMEX showcase — an important step for the growth of both the agency and its artists.
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7 new crew members joined us.
2024
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Put out 92 releases on the label: 13 albums, 70 singles and 9 EPs
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Ukrainian artists who joined the label: HLIBOROB, Small Depo, Ragapop, Stas Koroliov, mine. Plus one international band — heavenphetamine.
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Supported more than 60 projects communications-wise, in various formats — from short PR campaigns for releases to full communication strategies for festivals
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Partnership with ATLAS UNITED: artists from our booking roster took over two stages at the festival. 12 of our artists performed in total
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Pitched 75 songs by our label artists for the game S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2
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Handled 80+ concerts for artists on our booking roster, in Ukraine and abroad
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Won Label of the Year at the Jäger Music Awards
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Produced 25 concerts, among them: two consecutive Пиріг і Батіг (Pyrih i Batih) shows at the National Philharmonic of Ukraine, a ДК Енергетик (DK Enerhetyk) concert in partnership with DTEK, the return of Ірена Карпа (Irena Karpa) to a major stage — a Фактично Самі (Faktychno Sami) show at Atlas — and four auction concerts together with Олександр Сердюк (Oleksandr Serdiuk)
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Our artists hit record numbers on streaming platforms: 22,000,000 plays for «Гаї шумлять» (Hai Shumliat, “The Groves Are Rustling”) by Пиріг і Батіг (Pyrih i Batih), 7,000,000 plays for «Запальнички» (Zapalnychky, “Lighters”), 2,000,000 for the single «DVD» by Shmiska, and another 3,000,000 for «Ptaha Fred» by The Unsleeping
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Ran a lecture series for music managers together with the Порічка (Porichka) community
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Helped organise and market the event «Епоха» (Epokha, “The Era”) by the Third Assault Brigade
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Grew the team to 11 people, and we are not stopping!
2023
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Started operating as a label
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Produced concerts for: The Unsleeping, Стас Корольов (Stas Koroliov), Структура Щастя (Struktura Shchastya), Sad Novelist, ТОНКА (Tonka), Ницо Потворно (Nytso Potvorno), Джозерс (Djozers), Пиріг і Батіг (Pyrih i Batih), Ігор Цимбровський (Ihor Tsymbrovsky), Каданов і Кононов (Kadanov i Kononov), Марний (Marnyi), Скажи Щось Погане (Skazhy Shchos Pohane), Alice Change
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Nationwide Ukrainian tour for Джозерс (Djozers) + Lykho
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The festival «450 vs kontrabass » in Lviv: Структура Щастя (Struktura Shchastya), Kurs Valüt, Ship Her Son, Sad Novelist, Nestor Selin
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30 events across Ukraine handled by our booking agents
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International dates
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Third European tour for Kurs Valüt across 7 cities: the Netherlands, Poland, Germany
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Kurs Valüt at the Eurosonic showcase
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Стас Корольов (Stas Koroliov) in Berlin, Amsterdam and Liverpool
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Ragapop at Pohoda Festival
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Promsonya at Sziget Festival
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2022
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Founded the Musicians Defend Ukraine fund
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Found our feet after the full-scale invasion began and started staging charity concerts in May
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Produced concerts for: The Unsleeping, Kurs Valüt, Паліндром (Palindrom), Blooms Corda, Renie Cares, Sheetel
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10 events across Ukraine handled by our booking agents
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Two European tours for Kurs Valüt: 22 cities, 11 countries
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Ragapop shows in Berlin and Vienna (Waves Vienna Festival)
2021
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Opened the booking division
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Released the YouTube project «Змова» (Zmova, “The Conspiracy”), featuring independent artists performing in culturally significant venues around Kyiv:
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Курган (Kurhan) at the Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine
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Hyphen Dash at the National Art Museum of Ukraine
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The Unsleeping at the Countess Uvarova Estate
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Ragapop at the National Cinematheque of Ukraine
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22 events across Ukraine handled by our booking agency
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Produced concerts for: Паліндром (Palindrom), Аппекс (Appeks), Kurs Valüt,
Стас Корольов (Stas Koroliov) -
Announced the independent music festival КОНФІСКАТ (Konfiskat) and cancelled it days before the date. The line-up was to include: Стас Корольов (Stas Koroliov), Паліндром (Palindrom), thekomakoma, Курган (Kurhan), Ragapop, Джозерс (Djozers), Shadazz, Milktuth. After that we burned out and took a long break
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The Unsleeping performed at Waves Vienna Festival in Vienna
2020
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Initiators and co-organisers of Intercity Live, the largest online festival in Ukraine during the lockdown era. Between April and August 2020 we ran 4 festivals, which reached:
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200,000 views
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150 artists
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20 cities across Ukraine
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15 countries
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Every continent on the planet
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Music stage at Космос Табір (Kosmos Tabir): ЦеШо (TseSho), Sheetel, Love’n’Joy, Vertuha, Straytones, Zfeelz, Марія і Магдалина (Mariia i Mahdalyna), D.Marsh, Kontur, The CBYW
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Produced the online festival Respublica fest 2020
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Before the pandemic hit we managed to put on concerts for: Krapka;Koma, Love’n’Joy, Komissiya, Аппекс (Appeks), Vacuum Formula, Kraken Landau, Адвокати (Advokaty), Ptakh, Intelligency, Our Atlantic, TBPOFT
2019
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Produced headline concerts for: The Unsleeping, Love’n’Joy, Tik Tu, Глава 94 (Hlava 94), Straytones, Komissiya, Braii, Blooms Corda, Джозерс (Djozers), Sheetel, DZ’OB, Intelligency,
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Ran our first own festival, Vertuha Arts Festival, with more than 30 artists on the bill
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Night stage at Dnipro ГогольFest (GogolFest): Стасік (Stasik), Sheetel, Monotonne,
Dj Tapolsky, Elektro Guzzi, MC Брехунець (MC Brekhunets), Olive Taud, Our Atlantic, Zagreb, Kontur, R -
Music stage at Космос Табір (Kosmos Tabir): Love’n’Joy, Vertuha, Sheetel, Мало (Malo), D.Marsh, TBPOFT
2018
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Launched the concert agency in late August 2018
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Produced concerts for: Tik Tu, Sheetel, Олег Каданов (Oleh Kadanov), Intelligency, Адвокати (Advokaty), Cockpit Music
