Our biggest project ever!
I’m excited to announce the biggest project I’ve ever undertaken: a three-week tour of the Western United States with my Transylvanian band!

Last summer, I released an album called “In a Sea of Stars,” featuring three fantastic musicians from Transylvania with whom I started collaborating in 2021 when I was living in Romania on a Fulbright grant: Károly Dénes (bass), Kálmán Szopos (brácsa) and Gergely Réman (cimbalom). Recorded live in historic synagogue spaces across Transylvania, “In a Sea of Stars” landed some critical acclaim.

I’ve long dreamed of bringing these colleagues on a US tour. Musically, what Kálmán, Károly and Gergő have to offer is unique to American audiences. They play instruments that are not often seen in the US (like the brácsa, a chordal viola, and the cimbalom, a giant dulcimer) in a powerful, intense style that’s unlike any other string band music I’ve heard. 

More importantly, though, they bring US audiences a novel perspective. They grew up in Transylvania in the 90s, a tumultuous period of rapid change following the revolution against, and subsequent overthrow of, the dictator Ceaușescu. They have a keen sense of history, and life stories to share that we don’t often get to hear in the States. 

Americans are currently living in an environment that urges us to ignore history and to decrease our ties to the rest of the world. However, musicians and supporters of the arts know that isolation doesn’t serve us. Collaboration across cultures helps to keep our local scenes fresh, relevant and current. Music in particular is a medium that has always flowed over borders, bridging divides like no other art form can. And these musicians have shared so much of their culture with me, I long to share my home culture with them in return.

That’s why I think this tour is particularly important at this moment in time. If you agree, I humbly ask for your help.
 

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I’ll unveil the full schedule with venue info soon! 

Feb 16-19: Boise, ID (residency at College of Idaho) 

Feb 21: Portland, OR 

Feb 22: Olympia, WA 

Feb 23-24: Eugene, OR (residency at the University of Oregon) 

Feb 25: Ashland, OR 

Feb 26: San Francisco, CA 

Feb 27: Santa Cruz, CA 

Mar 1: Moab, UT 

Mar 3: Grand Junction, CO

Mar 4: Granby, CO

Mar 5: Boulder, CO

Mar 7: Denver, CO

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We need your help to make this tour happen. 

We are lucky to have the support of some amazing institutional and individual sponsors. However, we need additional help in order to pay for upfront costs. 

The good news is, sustaining sponsor Noah Youngs has graciously offered $5,000 as a matching grant. That means if your contribution is part of the first $5,000 received, your donation will have 2x the impact!

Our largest up-front costs are for fees associated with getting P-3 artist visas for Kálmán, Károly and Gergő. These costs have already totaled almost $7000. We are partnering with Tamizdat/ Covey Law, widely recognized as one of the best law firms for international artists, to make sure every step of this process is done to the absolute best of our ability. 

Other costs include van rentals, instrument rentals, and some documentation (sound recording).

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$3810: Visa filing fees and legal costs

$2805: Cost to upgrade our visa petition to Premium Processing to move it through USCIS’s system faster. While not designed as a requirement, this fee has become more and more necessary in the last few years, and we were advised by our lawyers to pay it. 

$615: Consular interview fees

$4000: Van rental (estimated). It’s very important that we have all-wheel drive and solid insurance coverage for this trip, which adds to the cost. 

$550: gas (estimated, based on current gas prices)

$1200: cimbalom rental 

$920: bass rental 

$680: 8 hours of studio time at Mighty Fine Studios in Denver. By the end of the 3-week tour, the band will sound tighter than ever, so it will be an optimal time to document some new pieces. 

$700: guest artist for recording. If logistics work out, my pie-in-the-sky goal would be to bring in Isabel Frey, Vienna-based Yiddish singer and composer, to record a few new vocal pieces with us in the studio.

Total: $15280

— food 

— hotels (possibly necessary for one or two days on tour when homestays may not be feasible)

— more studio time will be required, + engineers

— custom graphic design ($900 from acclaimed Berlin-based artist Eyal Davidovitch) 

— professional photography 

— video recording

— mixing and mastering for sound recordings 

Those costs will be paid by me out-of-pocket, or if necessary out of the earnings we get from concerts. 

So the true total of our costs for this tour will likely be closer to $25,000-$30,000. I chose $15,000 as the goal for this campaign because it's a more achievable target which covers our most crucial needs for this tour. 

We’d like to thank our institutional sponsors: the College of Idaho Neilsen Lecture Series in Jewish Studies and the University of Oregon World Music Series, as well as sustaining sponsor Noah Youngs. 

Full list of venues who are graciously hosting us coming soon.

As always, thank you in advance for your consideration for this project. Everything we do is possible only with the support of our community.  

Sincerely,
Zoë