Meet our Artists
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Nanilo | Music
Nanilo | Music
Nanilo is a duo of women singing songs of diaspora. Nanilo traces musical lines to tradition from Jewish and Eastern European roots. Singing entirely in the songs’ original languages, including Yiddish, Russian, Ladino, Hebrew, and more, the duo showcases the way music has moved through generations of immigrants arriving to North America. With the tight harmonies of a family band, Nanilo brings you onto a familiar front porch — if your front porch were in Grajevo or Breznitsa. The duo finds a fusion between traditional sounds and an Americana sensibility, spinning out stories of love, longing, and liberation that are carried in the lyrics of their rich traditions. In workshops and performances, Nanilo loves to invite audiences into participation in the music, teaching and learning simple melodies and verses in the songs’ original languages, using music to open the door to stories of cultural change and migration.
So much wisdom lives in our voices; we share stories, pass on traditions, ask questions, laugh, remember. Singing can lift your spirits, increase immunity and provide a workout for the brain and lungs. We love to watch people’s eyes light up as a song sparks a tender memory, and we listen together to the stories that flow from people as music connects them with their own personal and family histories.
The members of Nanilo have studied with mastersingers and community members carrying cultural tradition in immigrant communities in the US and in the music’s countries of origin. Mentors include: Efim Ciornii, Master Yiddish Singer and Folklorist (Kishinev, Moldova), Ketevan Mindorashvili and Zedashe Ensemble (Republic of Georgia), Slavka Slavtcheva (Bulgarian community of Minnesota), Susan Gaeta (Sephardic Jewish / member of Trio Sefardi in Alexandria, VA), Ethel Raim (Yiddish / Center for Traditional Music and Dance NYC), and Sanja Rankovic (University of Arts & Culture, Belgrade). Members Sarah Larsson, and Sarina Partridge are professional folklorists and researchers, and have performed at Orchestra Hall, the Cedar Cultural Center, the Ordway, and the Fitzgerald Theater.
Member Biographies:
Sarah Larsson (she/her) is a folklorist, vocalist, and percussionist devoted to celebrating folk tradition. Sarah plays with The Nightingale Trio and as a solo artist under the name Sarah Jagoda. Her project “Folk Will Save Us” highlights the radical work of roots artists who transform society using cultural tradition. Sarah has studied Eastern European folklore at the Faculty of Music Arts in Belgrade, as a member of the Yale Slavic Chorus, and by studying with heritage singers including Diana Yefanova (Minneapolis), Elena Kallevig (Mpls), Nataliya Danylkova (Mankato), Vahidin Omanovic (Sanski Most, BiH), Nafie Hussein (Breznitsa, BG), Bojana Djordjevic (Belgrade), Sanja Rankovic (Belgrade), Petrana Koutcheva (NY), Irina Ivorciuc (Gura Humorului, RO), Josko Caleta (Zagreb), David Harris (Mpls), and Arielle Lekach-Rosenberg (Mpls). Sarah has appeared with The Nightingale Trio on NPR’s “A Prairie Home Companion”, as well as performances at The Cedar Cultural Center, St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral, Hamline University, Lakewood Cemetery Chapel, and more.
Sarina Partridge (she/her) is a songleader, musician and educator who feels most alive while singing in harmony, and is committed to connecting people with the power of their own voices. Sarina performs locally with Mila Vocal Ensemble, which focuses on Eastern European women’s music, and tours nationally and internationally with Heartwood Trio and Northern Harmony. She leads workshops as a member of these ensembles as well as on her own, teaching her own original choral works, early childhood music, and old time/bluegrass. In her studies of folk music, Sarina has traveled to Corsica, The Republic of Georgia, and Canada to study folk singing with master teachers and tradition bearers, and connected with master teachers locally: Ketevan Mindorashvili / Zedashe Ensemble and Muradi Pircxelani/ Ensemble Riho in the Republic of Georgia; Frederic Vesperini / Spartimu in Corsica; Ethel Raim and Sruli Dresdner at KlezKanada in Montreal, Canada; and Natalie Nowystki in Minneapolis. Performance highlights include The Cedar Cultural Center, The Fitzgerald Theater, The Ordway, SE Minnesota A Cappella Festival, The Sage in Newcastle, Basque Radio Iruña, and more.
Sample Programs: Customizable To Site’s Needs
Workshops
Vocal Music for Schools
Singing is about connecting with each other and with the power of our own voices - to explore, play, and listen. Folk music is called folk music for a reason - it’s for all folks to learn, share and enjoy! Nanilo offers vocal music workshops rooted in conversation about ethnicity, migration, and culture. We would love to integrate a workshop into your course curriculum -- for example, teaching Yiddish songs with 9th graders reading My Name is Asher Lev, or with a history class learning about immigration in the 20th century. In workshops, we teach the intricate harmonies and vocal styles of music from the traditions of Eastern Europe and the Jewish diaspora. We walk through new melodies and rhythms with students, teaching mostly in oral tradition. Students will learn several songs in full, while also gaining exposure to wider styles of music and vocal technique. Students can expect to learn about multiple unfamiliar rhythms, and harmonies, and pronunciation of lyrics in at least two languages. We also provide texts and translations for the lyrics of the songs.
Vocal Music for Older Adults
In our workshops with older adults, we seek to reconnect listeners with the power of the voice, the power of their own voices. Music - and singing in particular - is such a direct way to build community, to learn, and to share. Singing together provides many benefits for older adults. Singing is an activity that people can enjoy and participate in regardless of mobility challenges or memory challenges - it is a lifelong gift that all people deserve. Performing and sharing traditional music unlocks our audiences’ memories and stories. Each of the songs we sing has a story -- we learned many of them from elders in our traditions. What we love to do is share a song with a story, and ask others in the room for stories and songs of their own.
Performance
Nanilo Sings
Nanilo sings rich vocal arrangements of Yiddish, Sephardic and Eastern European folk songs. Singing in the tradition of lineages of women’s group singing, the duo lifts up the complex harmonies of these musical traditions entwined in the simple joys of singing together. In performance, Nanilo offers translation and storytelling of all the songs they sing, illuminating the real life struggles and longing embedded in the lyrics of the songs. Journeying through Bosnian ballad songs, Yiddish lullabies, Hebrew devotional and festival tunes, and Ladino songs of longing and loss, the duo makes connections between their own journeys learning this music and the ways that music has traveled with communities of people across borders and time. Nanilo invites audiences to draw connections to their own families’ stories of immigration, heritage, and roots, and uses music as the key to unlock doors of understanding.
