I'm very excited to finally announce a few shows coming up.  It's been almost exactly two years since I had to cancel all my performances due to the pandemic, and more than anything, I've missed live events—playing music with people, for people, all in the same room.   The energy in the room when making music and communicating with people in person, fostering a real human interaction through music—that is why I make music, to create those moments of connection.   

The first gig to get canceled was at Barbes, March 13, 2020, followed by Sharq Attack, and a planned show at the Owl.  So it is exciting to be performing with many of the musicians from those canceled performances at many of the same venues.   

Marandi Hostetter is an amazing violinist and dear friend who has been a key part of many of my musical projects of the past decade, including Sharq Attack and the Bil Afrah Project (as well as being a co-founder of Brooklyn Maqam), we'll be performing together at WCSU and Barbes.  Philip Mayer likewise is a stellar musician and has been a great friend and collaborator both with Sharq Attack and Nashaz, as well as my guitar trio and many other projects with Matt Darriau and others.  Eric Allen is a brilliant cellist with wide-ranging tastes, we had just started working together a little bit before the pandemic (one of our last gigs was with the talented Syrian singer Nano Raies at Drom in the East Village).  He and Marandi were supposed to play with me on the aforementioned 2020 gig at Barbes, so it's exciting that the three of us (plus Philip) will be back at Barbes almost two years to the day after our canceled event.  New friend and talented violinist Sarah Mueller will be joining us at the Owl, I look forward to further collaborations with her—and I'm thrilled to be back at the Owl, one of my favorite venues. 

Additionally, I'm looking forward to performing with Samer Ali and Takht al-Nagham at Roulette.  This will be an amazing evening of Syrian music with a terrific band!

Hope to see some old friends and some new ones!

Sharq Attack at Western Connecticut State University, March 3
Near East River Ensemble at Barbes, March 7
Takht al-Nagham at Roulette, March 12
Brian Prunka & Strings at the Owl Music Parlor, March 31

More details on all events here.