Rim Banna

This Palestinian singer was born in Nazareth in the Galilee, and after a girlhood spent singing, she traveled to Moscow to study voice. While there, she met her guitarist husband and collaborator Leonid Aleixenco and assembled a small group. She came to the KKV label's attention when she contributed two songs to the excellent children's album Lullabies from the Axis of Evil; KKV snapped her up on the spot. Her debut, 2005's The Mirrors of My Soul, had modest success, and she followed it in 2007 with an album of love songs, Seasons of Violet.