Kyiv Opera conductor Kostiantyn Starovytskyi has died on the frontlines.

The conductor was killed in battle defending his home country from the Russian invasion.

Starovytskyi was born on Oct. 30, 1982 in the town of Brovary and graduated from the orchestra department of Ukraine’s National Music Academy. He went on to work with the Kyiv Opera where he staged Gaetano Donizetti’s comic opera “Rita” and received four nominations for the Kyiv Pectoral 2016 theatre award.

During the first days of the invasion, the conductor served as a senior rifleman in a company unit defending the Brovary district territorial center and then served in Kharkiv Oblast.

He is survived by his daughter, Yeva, his wife Snizhana, and his elderly mother.

In a statement, Ukraine’s National Academic Brass Orchestra said on Facebook, “Today the orchestra suffered an irreparable loss. Our colleague Kostiantyn Starovytskyi was killed while defending us, defending the entire Ukraine, on the Kramatorsk front.”