MARICHKA MARCZYK is a well-known singer, folklorist, activist and musician with the Ukrainian-Canadian band Balaklava Blues and Lemon Bucket Orkestra. Since 2014, she has lived in Toronto, Canada, with her family—she is the mother of four children.

In 2002, Marichka graduated from the National Music Academy of Ukraine with a Major in Ethnomusicology/Folklore Music. Marichka is the only Ukrainian singer in North America who truthfully and deeply represents the original tradition of folk singing.

Together with her husband Mark Marczyk, Marichka's creative work and performances have won numerous international awards, including the First Edinburgh Fringe Festival award (2016), the Amnesty award, two Dora awards (2017), and Stingray Rising stars award (2021). Her music has also received many stunning reviews in some of the world's most influential media outlets including The New York Times, The Guardian, Toronto Star and others.

She is known for the famous revolutionary folk opera "Counting Sheep", which she co-directed together with her husband, Mark Marczyk.

In the winter of 2022, Marichka performed in as part of the concert "Dogs of Europe" at the legendary Barbican Center in London. Her voice sounded as part of "Ancestors & Elders”, a large-scale historical performance by the Canadian-Ukrainian company Shumka Dancers in Edmonton. In the summer of 2022, Marichka sang before 60,000 people at the "Colours of Ostrava" festival in the Czech Republic.

In May of 2021, during the pandemic, Marichka built the digital archive “Folk songs of Ukraine,” an educational project for students in Ukraine and around the world consisting of audio materials collected by folklorists over the past half century. The project is supported by the Ukrainian-Canadian Research and Documentation Center and Music Academies of Ukraine in Lviv and Kyiv. During the Russian-Ukrainian war, the archive was destroyed several times by cyber attackers, confirming attempts at the genocide of Ukrainians through the destruction of traditions and culture.

Marichka performed frequently for soldiers and in military hospitals at the front line in Eastern Ukraine from 2014 to 2019.

Marichka also teaches Ukrainian traditional songs in order to further develop a special vocal technique of Ukrainian polyphony called "open voice". This unique singing style was developed over centuries in the plains of central and eastern Ukraine. Marichka's teaching and singing repertoire is over 500 years old and has been collected over the past 20 years from various ethnographic field expeditions by the renowned folk ensemble Bozhychi, of which Marczyk is a founding member.

In December of 2022, Marichka performed in Carnegie hall as an soloist singer with her arrangement of folk song for 3 choirs as part of a concert dedicated to the 100-year anniversary of the first performance of Mykola Leontovych’s legendary "Shchedryk”, known throughout the world as "Carol of the bells”.

In 2023 Marichka joined Ukrainian Army Forces as a volunteer combat medic in a war zone in Eastern Ukraine.