DAN AUVIL
It was love at first sight when Dan saw the large, two-headed drum called the tupan 30 years ago...and he's been playing Balkan percussion ever since. He was a founding member of Édessa and Ziyiá and has toured and taught internationally
JULIANA GRAFFAGNA has been singing traditional Balkan music since 1988. As vocalist and music director of the internationally acclaimed women’s ensemble Kitka (www.kitka.org) Juliana performed extensively throughout the U.S., with a couple of side tours to Bulgaria and Ukraine, and made numerous recordings. She has studied Eastern European vocal technique with master singers Tzvetanka Varimezova, Mariana Savodska, Donka Koleva, Carl Linich, Merita Halili and Christos Govetas. Juliana is also an Orff-Schulwerk trained elementary school music and piano teacher.
GARI HEGEDUS plays violin, viola and a variety of stringed instruments from Greece and Turkey including lauoto, oud, saz and hand drums. Gari plays in the duo Teslim with violinist Kaila Flexer, and performs with world music group Stellamara (www.stellamarra.com) and Persian vocalist Hamed Nikpay (www.hamednikpay.com). He has studied with oud master Naseer Shamma and has recorded and performed with Ross Daly. He has toured with the Mevlevi Dervish (Sufi) Order of America and continues to participate in Turkish ceremonial and devotional gatherings around the country.
PETER JAQUES (www.huzzam.com) has been a fixture of the Bay Area Near Eastern music scene since 1995. His style combines traditional Turkish, Greek, & Balkan Rom styles with his own, deeply soulful approach. He performs principally on the Bb clarinet & trumpet, as well as Turkish G clarinet, alto saxophone, & Egyptian nay (reed flute). Peter also directs the Brass Menažeri Balkan Brass Band (www.brassmenazeri.com), and plays with Dan Cantrell's Megaband (www.bellowhead.com), Stellamara, a Middle-eastern/Balkan/world fusion ensemble (www.stellamara.com), and Gamelan X, a hybrid processional gamelan orchestra based on traditional Balinese baleganjur
(www.gamelanx.com)
BILL LANPHIER is a bass player and writer with an incredibly diverse musical background. In addition to playing with Balkan master musicians Yasko Argirov, Nikolay Kolev, Ivan Milev, Nedyalko Nedyalkov, Georgi Petrov and Christos Govetas, Bill toured with Madonna on the “Virgin Tour” and has performed with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Rickie Lee Jones, The Rippingtons, Art Garfunkle and Linda Ronstadt. Bill recent band adventures include Bay Area favorites Trio Mopmu, The Toids and Izvorno Icepick.
