Mid-day Mantra: Zoe Rahman
We’re finishing our 2022 season with the incredible Zoe Rahman.
Zoe Rahman was born in Chichester, UK, to a Bengali father and English mother, and studied classical piano at the Royal Academy of Music. Later she took a music degree at Oxford University and then won a scholarship to study jazz performance at Berklee College of Music, Boston, where she studied with the inspirational pianist JoAnne Brackeen.
Zoe’s albums have won many awards and acclaim including a MOBO for best Jazz Act 2012 (a work of breathtaking musical imagination’, Metro), Mercury Award nomination in 2006, and ‘Jazz Album of the Year’ at the UK’s first Parliamentary Jazz Awards. Her fourth album, Where Rivers Meet, is a stunning collaboration with her brother Idris, exploring music from their Bengali heritage, which creates “a wholly original brand of Anglo-Asian music” (Sunday Times).
On Weds 8 December 2021, Zoe won the Ivor Novello ‘Impact Award’
More here ivorsacademy.com/nominee/zoe-rahman/
Accompanying Zoe Rahman will be Idris Rahman on Clarinet.
Zoe Rahman is a vibrant and highly individual pianist and composer, her style is deeply rooted in jazz yet it reflects her classical background, British/Bengali heritage and her very broad musical taste. Zoe is one of the brightest stars on the contemporary jazz scene.
Idris Rahman is a London-based saxophonist, clarinettist, singer, bass-player, composer and producer. He has co-led the band Soothsayers for nearly two decades and has co-written and co-produced their seven critically acclaimed albums, the most recent released on label Wah Wah 45s. Soothsayers have played at most major UK festivals and have toured widely throughout Europe and beyond.
Rahman has performed and recorded with a whole range of artists including Anoushka Shankar, Arun Ghosh, Julia Biel, Osibisa, Ayub Ogada, Oriole, Dodgy as well as with his sister Zoe Rahman, with whom he has toured and recorded extensively.
Photo by L. Wormsley
Mid-day Mantra concerts take place in Symphony Hall’s brand-new The Jennifer Blackwell Performance Space. The concerts are free but you must book a ticket to attend at www.BMusic.co.uk