Sophie Solomon: Klezmic Skeletons? Making new music from old bones
19 March 2007

Sophie Solomon is a tour de force. An extraordinary violin player with great energy both on and off stage, she has a natural, earthy Klezmer style, with the ability to fuse just about any kind of music together convincingly just on her violin.

Sophie will be taking workshop participants through some cool Klezmer licks and working out ways to turn them into new and exciting modern music of just about any style.

While studying History and Russian at Oxford University, Sophie not only DJed drum’n’bass, but also developed a passion for other kinds of music such as Russian, klezmer, East European and gypsy styles. She also travelled widely in Poland and Eastern Europe, absorbing new sounds and influences along the way.

Sophie's experiences led in 1999 to her becoming a founder member of Oi Va Voi, “one of the most exciting bands in Britain today” (Daily Telegraph). "With Oi Va Voi I came back to the violin on my own terms," she says. "...It was liberating because I had the technique but felt I'd lost the constraints that classical training imposes."

Famed for their live appearances and Sophie's on-stage pyrotechnics (one critic dubbed her 'the Keith Richards of the violin'), the band's debut album ‘Laughter Through Tears’ received rave reviews, was voted in the top 10 albums of 2004 by the New York Times, and won them two nominations in BBC Radio 3's annual awards for world music.

Sophie became increasingly in-demand, lending her violin playing to the likes of Rufus Wainwright, Heather Nova and Theodor Bikel and collaborating with Canadian hip-hop producer Socalled on the album ‘Solomon & Socalled's HipHopKhasene’ (released on the German-based Piranha label) which won the German Record Critics’ Award for Album of the Year 2004. She has also taught at London's School for Oriental and African Studies and is on the artistic advisory committee of the Genius of the Violin festival, the only such event in the world devoted entirely to the instrument.

A solo career which tied together her diverse musical interests was the next logical step. "I’ve always been fascinated and inspired by a rich tapestry of music and the solo record has given me the opportunity to explore this. There's a deep Russian influence, a North African vibe, a drunken underground Romanian late-night bar feel and a Tom Waits sleaze factor creeping in... I wanted an album that was diverse but had a cohesive voice, which is my violin."

Produced by Kevin Bacon and Jonathan Quarmby (Finley Quaye/Oi Va Voi/Ben Taylor) and Marius de Vries (Madonna/Bjork/David Gray and a host of films such as Moulin Rouge), three tracks have guest vocals. ‘A Light That Never Dies’ (listen) finds actor and fellow Russophile Ralph Fiennes lending his voice to words based on a poem by Russian Symbolist Alexander Blok. ‘Burnt By The Sun’ (listen), sung by Richard Hawley, ex Pulp and Longpigs guitarist and now one of the most talked about artists of 2005, is "based on Stalin's favourite tango and is the first thing I learned to play on the accordion," Sophie says. ‘Lazarus’ (listen) has a dark ambiguous lyric about "a knock-on the door in the middle of the night."

www.sophiesolomon.com