She won Junior Eurovision 2017 with the emotional ballad “Wings”, an ode to children living in abusive situations. And now Russia’s Polina Bogusevich is back with the new single “Я не один” (“I’m not alone”).
Following on from her earlier 2018 release “Heavy on my Heart”, this latest song sees Polina return to the Russian language. It once again touches on the lives of children, but this time puts the spotlight on those who have become orphans.
While this may seem like a sad subject, the lyrics of song reveal it to be an uplifting ballad all about the strength of these individuals. Although they may feel alone and unappreciated, they are always strong and have the ability to power through whatever comes their way: “I’m not alone! / Through storms and blizzards / I fly to my goal alone / Not alone! / I will become very strong / My dreams are naive, but I’m not alone”.
Just like in her Junior Eurovision entry, Polina’s vocals soar throughout the track and demonstrate just why she took home the trophy. She’s able to put all the emotion that’s required into the song and you can’t help but feel something even if you don’t understand the Russian language.
Polina Bogusevich – “Я не один”
The music video continues the song’s theme, focusing on a child who was orphaned at birth with only a picture of his birth mother to remind him of his biological family. The boy has to deal with a rather unsympathetic carer who locks him in the wardrobe as punishment for sneaking into her office.
Eventually managing to retrieve the picture of his mother, he heads out to find her and does indeed come across her in a playground. However, it’s revealed that she has since had another child and naturally the boy feels a sense of anger that she would leave him but not her new child.
Although he initially tears up the photo and runs away, we see him track down his mother again in later life once he’s ready to embrace her.
Polina Bogusevich – “Heavy on my Heart”
At the end of the music video there are a series of official statistics about the number of orphans in Russia. Although they could have focused on the more harrowing facts, there’s a sense of optimism with those presented: in 2017, the number of orphaned children that were registered in the Russian government’s database decreased by 15.1%, while more than 64,000 found families to take care of them.
It’s great to see Polina not only release some great music, but also use her position to raise awareness for all the children in Russia and across the globe that still need our help.
With such an emotional maturity at only 15 years old, we’re confident that there are great things lined up for her future (perhaps even an appearance on the main Eurovision stage).
What do you make of Polina’s latest song? Do you want to see her representing Russia at the main Eurovision Song Contest one day? Sound off in the comments below!
I have recognized that Jonathan’s posts always get only a few comments up to no comments at all. Marco, the Lithuanian singers, Polina: all are articles with no comments. The reason might be that these articles are about new music by former Eurovision artists. And not everyone listens to all of these songs and/or shares his/her opinion. So I wanted to say that I love this information like any other article here and that your work is apprecciated. Please continue Jonathan <3
Thank you so much for this comment. That’s so lovely of you to say. I love exploring new music from former Eurovision stars, and international music as a whole (I have playlists full of songs from so many countries: Finland, Russia, Kazakhstan, South Korea and beyond). I’m more than happy to keep writing all these new music reviews since there’s so much great music out there to listen to. I’m not the sort of person that’s too fussed about the number of comments my articles get because I followed wiwibloggs for several years before joining the team and never commented… Read more »