Polina Tarasenko was born in 2001 in Kherson, Ukraine.

Between 2019 – 2022 she studied at the Hochschule für Musik, Theater und Medien Hannover with professor Jonas Bylund and then continued her studies at the Hochschule Bern with professor Ian Bousfield where she graduated with highest honours in July 2024. She currently is a member of the Mendelssohn Academy at the Gewandhaus Orchestra Leipzig.

Polina holds scholarships from various foundations; since the beginning of her studies in Germany she has won several prizes at many international trombone competitions in Italy, France, Germany and the USA. She is a prize winner of the International Aeolus Wind Competition 2023 and has received three special prizes at the International ARD Competition in 2022.

In 2020/2021, Polina played with the NDR Radio Philharmonie Hannover  and was “debut artist in residence” at the Nikolaisaal Potsdam. Invitations in 2022/2023 led her to Barcelona, to the Konzerthaus Dortmund, the Philharmonie Luxembourg, the Tonhalle Zürich and to orchestras such as the Brandenburgisches Staatsorchester Frankfurt (Oder) and the Baden-Badener Philharmonie. In 2023/2024 she returned to the Philharmonie Luxembourg and gave her debut in Poland, with the Düsseldorfer Symphoniker, the Symphony Orchestra Münster, the Magdeburg Philharmonic Orchestra and the Erfurt Philharmonic Orchestra under Thomas Sanderling. In 2024/2025, she will return to the Philharmonie Luxemburg and will give her debut in Great Britain and in the Elbphil- harmonie Hamburg. In January 2025,  she will go on an extensive tour with the Symphony Orchestra Göttingen and Nicholas Milton and in June 2025 she will play five concerts with the Schleswig- Holsteinisches Sinfonieorchester Flensburg.

Polina Tarasenko is also a devoted chamber musician. In July 2023, she was invited to the Festival Mecklenburg-Vorpommern at Schloss Bothmer and to the Gezeitenkonzerte in Ostfriesland. In 2021, she founded together with fellow students from Hannover the Anima Trombone Quartet. The quartet was awarded the first prize at the International Littin Competition for Trombone Quartet in Frankfurt/Main in September 2024.

Polina began to play music at the age of five, first on a drum kit, then on the saxophone, trumpet and trombone in the children’s jazz group “Dixieland” in the Kherson Palace of Children’s and Youth Creativity. As part of “Dixieland”, she regularly performed at concerts and festivals, not only in Ukraine but also abroad.

In 2011, Polina started to be taught via Skype by the trombonist Alexandr Nyankin who at that time lived in Taiwan. At the Moscow Rotary Competition in 2013, she received two prizes and was invited to study at the Gnessin Moscow Special School of Music in the main specialty trombone and electives saxophone, trumpet, composition, piano and organ. She was honored as the best student of the school in 2015 and graduated there in 2018 with highest honors.

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