Live Music & Film Screening; celebrating musical heritages from around the World, in a shared community event.
Huge thanks to everyone who came, supported or helped in anyway at Winter Warmer, our collaboration with Brighton and Hove City Libraries and communities across the city.
The day started with a well attended film screening of the Stone Flowers documentary
Every musician bought some magic with them; people danced, laughed, shed a tear and shared together.
Photographs by Manal Gharezeddin
Last year Manal completed a BA Honours Degree in photography at Brighton University. She is originally from Syria, her work explores Syrian food, the stories of people who are refugees and food as a way to share, celebrate culture and talk about people’s stories and history. She has also written a book of Syrian food recipes, which she sold to raise funds for people affected by the war in Syria. Huge thanks to Manal for her continuing work documenting our events. Manal is also part of an ongoing project documenting community projects with Jubilee Library.
Huge thanks to everyone who came, supported or helped in anyway at Winter Warmer, our collaboration with Brighton and Hove City Libraries and communities across the city.
The day started with a well attended film screening of the Stone Flowers documentary
Every musician bought some magic with them; people danced, laughed, shed a tear and shared together.
Musicians on the day:
Ilesh & Rakesh
Klezmer Quartet (Polina Shepherd, Fran and Flora, Anna Lowenstein)
Thanks to all the supporting community organisations
Hummingbird Project/Global Youth Club
Hopeful Solidarities/Story Tree (See Brighton Bound book)
Freedom From Torture Sussex University
Huge thanks to everyone at Jubilee Library for all their work on this event, and our previous events in the library.
This event was funded by National Lottery Community Fund
Music recordings to follow
Stone Flowers Documentary
A Documentary about the Power of Music by Music Action International award-winning film made by James Sandy, following the lives and music of Stone Flowers, a refugee music collective of torture survivors from across the globe, now based in NW England.
Artists details:
Klezmer Quartet: Polina Shepherd + Fran & Flora + Anna Lowenstein
Fran & Flora
Multi-award-nominated experimental/folk duo Fran & Flora captivate audiences with their reinventions of traditional Eastern European melodies and songs. Francesca Ter-Berg (cello/vox) and Flora Curzon (violin/vox) draw inspiration from archival recordings, recovered manuscripts and studying with traditional masters, infusing source material with drones, loops, free improvisation and electronics to create a “border-defying” aesthetic (Mojo).
Anna Lowenstein
Anna is one of the UK’s most sought-after performers and teachers of the Klezmer fiddle
tradition.
Notable appearances have included live sessions on BBC Radion 3’s Music and
an onstage role in the highly critically acclaimed production of Indecent alongside Musical
Director and Clarinetist 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.
Polina Shepherd
Polina is a composer, performer, educator and cultural activist originally from Siberia, now living in Brighton UK. She grew up with singing at family gatherings where she accompanied her grandfather, a WWII veteran and her whole Cossack / Jewish family from the age of 7. Since moving to the UK in 2003 has been performing, teaching, composing and touring with various projects internationally.
Her singing, though based on traditional forms, cuts a sound deeply rooted in east European Jewish and Russian folk. Growing up in Tatarstan also placed her close to Islamic ornamentation and timbre, which can be heard in her unique vocal style.
Kareem Samara
Kareem Samara is an improviser and composer from London.
He has worked extensively in theatre as a composer and his various projects have seen him tour across the United States and Europe. He combines the Oud and Arabic percussion, with loopers and samplers to create a new dialogue between himself and technology, between the past, the present and the future. Honouring all his musical traditions, he challenges the empty political posturing of the music industry and uses his music to advocate for a free Palestine through collective liberation.
Currently he is the Arabic music advisor on the forthcoming musical ‘The Shadow World’ based on the award winning arms trade expose book and film.
Theatre credits include ‘Hakawatis’ Shakespeare’s Globe, ‘A History of Water in the Middle East’ Royal Court, ‘You Bury Me’ Bristol Old Vic, ‘The Chronicles of Majnoon Leila’ The Gate Theatre, ‘Wipe These Tears’ Camden Peoples Theatre.
Trio Akima
Inspirations from World Folk music, with spontaneous creative improvisation
Joseph Philogene :
Kamele N’goni 8 string west African harp
North African frame drums
Indian bells and shakers.
Indonesian jaws harp
Nepalese singing bowls.
Geoff Hearn:
Flutes: Shakuhachi (Japanese bamboo flute) Native American ‘love flutes’ in various different woods and keys, eagle bone flute and bird callers,western alto flute and soprano saxophone.
Hugh Bance:
Acoustic and electric guitar.
Ilesh Patel and Jayesh Vaduhul
Ilesh Patel learnt Sitar initially from Sri Sachinda Dasgupta. At present, he is learning from Pandit Arvid Parikh (India) and Ustad Mehboob Nadim (UK)
He has is a popular performer at cultural events, and weddings and was a regular on the main stage at Crawley International Mela Festival.
Jayesh Vaduhul is well known UK based Tabla player and plays with Ilesh at many events.
Mavka Singer
Ukrainian Singer songwriter, sharing Ukrainian music and culture, living in Britain since 2022
Best Foot Music | Refugee & Migrant Music | Brighton, UK 