Alice Zawadzki
@ the PizzaExpress Jazz Club
17 November 2017
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Biography
Alice Zawadzki is a vocalist, violinist, songwriter and composer
based in London. Her work as a performer, collaborator, composer
and speaker, has seen her gain considerable repute as “a
genuine original” (The Guardian), and a distinctive and
individual presence on the creative European music scene.
Anglo-Polish Alice’s rich musical background and “whimsical
hyper-creativity” (MOJO Magazine) converge into artistry
which draws upon her early exposure to New Orleans jazz and gospel
with the legendary Lillian Boutté who took a teenage Alice
under her wing, an extensive classical training as a violinist,
and a continuous exploration of improvisation, poetry, and folk
music from diverse traditions, “all propelled in a voice
of velvet suppleness and gutsy emotional power” (The
Arts Desk). She performs extensively as both a soloist and as a
collaborator, with headline performances at the major UK alternative
and jazz venues and festivals, including the Royal Albert Hall,
Ronnie Scott’s, the London Jazz Festival, the Vortex, Celtic
Connections, and internationally at festivals from Taipei International
Jazz Festival (Taiwan) to Coventry Calling (Massachusetts, USA)
to Sudtirol Jazz Festival (Italy), and more. She also performs and
collaborates at underground venues in the London scene and on unexpected
platforms, with a keenness to nourish music at its roots, and to
support inclusive community-wide music making.
She released her debut solo album “China Lane” (Whirlwind
Recordings) in 2014, a collection of original songs and arrangements
infused with modern, ancient and invented folklore, and featuring
some of Europe’s most celebrated musicians and improvisers.
China Lane was met with widespread critical acclaim, being made
Album of the Week by BBC Radio 3, and making the The Guardian’s
Best Albums End of Year List, described as “beguiling, unorthodox
and pure” by The Independent, and “a real force
to be reckoned with” by Jamie Cullum, who invited Alice
and her band to perform live on BBC Radio 2 at Maida Vale. The success
of China Lane also led to her nomination for British Vocalist of
the Year by both Jazz FM and the Parliamentary Jazz Awards in 2015,
and she was selected to take part in Take Five, the professional
development programme run by international music producers, Serious
Ltd, sponsored by the Performing Rights Society and Arts Council
England.
Her striking ability to perform across and transcend genres whilst
retaining her own expressive and intelligent musical style gives
her a unique accessibility, and her distinctive voice can be heard
on numerous film and television scores, including Disney’s
major motion picture African Cats, written by Nicholas Hooper, Charlie
Brooker’s Black Mirror (BBC). She also performs live as vocal
soloist with the Prague Philharmonic for George Fenton’s Planet
Earth Live in Concert, and as the vocal and fiddle soloist in James
Horner’s iconic score of the film Titanic, performed live
internationally with the Kansai Philharmonic, Osaka Symphony, Tokyo
Philharmonic, Moscow City Symphony Orchestra, and the St Petersburg
State Symphony Orchestra.
As an in-demand interpreter of new and unusual works, Alice has
had the privilege to premiere several new large-scale pieces, including
Daniel Cohens Reciprocity at the Ottawa Chamber Music Festival,
Alex Roth’s Arvoles Lloran Por Luvia at Battersea Music Hall,
Alya Al-Sultani’s Two Sisters: An Arabic Opera at the Ahbab
Festival in Cambridge, as well as performing exciting virtuosic
works for the voice including Louis Andriessen’s M is for
Man, Music and Mozart, with Sinfonia Viva.
She trained in jazz singing and composition and gained an MA at
the Royal Academy of Music, with a scholarship from the Musicians
Benevolent Fund, after completing undergraduate studies in classical
violin at the Royal Northern College of Music, where she also won
the Hilda Collens Prize and the Cove Park Emerging Artists Residency,
supported by the Jerwood Foundation and the Scottish Arts Council.
Alice has held several higher education posts as a teacher, and
delivered vocal and improvisation programs for the RNCM, Salford
University, the University of Kent, and the Engines Orchestra. She
has worked extensively for Live Music Now, a charity which takes
live music into places where it is hard to access, including special
needs schools, hospitals, care homes and prisons, and is currently
a core member of Play For Progress, an organization who provide
music workshops and friendship to unaccompanied teenagers who have
or are seeking refugee status in the UK.
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