Moscow to Manhattan

Mira Stroika Mira Stroika is a multimedia performance artist and accordion playing singer-songwriter, with extensive training and experience in the performing arts. She studied classical piano since the age of 4 with a Russian-Jewish instructor, continued with performance and composition classes at Yale University and studied voice with Bel Canto master Nicola Verussi. She has had additional acting and playwriting training with Deb Margolin, an OBIE award winning Jewish playwright and has studied video art with Pia Lindman and Jennie Livingston (Paris is Burning). As a professional performer, Mira Stroika has made headway in the Russian and Jewish music scene in New York having performed and collaborated with Frank London (Grammy award-winning bandleader of the Klezmatics), Metropolitan Klezmer, Slavic Soul Party, Nice Jewish Girls Gone Bad and Romashka. Her playing and singing were also featured in an exhibit on Chagall and the Yiddish theater at the Jewish Museum. She has performed at the Oshman Family JCC in California including the grand opening and a sold-out show with an audience of nearly 400. As an indie cabaret artist, she has performed at numerous events and venues in non-Jewish/non-Russian settings and received media recognition including from the Huffington Post:

“Take two cups of Edith Piaf, one half cup Eartha Kitt, a sprinkle of Betty Boop plus a serious portion of that je ne sais quoi that enthralls audiences, and you have what I see as one of New York’s most exciting new cabaret singers: Mira Stroika.“

Ilya Khodosh Moscow to Manhattan Ilya Khodosh is a writer and performer in New York. He was a company member of the storytelling/spoken-word show Birthright Israel Monologues, which toured nationwide. He was published in the anthology, “What We Brought Back: Jewish Life After Birthright.” He recently served as the Associate Artistic Director of the United Solo Theater Festival, the largest solo performance festival in the world, where he also premiered his second one-person show. A graduate of the Columbia Publishing Course, he is a regular contributor to the Berkshire Review for the Arts. He is also a freelance Russian translator and has written for Radio Free Europe. At Williams College, he was awarded the Hutchinson Fellowship for outstanding work in theater. Read Ilya’s blog.