Kazband

This fiery instrumental trio performs the music of Karen Kyriakou in the style of Eastern European dance traditions. Kazband has exhausted audiences around Melbourne beyond with their energetic stage antics and a few good stories to tell! Expect to be entertained with music full of Klezmer and Gypsy flavours. Fiddle player Karen Kyriakou, clarinettist Jason Day and accordion player Dave Evans make this group an energetic trio – full of toe tapping goodness!

Kazband was the runner up in the 2005 MusicOz Awards for ‘Best World Music Group’, and Karen won the Port Fairy Tune Writing Competition, also in 2005, with her tune ‘Cockroach’.

Karen Kyriakou, Fiddle

Since completing her Bachelor of Music Education at the University of Melbourne in 1993, Karen has worked exclusively as a musician and a music educator and composer. The involvement of Karen in the Folk music circuit has been extensive, having performed at nearly all the major folk festivals in Australia. Karen is no stranger to different styles and genres of music, being classically trained, she has also performed with blues artists, bluegrass bands, Celtic bands, Klezmer ensembles, and musical theatre. Now called upon as a freelance composer, Karen is currently engaged with two projects with Polyglot Theatre company as their resident composer, she won the Tim Whelan tune writing award at Port Fairy folk Festival in 2005, the same year that her tune ‘Cockroach’ became runner up in the MusicOz awards in the world music category. Karen currently is a member of Ogham Soup Celtic band (currently with Music Viva In Schools program), Shenanigans – international folk music and KAZBAND – with original and traditional gypsy tunes.

Jason Day, Clarinet

Jason graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts in 1992 as a fully trained classical clarinettist. The next day, he realized he didn’t want to be one! Luckily he discovered that clarinet was a popular folk instrument in far-away countries, with melodies and rhythms more exciting than he’d ever heard before. Since then he has been a founding member of ARIA nominated group ‘Akin’, clarinettist for Jewish band ‘Havana Moon’, and has performed at festivals across Australia and Europe on clarinet, didgeridoo, Irish tin whistles and a little bit of harmonic singing. He traveled to Bulgaria in 2001 to study clarinet with Kostadin Atanasov, and also met his hero Ivo Papasov who passed on a few tips! He has toured extensively around Ireland with his tin whistle and a fold-up didgeridoo, performing Celtic music in as many sessions as possible. Jason currently teaches clarinet at St Leonard’s College, Toorak College and Yarra Valley Grammar and performs with Irish group ‘Ogham Soup’ acoustic ambient ensemble ‘Aajinta’, gypsy ensemble ‘Kazband’ and world groove ensemble ‘Rivertribe’.

Dave Evans, Accordion

Dave has been playing piano accordion professionally for more than twenty years. He has performed in a wide variety of styles such as jazz, rock, zydeco, cabaret, klezmer and world. A founding member of The Band Who Knew Too Much in 1990, who have released three CDs and toured North America, Canada, Western Europe and the U.K. in 1994, and Scandinavia in 2000, 2002 and 2004. Recording credits include Cindy Boste, Ruby Hunter, Mark Seymour and nearly all the groups he’s performed with. Recently he’s playing with Dan Warner, Barb Waters and the Mothers of Pearl, Spielazoi, Bric-a-Brac (Ced Le Meledo), Miss Josephine’s Cabaret, Stella and the Night Sky and performing a live score for that classic old Australian silent film “The Sentimental Bloke” with Jen Anderson and Dan Warner.