Photo credit: Alice End
Flora Curzon is an award-winning violinist based in London. She plays western classical music from baroque to contemporary, Klezmer / Yiddish music, experimental and improvised music, and is particularly interested in projects where genres intersect and art forms collide. She plays on both 'modern' (metal string) and 'historical' (gut string) violins, sings, and works with live electronics.
Her unique interests and skills have led her towards a wide range of performance opportunities from small ensemble concerts to large scale theatre/dance and mixed media projects. These include shows with her critically acclaimed experimental folk duo Fran & Flora (with cellist Francesca Ter-Berg), London Klezmer Quartet, Barokksolistene (Siwan, Dido and Aeneas, The Alehouse Sessions, Narum), English Baroque Soloists, The OAE, Teac Damsa / Michael Keegan-Dolan (NOBODADDY), Shobana Jayasingh Dance (Clorinda Agonistes), Jocelyn Pook (Drawing Life), Jon Hopkins and Khiyo. Flora also worked closely with MishMash Productions from 2017-2024 devising and performing in several fully staged 'chamber-music-theatre' shows for Young Audiences.
Performance venues and festivals include The Wigmore Hall (recital of baroque music with Benedict Williams), Kings Place, Sadler's Wells, The Globe, Jools Holland, Hidden Notes Festival, Schleswig Holstein Festival, Sintra Festival, KlezMore Festival, ACC-X Festival (South Korea), Tiny Desk and BBC Radio 6music and BBC Radio 4s Woman's Hour. In 2019 she was Artist in Residence at Ryedale Festival, and in February 2020 she was interviewed on BBC Radio 3 This Classical Life with Jess Gillam.
As a recording artist she has released albums Precious Collection (Fran & Flora, Hidden Notes Records, April 2024, which was selected as one of the Guardian's Top 10 Folk Albums of 2024), Hold Still Liminal (solo, Feb 2023), Unfurl (Fran & Flora, Feb 2019), and Meditations and Laments (Gaia Duo, Dec 2019) under her own name. She also records and arranges string parts for songs, films and TV both from home and in studio sessions for composers/bands including David Schweitzer (inc. Our Great National Parks - feat. Barack Obama), Johnny Yates, James Riley and the Rooftop Assembly, Sam Lee, Anand Kirtan, Pulp, The Petshop Boys, Portico Quartet and Jamie Cullum.
Flora teaches privately at home (London) and online, with specialisms in Klezmer and Baroque music, and is available to lead Klezmer workshops.
EDUCATION
Flora trained on both 'modern' and 'historical' violins at the Royal Academy of Music, London, supported by the RC Wyse Bequest Award, where she studied with Maureen Smith, Elizabeth Wallficsh, Rachel Podger and Nicolette Moonen and took masterclasses with Maxim Vengerov and Ruth Watermann. She was a member of the Sainsbury Royal Academy Soloists, and winner of the Music Patrons Award in 2019, the Bickerdike Allen, Roy Burcher and John McAslan prizes in 2014. She has studied Klezmer at KlezKanada, Yiddish Summer Weimar and Klezfest London, and has taken lessons with many renowned Klezmorim over the last 15 years.
She continues to study many kinds of classical and traditional music (old and new), improvisation, music production and pedagogy. She is also budding viola player (5 string violin) and Transylvanian brácsa player (3 string), and occasionally tries her hand at the musical saw. She is currently working on new Fran & Flora, London Klezmer Quartet and solo records, studying Dalcroze Eurythmics, and will be begin training as a Music Therapist at Roehampton university in September 2026.
Her unique interests and skills have led her towards a wide range of performance opportunities from small ensemble concerts to large scale theatre/dance and mixed media projects. These include shows with her critically acclaimed experimental folk duo Fran & Flora (with cellist Francesca Ter-Berg), London Klezmer Quartet, Barokksolistene (Siwan, Dido and Aeneas, The Alehouse Sessions, Narum), English Baroque Soloists, The OAE, Teac Damsa / Michael Keegan-Dolan (NOBODADDY), Shobana Jayasingh Dance (Clorinda Agonistes), Jocelyn Pook (Drawing Life), Jon Hopkins and Khiyo. Flora also worked closely with MishMash Productions from 2017-2024 devising and performing in several fully staged 'chamber-music-theatre' shows for Young Audiences.
Performance venues and festivals include The Wigmore Hall (recital of baroque music with Benedict Williams), Kings Place, Sadler's Wells, The Globe, Jools Holland, Hidden Notes Festival, Schleswig Holstein Festival, Sintra Festival, KlezMore Festival, ACC-X Festival (South Korea), Tiny Desk and BBC Radio 6music and BBC Radio 4s Woman's Hour. In 2019 she was Artist in Residence at Ryedale Festival, and in February 2020 she was interviewed on BBC Radio 3 This Classical Life with Jess Gillam.
As a recording artist she has released albums Precious Collection (Fran & Flora, Hidden Notes Records, April 2024, which was selected as one of the Guardian's Top 10 Folk Albums of 2024), Hold Still Liminal (solo, Feb 2023), Unfurl (Fran & Flora, Feb 2019), and Meditations and Laments (Gaia Duo, Dec 2019) under her own name. She also records and arranges string parts for songs, films and TV both from home and in studio sessions for composers/bands including David Schweitzer (inc. Our Great National Parks - feat. Barack Obama), Johnny Yates, James Riley and the Rooftop Assembly, Sam Lee, Anand Kirtan, Pulp, The Petshop Boys, Portico Quartet and Jamie Cullum.
Flora teaches privately at home (London) and online, with specialisms in Klezmer and Baroque music, and is available to lead Klezmer workshops.
EDUCATION
Flora trained on both 'modern' and 'historical' violins at the Royal Academy of Music, London, supported by the RC Wyse Bequest Award, where she studied with Maureen Smith, Elizabeth Wallficsh, Rachel Podger and Nicolette Moonen and took masterclasses with Maxim Vengerov and Ruth Watermann. She was a member of the Sainsbury Royal Academy Soloists, and winner of the Music Patrons Award in 2019, the Bickerdike Allen, Roy Burcher and John McAslan prizes in 2014. She has studied Klezmer at KlezKanada, Yiddish Summer Weimar and Klezfest London, and has taken lessons with many renowned Klezmorim over the last 15 years.
She continues to study many kinds of classical and traditional music (old and new), improvisation, music production and pedagogy. She is also budding viola player (5 string violin) and Transylvanian brácsa player (3 string), and occasionally tries her hand at the musical saw. She is currently working on new Fran & Flora, London Klezmer Quartet and solo records, studying Dalcroze Eurythmics, and will be begin training as a Music Therapist at Roehampton university in September 2026.
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