Khrystyna Mykhailichenko, 17, has been awarded a full bursary for four years to study piano at the Royal Academy of Music in London. Her 12-year-old sister, Sasha, a violinist, has a scholarship to become a weekly boarder at the Yehudi Menuhin School. Both feel that classical music helped them to face the trauma of abandoning their home with their mother.

  • If only every Ukrainian refugee was a musical prodigy, they wouldn’t risk being forced onto the street in countries that shelled out to turn their home into a war zone. But I guess when you compare it with the treatment of refugees from other countries to the US, UK, EU, etcetera, it’s a cakewalk.