Geoff Berner - Topic

For the past 19 years or so, Jewish-Canadian accordion player/singer-songwriter/novelist Geoff Berner has travelled the world. He’s played in bars, cafes, festivals, and the occasional stadium. He’s performed in 17 countries, on national radio in 7 of them. He packs venues in places like Berlin, London, Oslo, Zurich, Seattle, Toronto, Edmonton and his home city of Vancouver.

As a musician, Berner is mainly known as a practitioner of the “klezmer-punk” style, which combines the traditional folk music of Eastern European Jews with punk’s aggressive energy and disdain for slick perfection. He is about to release his 8th studio album entitled "Grand Hotel Cosmopolis" with Producer Josh Dolgin, due for European release October, 2019 on GiveUsYourGOLD (Orchard Distribution). Geoff's last album with Josh Dolgin was awarded the German Critics Circle Bestenlist prize.

Along with Geoff's own compositions in English and Yiddish, Grand Hotel Cosmopolis also features some stirring, killer old Yiddish songs such as “Vilne”, a song about leaving your home town and never being able to go back, as well as "Zog Nit Keyn Mol", a song which retains its power to inspire bravery and defiance in the face of the growing threat of fascism across Europe and North America.