Alina Bzhezhinska is one of the worlds leading harpists. Beginning her studies in Poland at the Chopin Academy in Warsaw, she then honed her jazz skills in Arizona before moving to the UK, tutoring at the Royal Conservatory in Scotland. So yes, she’s well qualified!
She’s putting her skills to great use, and is currently on a mission to bring the harp to the fore of contemporary sound. As a founder of the digital platform HipHarpCollective, she’s aiming to bring the harp to a wider audience.
Alina has a track record of working with and alongside contemporary jazz legends Denys Baptiste and Pharoah Sanders, performing at the London Jazz Festival. Working with hip-hop and grime producer Diamondz on two remixes, ‘For Carrol’ and ‘Annoying Semitones’, further demonstrated a new direction was aligning. Creatively inspired, Bzhezhinska’s started a new formation, HipHarpCollective, and along with it, has recorded a new album slated for release in 2022, featuring innovative works and rising stars, including rappers Lady Sanity and Tom TheyThem.
Here’s a track called African Flower, to give you a flavour of her sound. We don’t normally feature a lot of jazz here, but this is lovely…
Alina takes her inspiration from classic jazz harpists such as Dorothy Ashby and Alice Coltrane. With that in mind we had to include this classic Dorothy Ashby track taken from the phenomenal album Afro-Harping…
