Anna Lowenstein is one of the UK’s most sought-after musicians of the Klezmer fiddle tradition. Appearances have included live sessions on BBC Radio 3’s Music and an onstage role in the highly critically acclaimed production of Indecent alongside Musical Director and Clarinettist Merlin Shepherd. She has gigged, toured and taught across London and the UK, including Cecil Sharp House, Southbank Centre’s Friday Tonic series and The Jazz Cafe , Bridgewater Hall, Sage Gateshead, and multiple tours for the National Rural Touring Forum. She performs widely as part of Klezmer trio Loshn and has made up the faculty on both national and international workshops including Fiddlers On The Move – Belgium, Klezfest – London, KlezNorth – Derbyshire, Friling Festival – Austria. Her debut album, Through The Walls, is currently in production.

Despite the change, we are sure that the concert will be wonderful as we are making a double effort to make this spontaneous programme very exciting.

Polina Shepherd (voice, piano) grew up in a Russian Jewish home where songs were frequently sung at family celebrations. When living in Tatarstan and studying at the State Academy, she played Russia′s first klezmer band after Perestroika, and toured the world with her own quartet Ashkenazim. Now living in the UK, she leads choirs, collaborates with bands, orchestras, soloists, ensembles and performs internationally. Her compositions, including music for choirs, theatre, song settings for Yiddish poems are performed all over the world.

Expect an evening of improvisation, flare and fun. Those of you looking for heart-felt and passionate songs will be thrilled too. Performing both traditional and new compositions, they merge sounds of the Old World with sounds of the New.