A successful businessman with more than twenty years of experience, three university degrees and an unexpected passion for music. Volodymyr Hrynko, who is launching a music career under the stage name GREENWICH, admits that war, divorce and a broken heart led him to songwriting. Personal turmoil has turned into more than forty original songs, while a failed romance inspired “Zaya” and his first music video. In his first in-depth interview, the artist speaks candidly about mistakes, family, women, creativity and new beginnings — convinced that it is never too late to change your life.
1. Let’s start at the beginning. We know almost nothing about you, so I’d like you to introduce yourself to our audience. Who is Volodymyr Hrynko, also known as Greenwich? I imagine you’re well known in your industry, but music is new territory for you. Who are you, where do you come from, and how did you end up here?
My name is Volodymyr Hrynko. I was born in Kyiv in 1982, into an ordinary Soviet family. My father was a builder, a Moldovan, a cheerful and gifted man. My mother used to be an accountant. When my younger brother and I were born, she decided that being a mother was her most important job. She gave up her career and devoted herself to her family and sons. When I was five, we moved to Dnipropetrovsk.
2. What made your family leave Kyiv? It was the capital, after all.
Well, Kyiv was only nominally the capital in some ways back then. Dnipro was a major city and was held in just as high regard. The reason we moved was simple and tragic: Chernobyl. My parents decided it wasn’t good for children to grow up so close to Pripyat and the destroyed nuclear reactor. They exchanged our apartment in Kyiv for one in Dnipro. So it was Dnipro that shaped me as a person and a man, and I don’t regret that at all.
3. For many years you were, above all, a businessman. What led you down that path? And at what point did the musician Greenwich emerge from businessman Volodymyr Hrynko? Where did the music come from? Did you study it as a child?
I didn’t formally study music. I played the guitar, like everyone else. My father was probably the inspiration. He was a very handsome man and extremely musical. He sang among friends, and I’m told that when he was young he sang in restaurants. So his genes must have awakened in me — rather late, I should say. Back in kindergarten in Dnipro, I was selected along with other gifted children for music school. But it didn’t work out: I never actually attended music school, unfortunately. I traded music for chess. And I’m quite a strong chess player — I hold the Candidate Master of Sports title. Chess helps in business, too: I think many moves ahead.
4. Music school didn’t work out, but did you have musical preferences as a child and teenager? Was there anything that really struck you and made you want to sing?
I call my musical style ‘Horses, People and Spare Parts.’ I’m serious! As for my tastes, at five I knew every Ion Suruceanu song by heart. My father loved his songs and sang them beautifully. So you could say I grew up on Suruceanu’s music. That’s no joke, though it may sound like one. My Moldovan genes made themselves known! Later, like any normal teenager, I wore out my Queen tapes, adored Pet Shop Boys and listened to the usual 1990s favorites. Really, I love rock, good pop music and classical music. My favorite is Vivaldi. Sometimes I put on one of his concertos while driving on the highway — it really gets you going!
5. Let’s go back to Hrynko the businessman.
No problem! I got into refrigeration systems more or less by chance. I’ve always enjoyed studying, which is probably why I have three university degrees. The first is in engineering, the second in economics, and the third, also engineering, in electrical engineering. I needed that for business. As for the business, I did well early on, so they put me in charge. I quickly went from employee to partner, and things took off. Business was a necessity. I spent 20 years in a happy marriage, and I have two children. My daughter is 19 and my son is 12. My son is a particular source of pride: he plays football at an almost professional level. I’m grateful to business for two things: it enabled me to raise my children and gave me the opportunity to see the world. Travel gives me strength and helps me come to terms with a difficult reality.
6. And once again, how did Hrynko become Greenwich?
Divorce brought me to Greenwich, and the war brought me to divorce. At the beginning of the war, I sent my wife and children to live permanently in Lviv, away from danger. I couldn’t cope with living as a bachelor and started seeing other women; in the end my wife didn’t forgive me. The stress was immense. I suffered and drank heavily. Then, suddenly, music began pouring out of me and songs started writing themselves. When your soul hurts, that can be the strongest stimulus for creativity, sad as it is. My first two ballads are raw, undisguised pain. I don’t particularly want to release or perform them. Let that pain remain mine.
7. But doesn’t that mean you were responsible for the divorce? That your suffering was, in a sense, a fair consequence?
Of course I was in the wrong too. But I still think the main culprit was the war. Do you know how many broken families and ruined lives will emerge from all this? How many unhappy children? Take my word for it.
8. So your soul is hurting, the country is in turmoil, families are falling apart — and you’re singing?
Whatever happens, the war won’t last forever. It will end sooner or later, and I’m absolutely certain my songs will have their place then. People need music and art even during wartime, and that need is strong. Just wait and see what happens afterward. By the way, since the war began, my former wife and children have consciously switched to speaking Ukrainian. They haven’t spoken a word of Russian since.
9. So it was the war and the divorce — or rather the stress of the divorce compounded by the stress of the war — that pushed you toward songwriting. What happened next?
Everything developed very quickly. I wrote my first song on March 27, and the second a week later. Then the floodgates opened, and within six months I had more than forty songs! Oddly enough, what prompted me to start recording was a gift from Natalia Mohylevska: she gave me the opportunity to have one song arranged and some studio time. So I simply had to use it. I’d just written a song called ‘Nebokrai’ (‘Horizon’), which sounds almost like a new anthem for Ukraine. To be honest, I wasn’t entirely happy with the arrangement — it was too pop-oriented — but I loved working in the studio. That’s how the singer Greenwich was born.
10. And what about the song ‘Zaya’? I’ve heard there was quite a drama behind it.
Well, I wouldn’t call it a drama. Just an ordinary story from life. I met a beautiful woman and fell in love. We lived together, and everything seemed wonderful. I was planning to marry her — we even got engaged through the Diia app. The happiness lasted exactly nine months, and then everything collapsed. Don’t ask whose fault it was: I can’t give you a simple answer. But it all turned into a farce. When my ‘fiancée’ realized the wedding wasn’t going to happen, she decided to empty my apartment. While I was away, she took everything she could, including bed linen, a coffee maker and a toaster. Naturally, I was surprised and upset, to put it mildly. I really loved her, but it felt as if my feelings had been trampled on and traded for a coffee grinder and a toaster. I didn’t care about the things; I cared about the feelings. In a way, though, it sped up my recovery: all those emotions poured straight into the song ‘Zaya.’ That’s a true detail from our life, too — it was what she called me. It’s not necessarily my strongest song, but every word of it is true. That’s how singer Greenwich came into being through pain. I arranged the song and made a music video. The video, too, is grounded in real events — a transformation of real life into art, if you like. People around me reacted positively and practically convinced me to keep writing, singing and recording. I felt it myself as well. Creativity gives you an extraordinary high, stronger than alcohol or other stimulants. You might say I’m hooked on creativity. As I said, the floodgates opened: I started writing constantly, and I still do.
11. So Greenwich the singer is here to stay? Can we expect more music and events?
I think so. I don’t know where life will take me next, but for now I certainly intend to keep creating. I have no reason to stop. So look out for new songs and new videos, and, I hope, live performances.
