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On November 11 and 12th, Ljova appeared in the inaugural season of the Cedar Lake Ensemble, a new modern dance troupe led by
Benoit-Swan Pouffer. Ljova played selections from Bach's Cello Suites, accompanied by DJ Stefano Zazzera.

Ljova + Inna made their way to Moscow for the immensely powerful festival celebrating the music + life of Ljova's father, Alexander Zhurbin, and the 60th year of his birth.

For two weeks, the city was filled with Papa's music, whether it were for film, theatre, or the concert stage. Tons of fun was had (by us) and tons of drinks were consumed (primarily by others). Moscow is definitely a happenin' place. (If you can swing it.)

Full report soon, meanwhile, pictures can be found at Fotki

Russian-born New York-bred film composer LJOVA has recently wrapped scoring the film "MOTHER", written and directed by Michael P. DiPaolo. The film is based on the real life story of Ed Gein (familiar to horror fans as the model for "PSYCHO" and "TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE"), and contains almost no dialogue - rather, everything is told through images, music and sound effects.

The score features an extremely ambitious and expressive soundtrack, with the instrumentation of strings (performed by Ljova), vocals (performed by Vlada Tomova) and the percussive sounds of Timothy Quigley.

Coming soon! Meanwhile, view the trailers!

This summer, Ljova was privileged to be one of six fellows in the Sundance Institute's Film Composers Lab.

As part of the 2-week workshop, Ljova had a chance to score bits from old and upcoming films, and to receive guidance from such Hollywood iconoclast film composers as James Newton Howard, George Clinton and Jeff Beal, as well as "semitic electronica" composer Osvaldo Golijov, the film editor Joe ("Grizzly Man") Bini, and director John ("Pecker") Waters.

Good fun, weak coffee, mediocre vegetarian food, and much new music was shared by all.

A few pictures can be found at Fotki

Ljova participates in the premiere of Osvaldo Golijov's groundbreaking song cycle Ayre at Zankel Hall, in a hand-picked ensemble featuring soprano Dawn Upshaw, guitarist/composer Gustavo Santaolalla, clarinettist David Krakauer, accordionist Michael Ward-Bergeman, laptop-ist/composer Jeremy Flower, flutist Susan Palma-Nidel, cellist Priscilla Lee and bassist Mark Dresser. (Also on the program were the Folk Songs arranged by Luciano Berio, with percussionists Maya Gunji and Joseph Gramley.)
(This Zankel Hall concert was broadcast on NPR and you can listen to it at this NPR website!)

Ljova joined forces with longtime friend and collaborator Jakub Omsky (now a professor of Cello in Wichita, KS) to form JOINT CUSTODY, a violin/cello duo which performs a variety of repertoire. On their debut tour of California, they performed the musics of Bach, Bartok, Beethoven, Chopin, Lutoslawski, Mozart, Schickele, as well as a selection of jazz standards and free improvisations.

Visit The Joint Custody Duo on MySpace!

Yo-Yo Ma & the Silk Road Project commissioned from Ljova five arrangements of Gypsy tunes and premiere them on their January US tour, plus one co-authored with Osvaldo Golijov!
"...there's no denying the ingenuity and skill of the arrangements, the native vitality of the music and the brilliance of the playing."
-Richard Dyer, Boston Globe // January 7, 2004

(We don't want you to feel like this website came out of the blue. Thus, here are some news from the archives - how we got here.. or, how YOU got here, possibly.)