American singer. Critics call her music ‘rock noir’ or ‘folk noir.’ Compared with PJ Harvey, Nick Cave, Tom Waits or Johnny Cash. In her last album Rykada proves that she has created her own, distinguishable sound.

Rykada Parasol breaks all stereotypical beliefs about what women can do in music and how, both in the field of performance and the topics she undertakes; she sings about things which others wish to forget. Moreover, she is an artist who meets the highest requirements going far beyond the context of popular and light music.

Rykarda Parasol – Musician and songwriter. A deep gender-bending voice, her focus is delivering Faulkner-like tales with conviction and suspense. Parasol draws on American rock, soul and southern influences as well as Northern European styles imparted to her by her parents. Based in San Francisco, California, Parasol is immersed in many cultures. She is half Swedish, half Israeli. The daughter of a Polish-born Holocaust survivor and a Swedish mother. She has written and self-produced and self-released two highly acclaimed albums (“For Blood and Wine” 2009 and “Our Hearts First Meet” 2006). She has plans to publish a spoken word book as well as an illustrated one. And her unique musical style can be traced to her studies in art, music, and literature. Parasol has shared the stage with such notable artists like Frank Black, Jason Collett, Jolie Holland, the Trail of Dead, Kirsten Hirsh, Chuck Prophet, Jonette Napolitano (Concrete Blonde). Most recently Rykarda with her band performed at the Festival Ars Cameralis in Poland as well as the Plissken Festival in Athens, Greece. Rykarda has also gained noteriety for performing at maximum security prisons in Poland.

www.rykardaparasol.com

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Rykarda Parasol, the master of Rock Noir, will charm the stage of the Two Riversides Film and Art Festival with her voice. This resident of America, daughter of a Swedish emigrant and a Polish Jew, has created a new genre of music, which together with her voice created a blend difficult to ignore and impossible to define. Some critics describe her work as folk goth, others as indie. Faced with this rather inapt nomenclature, Rykarda has created her own term: “Rock Noir.” Her compositions, usually full of sadness and melancholy, express the feeling of a controlled, aesthetic anxiety. Rykarda Parasol’s warm, low, opera-trained voice gets under the skin and the influence of its magic is hard to escape. One can name various inspirations of Rykarda, from Nick Cave or Marka Laneman, to the Doors. Nevertheless, it will not fully express the fusion between, as she herself calls it, “morass and finesse”. One thing is certain: the concert of Rykarda Parasol will be an event that has to be included in the calendar of all the people who are familiar with original and emotional music.

Karol Surówka