Who is Max Korzh, the artist from Belarus who brings 39,000 foreign spectators to the National Arena: “The largest number of foreign tourists brought to an event in Romania”
An artist from Belarus, almost unknown in Romania, managed to sell all the tickets at the National Arena, for the concert he will perform on May 23 at the National Arena, setting a record for a solo artist at a stadium in Bucharest.
- The event was sold out in less than a week.
- “Out of the total of over 42,000 tickets sold, almost 39,000 are from other countries, such as Ukraine, Poland, the Republic of Moldova”, says Ioana Călimănescu, the organizer of the concert.
- Max Korzh's concert in Bucharest was the reason why no football match will be played in Bucharest on Saturday.
- Because most of the police forces will be gathered in the area of the National Arena.
- But who is Max Korzh, the artist who achieved this feat.
- And we will also talk about why checks have already started in the stadium area, what happened at a recent concert.
Maksim Anatolyevich Korzh (aka Max Korzh) is 37 years old and was born in the city of Luninets in Belarus.
He moved to Minsk at an early age, where he was sent by his parents to a music school. At 16, he was already playing in a band, and he recorded his first solo track while studying at the Belarusian State University.
In his third year of college, he decided to quit his studies and focus on his music career, borrowed $300 from his mother, went to a studio and recorded the song “Nebo Pomozhet Nam” (“Heaven will help us”), which he posted on VKontakte, Russia's largest social network, in 2012.
Shortly thereafter, he was drafted into the army. When he returned from military service, he found out that the song had gone viral and was very popular in Belarus. The song “Nebo Pomozhet Nam” (“Heaven Will Help Us”) attracted a large number of fans and began to be played on the radio.
In 2013, Korzh became the first Belarusian artist to perform a sold out concert in Minsk-Arena in front of 13,000 people.
From here, his popularity continued to grow, and his songs in Russian brought him fans from countries such as Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Germany, Kazakhstan, the Czech Republic, etc. In large part, his success is due to the fact that he addresses in his music very common themes for the new generations in Slavic countries who grew up in societies where freedom was or is problematic, where the future was always uncertain and full of anxieties.
How Max Korzh became a symbol
During the anti-Lukashenko protests of 2020, Max Korzh's music began circulating obsessively on Telegram and social media, becoming the unofficial soundtrack of the uprising.
Not because the artist called people to the streets or sent direct political messages. His lyrics already spoke of escape, of hopelessness, of freedom and of people crushed by a violent, repressive system.
For a whole generation of Belarusians, these began to sound more like something that unites them, like a thought that was found in each of them. During those tense months, Korzh became a symbol for many.
His music accompanied clips of protesters being beaten, arrests and night marches through Minsk. However, not everyone looked up to him with admiration. Some of the opponents of the regime considered him too cautious, too careful not to permanently break the relationship with the Russian market and too hesitant to condemn Alexander Lukashenko's regime head-on.
When the war started he canceled his concerts in Russia and Belarus
This changed in June 2022, when he released the song “Свой дом” (“My House”). By then, Ukraine was already fiercely resisting the Russian invasion, and the world was beginning to realize that this war was not going to be a short one.
In the song's lyrics, Max talks about the generation that grew up in relative peace but found themselves thrown into a war they don't understand, and the next generation that may never know peace.
After the outbreak of the conflict, he canceled all planned concerts in Russia and Belarus. And he didn't sing again for a long time after the concert in Odessa, from 2021.
After releasing the song “My Home”, publicly expressing support for Ukraine and raising the white-red-white flag (a historical symbol of Belarusian resistance against the Lukashenko regime) on stage during a concert outside the country, the Belarusian authorities invited him for a “polite discussion”.
It was the signal that Max was no longer tolerated by Lukashenko. In 2024 he left Belarus. Russia has also blacklisted him.
At his concerts, Max now gives speeches against the war in Ukraine, against the atrocities committed by Russia. “No father raises his son to be torn apart… We have to stop this, friends,” was one of his messages at the 2025 concert in Warsaw, before joining the crowd in chanting “Stop the war!”.
What happened in Warsaw at the Max Korzh concert in 2025
On 9 August 2025, rapper Max Korzh performed a concert at the PGE Narodowy Stadium in Warsaw in front of 60,000 people, which ended in a major scandal, caused by crowd chaos, mass arrests and the public display of a controversial flag of Ukrainian nationalism.
Just before the show began, thousands of fans gathered in a spontaneous, unorganized meeting. Inside the stadium, spectators caused a security breach by jumping over barriers and descending from the grandstand areas onto the main pitch.
Polish authorities detained 109 people for crimes such as drug possession, possession of pyrotechnic materials, assaulting security guards and trespassing. At least 50 people were fined.
Outrage appeared online and in the Polish political environment after some participants displayed the black-and-red flag of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA). This organization is highly controversial in Poland because of its role in the Volhynia massacres of the 1940s.
Also, at that time, after the concert, Donald Tusk announced that 63 foreign citizens (57 Ukrainians and 6 Belarusians) were deported and banned from entering Poland and the entire Schengen area due to the incidents caused at Max Korzh's concert, even being suspected of Russia's involvement in trying to create tensions between Poles and Ukrainians.
However, The Kyiv Independent had a reaction then and wrote that the black-red flag has existed since before the UPA and is often used in Ukraine now as a symbol of resistance against the Russian invasion.
The incidents at the Warsaw concert had other effects as well. For example, Max Korzh later stated that the unfortunate events in Poland were the reason why the authorities in the city of Almaty finally canceled the concert that was supposed to take place in September 2025 in Kazakhstan.
“It has an extremely loyal community”
In a response to HotNews.ro, Ioana Călimănescu, Marketing & Communication Manager at Emagic, the organizer of the Max Korzh concert at the National Arena, says that more than 42,000 tickets were sold, and the event was sold out in less than a week. It is a record for a solo artist at a stadium in Bucharest.
“Max Korzh is an artist with an extremely strong community internationally, even if he does not have a classical mainstream exposure in Romania. He has an extremely loyal community and a strong pacifist message, which resonates a lot with his audience”, says Ioana Călimănescu.
She also confirms that the audience in Romania will be extremely small compared to the huge number of fans who are expected to come from other countries.
“Out of the total of over 42,000 tickets sold, approximately 3,000 were purchased from Romania, and almost 39,000 from other countries,” says Ioana Călimănescu. Most participants come from Ukraine, Poland, the Republic of Moldova and Germany. However, in total there will be spectators from 85 countries, including more “exotic” destinations such as New Zealand, the Faroe Islands or Zimbabwe.
“Practically, we are talking about the largest flow of foreign tourists attracted to an event organized in Romania. This influx confirms the potential of cultural tourism: occupied hotels, full restaurants, the use of transport and retail consumption, which generates an economic impact estimated at hundreds of thousands of euros in the local economy. It is yet another argument for supporting large-scale events and for investing in a modern multipurpose hall dedicated to major productions in Bucharest”, Ioana also stated Călimănescu for HotNews.ro.
Checks have already started in the stadium area
Regarding security measures, the organizers say that the number of troops and checkpoints are sized to ensure safe flows and optimal access times.
“We are not talking about 'exceptions', but the standard of work for major events. For example, last week, at the Metallica concert, we applied the same type of protocol for a record audience of 65,000 participants”, says Ioana Călimănescu.
However, there has been a large number of gendarmes around the National Arena since Tuesday, according to residents of the area.
They patrol the area of Bessarabia boulevard, and the residents of the area said that they even saw crews searching suspicious cars. An impressive number of law enforcement is expected to be in the area on Saturday.
