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Casually sophisticated original folk/jazz with a fiery, swinging string band energy.
Myshkin is known for her rich alto voice, complex melodies, and story-poems subtly asking big questions about work, love, struggle and change, from a fiercely egalitarian perspective. Jenny Q brings her cello, beats, harmonies, and Arab influence to the mix.
Through three decades of composing and recording, touring and collaboration, Myshkin's curiosity has inspired her migrations and kept her music evolving. Combining the eye of a perennial outsider and a facility for incorporating musical traditions, the songs reflect a multi-faceted life. Raw-folk, nomad-swing, torchjazz, punk-poetry, desert-blues, post-rock, no pigeonholes. Stubbornly true to wherever the road leads.
Awarded a Global Talent visa to live and work in the UK in 2022, Myshkin's Ruby Warblers have made their home in the Scottish Highlands.
Prince Myshkin, Dostoyevsky's Idiot, is good because he's pure. Myshkin, the folk chanteuse with desert dust and swamp murk swirling in her voice, is good because she's impure; Celtic, bluegrass, Latin, klezmer, and punk snake through her story-songs.
—Village Voice
One of the best songwriters around...oh, and she sings like a dream too!
—FRoots
Dark, smoky folk-jazz. Gripping, affecting and disquieting.
—Read Magazine
A remarkable economic concoction of gothic folk, bluesy pop, vaudeville, R&B, swing, rockabilly and rock and roll. ... one of the finest records to come out of New Orleans this year.
—Offbeat
A poet who actually has something to say... dense, dark songs rendered beautifully.
—Dirty Linen
Myshkin’s voice is not to be taken lightly. A gorgeous rich alto infused with natural drama and melancholy, and best applied to her own songs: hushed one act plays that speak volumes.
—New Orleans Times Picayune
Haunting melodies, intricate metaphors and subversive subplots … tales of pirate girls on high seas! Lover’s feuds under apricot trees! Rosebud bullets, ruby warblers and whalebone skirts! An unmistakable, complex underground legend.
—Bitch Magazine
Album of the year! Myshkin is a giant among songwriters. well observed, unflinching, tender, bitterly funny songs.
—City Life
Mexico, Live at KALA, Astoria, Oregon 2023
Immobile Gardener, Live at KALA, Astoria, Oregon 2023
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Full Bio
The story of Myshkin's Ruby Warblers is the story of an endlessly curious outsider artist working in alliance with many genius collaborators, and a partnership that survived disaster and crossed an ocean.
By the time Myshkin landed in New Orleans in 1993, she’d been writing odd, literate, anti-pop songs for a while, but it was the cradle of Jazz that birthed her gigging life. Teaming up with Australian/Brit expat songwriter Mike West, she played over 300 shows a year and made five critically lauded albums in her decade there. Touring relentlessly, the duo played everything from the corner pub to some of the world's best known festivals. While soaking up the tunes of the city, Myshkin's sound in this era travelled from raw-folk through rock into her own kind of postmodern blues. Her songwriting found particular appeal with other writers and musicians, earning her local awards and international press and radio attention. The last New Orleans record, Rosebud Bullets (DoubleSalt 2002), was a passionate cohesion of far flung influences into what she dubbed torch-punk, introducing her band Ruby Warblers.
A move to Portland, Oregon grew the music in new directions. A partnership with the electronic musician Sailor Banks saw loops and beats joining acoustic instruments on the anti-war record Corvidae (DoubleSalt 2004) and an angry, spooky EP created in response to hurricane Katrina, Sigh Semaphore (DoubleSalt 2006). Myshkin's work had been explicitly political since her earliest songs, writing particularly on peace, equality and ecology, and there was plenty to sing about in Bush era America. In 2007 the work began to shift, attempting a move from the critical toward the practical. Leaving Portland to co-found a permaculture art-farm in the Oregon mountains in 2008, she designed and built an earth walled studio home there, taught natural building, and recorded her 9th release, the heady and hypnotic That Diamond Lust (DoubleSalt 2012).
On tour in the Mojave desert, Myshkin met her future wife—herbalist, entrepreneur and music devotee Jenny Q, and Jenny's daughter, in the artists' hideout of Joshua Tree. Jenny’s near death from sepsis in the first year of their relationship was a cataclysm for the family and community. Myshkin stopped touring and she and Jenny both turned to art-making for healing and transformation of the experience. Jenny published an experimental memoir, Held Together, a raw and revealing exploration of the journey to her new life on metal legs. Myshkin's Trust and the High Wire (DoubleSalt 2018) covered the same story from her perspective.
The record captured the Joshua Tree era Ruby Warblers at their peak. It was truly an all-star ensemble, whose members, including Danny Frankel, Damian Lester, Bob Furgo, and Scott (Drago) Kisinger have recorded and toured with some of the world's most renowned songwriters. During these same sessions, nine more tracks were recorded that were not part of the story, but favourites of the band. These tracks are being released in 2026, as Hot Night in Paris.
Joshua Tree was also the birthplace of Myshkin's multi-media performance work, including the anti-fascist Warning Signs, the absurdist Royal Rabble Circus, and the first iteration of a collaborative piece with Jenny around her book. Jenny amazingly began playing the cello after losing both legs and 4 fingers, and started performing with the band a song at a time. The family left the desert for coastal Oregon in 2019, and Myshkin and Jenny spent the pandemic years playing music together at home, inventing a new Ruby Warblers incarnation.
The worsening political situation in the US and a long-held love of rural Scotland led them to seek and be granted a global talent visa to live and work in the UK, they moved in 2023 and hope to never leave. Since their migration Myshkin has been writing, and the band has toured a series of benefit shows for Gaza and a new multimedia piece through Scotland. Held on the High Wire tells the story of their meeting and Jenny's illness through spoken word, song and short films, and was made possible through the support of Scottish festivals and theatres. In 2025 Myshkin released Choice Blooms, a re-mastered sampler of favourites from her thirty years of recording, and took the bulk of her music down from streaming as an act of reclamation.
The Ruby Warblers now find themselves in an old house in the midst of ancient trees in a Sutherland valley in the far north of Scotland, working on art, permaculture, small business and community-building projects. They both love music that combines tradition with innovation, from all over the globe, and in recent shows Jenny has been sharing the beauty of her Palestinian heritage through Arabic songs. Instrumentally experimental in the studio, in current live shows Jenny typically plays cello and percussion, Myshkin guitar and tenor guitar. The new material is thick with vocal harmony and attitude. The band will be recording this year, in between touring in support of Hot Night in Paris.
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Awards and Honours
UK Global Talent Visa based on endorsement from Arts Council England — 2022
Village Voice —Ten Best Records of the Year — no.6 — 2003
New Orleans Times Picayune — Ten Best Louisianna Records of the Year — no.2 — 2003, 2001
New Orleans Music Industry Award — Best Folk Album — winner 1997
New Orleans Big Easy Award — Best Folk / World Music Artist — finalist 2003, 2001, 1999
Selected Venues
Mull Theatre — 2024
Tenor Guitar Gathering, OR, USA — 2012, 2013, 2020, 2022
Joshua Tree Music Fest, CA, USA — 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020
Brooklyn Americana Fest, NY, USA — 2020
New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, LA, USA — 2001, 2014
Habrovka Festival, Prague, CZ — 2013
WalkAbout Fest, NL — 2013
Pickathon, OR, USA — 2002
Vancouver Folk Festival, BC, Canada — 2002
High Sierra, CA, USA — 2001
Naked Song Fest, NL — 2001
Folkwoods Festival, NL — 2000, 2001
Broadstairs Festival, UK — 2000, 2001
Port Fairy Festival, AU — 1999
Discography
Albums:
Choice Blooms —Myshkin's Ruby Warblers —DoubleSalt 2025
Trust and the High Wire — Myshkin Warbler — DoubleSalt 2018
That Diamond Lust — Myshkin's Ruby Warblers — DoubleSalt 2012
Sigh Semaphore — Myshkin's Ruby Warblers — DoubleSalt 2006
Corvidae — Myshkin's Ruby Warblers — DoubleSalt 2004
Rosebud Bullets — Myshkin's Ruby Warblers — DoubleSalt 2002
Why do all the Country Girls Leave? — Myshkin — Binky 2000
Blue Gold — Myshkin — Binky 1998
Econoline — Myshkin and Mike West — Binky 1996
Dr. Plague and Other Lullabies — Myshkin Impossible — Wreckit 1995
Slate — Myshkin — Wreckit 1993
Singles:
Ravens — DoubleSalt 2022
Faithless — DoubleSalt 2013
Performance pieces
Songs for the Wild World — 2025
Held on the High Wire — 2024
Trust.Together — 2018
Rosebud Redux — 2018
Fresh:Research/Jazz — 2017
Royal Rabble Circus presents 100 Years of Absurdity — 2017
Royal Rabble Circus presents Big Top — 2017
Royal Rabble Circus presents Climbing the Fence — 2016
Po^tion: Warning Signs — 2016
Related work
Selected Studio credits As Musician:
Shawn Mullins — Soul's Core — Columbia 1998
Kirk Rundstrom Band — Wicked Savior / Blue China — Bloodshot 1999 / 2001
The Road Dog Divas — Everything’s in Boxes / Pony — 2002 / 2003
Mike West — Interstate 10 / Redneck Riviera / Race that Train / Oddities and Rarities / 16 Easy Songs for Drill and Banjo / Home / New South — Binky 1990’s
As Producer:
Pablo — Pablo’s Finest Hour — 2015
Film Animation commission:
F-Bomb Theatre, The Beatles Were A Boyband — Edinburgh Fringe — 2023
Original animation:
Ravens selected for presentation at — Anamaphix international Animated Film Festival 2022 — One Earth Awards 2022
Music videos — 2003 to present
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Short Bios
250 words:
Myshkin is known best for her rich alto voice, filmic lyrics and wide musical range. She began recording and touring internationally after landing in New Orleans in 1993, becoming a central figure of the city's folk and alternative scenes. Her fifth record Rosebud Bullets—a riot of Folk, Jazz, Rock, Chanteuse and Middle Eastern ideas spun into a torch-punk tone poem—focused her artistic voice and introduced her band Myshkin's Ruby Warblers.
New Orleans gifted the singer/songwriter deep swing, moving to Portland, Oregon added a facility for beats and loops, but the Ruby Warblers has always been primarily an acoustic band, Myshkin's percussive guitar supported by arco strings, horns and harmonies.
After meeting future wife and cellist Jenny Q on tour, Myshkin relocated to Joshua Tree, CA, where she recorded and released her 10th record Trust and the High Wire, recorded Hot Night in Paris, and produced a series of politically potent performances incorporating film, spoken word, circus and theatre.
Myshkin's Arts Council endorsement and resulting Global Talent visa allowed the family to migrate to Scotland in 2023. Since arriving in the UK, the Ruby Warblers have been honing a powerful duo approach, touring Gaza benefit shows and their multimedia piece Held on the High Wire, based on Myshkin's record and Jenny's book.
A giant among songwriters. Well observed, unflinching, tender, bitterly funny songs
—City Life, Manchester
Haunting melodies, intricate metaphors and subversive subplots … an unmistakable, complex underground legend.
—Bitch Magazine, USA
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100 words:
Myshkin's Ruby Warblers play thoughtful original songs that swing and pulse with a fiery string band energy, drawing on early jazz, freak folk and nomad soul. Myshkin writes eloquently about work, love, struggle and change from a fiercely egalitarian perspective. Whether performing as the horn filled big band of Hot Night in Paris, or the current potent duo with multi-instrumentalist Jenny Q, The Ruby Warblers consistently deliver fresh, challenging, and moving music.
A giant among songwriters. Well observed, unflinching, tender, bitterly funny songs
—City Life, Manchester
Darkly joyous, endlessly restless, and spellbinding... a masterfully mercurial, seductive voice.
—Sing Out
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20 words:
Casually sophisticated original folk/jazz with a fiery, swinging string band energy.
Darkly joyous, endlessly restless, and spellbinding.
—Sing Out
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HOT NIGHT IN PARIS
Hot Night in Paris is the latest record from transatlantic songwriter Myshkin and her all-star Ruby Warblers. A harvest of nine songs written over the course of two decades, audience favourites that never made it onto a record, captured finally with a crew of legends while living in Joshua Tree, California, but feeling much more like New Orleans. Horn soaked, swinging, and wry, Hot Night in Paris is a last long look back.
Myshkin and partner Jenny Q have been dialling in a pithy, potent, acoustic Ruby Warblers since leaving the Pacific Northwest for the Highlands, gigging and recording their new material, raw and reactive queries into the precarious future.
The nine songs of Hot Night in Paris linger in the doorway. They catch a night-blooming sweetness we might still smuggle with us. They coax a last barefoot dance from the dusk.
The record busts open with a repeating horn section riff featuring Scott (Drago) Kisinger and Kelly Corbin that sets the stage for the whole journey, lush horns dominating the arrangements. The straight ahead push of The Light gives way to the spooky swing of Birds on the Line, a tango inspired Peace, the dry cutting swing of Cut Set Polished. Then the second line parade comes around the corner, beats courtesy of Danny Frankel (Lou Reed, k.d. lang) who drives Wheels straight to the band's birthplace of New Orleans. Myshkin, Danny and upright bassist Damian Lester formed the core of the Joshua Tree era Ruby Warblers, their rhythmic rapport evident throughout.
Myshkin's reputation for rich narrative writing continues with this set of songs whose themes—power, beauty, sacrifice, desire, courage, redemption—are expressed in succinct rhythms, lucid wit and vivid images. The title track was born in an afternoon session one hot desert day at the home of the inimitable Victoria Williams, who contributed some of the first lines to the song, and an ethereal Guzheng take in the studio. The record is soaked in peak performances from (Leonard Cohen violinist) Bob Furgo, guitarists Lucio Menegon and Tender Desertrat, long time collaborator Sailor Banks, and cellist Jenny Q, Myshkin's own taut rhythm guitar and silky alto playing ringmaster to a heady sonic circus.