Evgenia Markova started playing music at the age of 6. The first time she went to a music school to choose an instrument to play, she heard the domra and immediately fell in love with it.

After graduating from music school in 2002, she entered St. Petersburg Music College and then continued her studies at St. Petersburg Conservatory, graduating in 2012.

Vladimir Kirasirov has been playing music since the age of 4. He started taking piano lessons from his mother and then entered a music school. Besides the piano, he was interested in other musical instruments, especially the guitar.

In 2002, Vladimir entered St. Petersburg Musical Lyceum, going on to study at the prestigious Rimsky-Korsakov St. Petersburg State Conservatory.

After finishing his studies in St. Petersburg in 2011, Vladimir entered Maastricht Conservatory in the class of Carlo Marchione. After two years, he obtained his Master’s degree in the Netherlands.

The Wandervogel, also known as the lute guitar or German lute, is a German instrument that resembles a Renaissance lute but has six strings (up to 11 in some variants!) and metal pegs like a guitar. It is tuned the same way as a guitar. It was created by the German Wandervogel youth movement, which existed between 1890 and 1936. This movement played a significant role in reviving folk songs in wider German society. The neck of the lute guitar is similar to that of a modern classical guitar, but the fretboard design may be different, occasionally being scalloped.

The instrument was presented to Vladimir by the grateful listeners John and Manon Machiels in the Netherlands.

The mandolin is a small, pear-shaped, plucked instrument that belongs to the lute family. It is an ancestor of the Arabic oud, which appeared in Spain in the 8th century during the Arab conquest of the Iberian Peninsula and then spread eastwards to other countries in Western Europe. The name mandolin (known since 1634) is a diminutive form of the word mandola (known since 1235), meaning it is a smaller instrument. Unlike the “baroque mandolin”, the modern mandolin, which was invented in the 18th century and improved in the 19th century, has metal strings and peg mechanics which increase the volume of the resonating body.

The instrument was purchased when Evgenia decided to broaden the horizons of her musicality and to immerse herself more in her Western European repertoire.

The domra is a traditional Russian, Ukrainian, and Belarusian plucked-string instrument that originated in the Middle Ages. It has a round body and three or four strings, picked with a plectrum. It is known for its tremolo sound. The three-stringed domra is traditionally used in Russia, while the four-stringed domra is most common in Belarus and Ukraine. It was widely used by the “Skomorokhi” (wandering minstrels) in Russia in the 16th and 17th centuries, but disappeared under persecution by the church and civil authorities. In 1896, Vasiliy Andreev settled on the appearance of the modern domra, and a family of orchestral domras was created in the early 20th century.

The instrument was purchased when Evgenia entered music school in St. Petersburg. The warm and relatively matte timbre of the domra immediately was much to the young artist’s liking and exerted a considerable influence on her performance technique.

The guitar has a long history dating back to ancient civilisations, and emerged more or less in its modern form in 16th-century Spain. It has become one of the most popular and versatile musical instruments, finding its place in a wide variety of styles and genres. The Brazilian seven-string guitar is an acoustic guitar used primarily in choro and samba, introduced to Brazil in the late 19th century. It is typically tuned like a classical guitar, but with an additional C, B or A below the low E.

The special design of this particular instrument was conceived by the Lithuanian luthier Max Cuker, from whom Vladimir ordered it. An additional bass string has been added to expand the range of the instrument, as per the master craftsman’s design.