Svetlana Kundish (UA/IL/D; voice)

Sveta Kundish was born in Ukraine in 1982 and began studying music at age seven. After settling in Israel with her family in 1995, she continued her music studies at the Tel Aviv Municipal Arts High School, focusing on voice and piano. Following her graduation, she studied voice with Ella Akritova, a prominent singer and former professor at the Kiev Conservatory and, in 2001, began attending the Yiddish music master class of Nechama Lifshitz. In 2003, she enrolled in the musicology program at Tel Aviv University, earning a B.A. in 2007; that same year, she was invited by Prof. Yuri Kokozey to study voice at the Prayner Konservatorium in Vienna. During her studies in Vienna, Sveta won first prize at the 2008 Golden Hanukkia international vocal competition in Berlin. Following her graduation in 2011, Sveta began a master studies program at the Cantorial Department of the Abraham Geiger Kolleg in Berlin, which she completed in 2018.

Sveta’s repertoire embraces a wide range of Jewish musical styles. She has performed throughout Europe both as a soloist and in collaboration with renowned artists and ensembles, including Patrick Farrell, Alan Bern, Voices of Ashkenaz and the Trickster Orchestra.

In 2013, Sveta performed at the Festival of New Yiddish Song in New York and at the Erich Maria Remarque Peace Prize ceremony in Osnabrück, and in 2015 was invited to perform at the Third Ladino Summer School in Paris by the Aki Estamos association for Ladino language.

Sveta is a regular artist-in-residence and instructor at Yiddish Summer Weimar and, since 2017, serves as a cantor at the Jewish community of Braunschweig.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fE-uND5ouQ8

www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5mBva0VTlw

Photo: Ksenia Mushkat