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On November 26, 2024, KOMRADIN—drummer-composer David Sirkis’s cross-cultural jazz project—took a prime slot at the Jerusalem International Oud Festival (Nov 21–30), a long-running institution founded to spotlight Arab musical heritage and the ways it collides, mutates, and survives in contemporary music. That context matters, because this wasn’t a “world-music cameo” or a polite fusion set designed to keep everyone comfortable. It played like a working-band statement: arranged, paced, and built around real decisions.
Sirkis’s profile is anchored in the unflashy professional fundamentals: strong time feel, precise articulation, and a level of physical control that keeps high-intensity playing consistent without turning the music into endurance theater. In KOMRADIN, he isn’t simply “the drummer behind the repertoire.” He’s the one shaping form—cueing density shifts, guiding transitions, and controlling how the ensemble breathes. You can hear it in the architecture: sections lock and release with intention, the improvisation stays tethered to the composition, and the ensemble sound remains cohesive even when the rhythmic grid gets complex.
Outside this project, Sirkis’s activity reads less like a local résumé and more like a network map. He has performed at major festivals including the Red Sea Jazz Festival, Tel Aviv Jazz Festival, and the EFG London Jazz Festival circuit (including Guildhall-related festival programming), and he has appeared at notable New York venues such as Smalls Jazz Club, Mezzrow, The Jazz Gallery, and Ornithology—rooms where bandstand credibility is earned nightly, not assumed. He also leads multiple ensembles—KOMRADIN, the David Sirkis Trio, and the David Sirkis Quartet—which signals the higher bar of directing repertoire, personnel, and artistic outcomes rather than operating only as a sideman.
His recorded output reinforces that scope. Releases connected to his work include KOMRADIN – Qamar Al Din and David Sirkis – When It All Starts, alongside credited appearances on projects like Nadav Remez – Summit and Sharon Mansur Trio – Trigger. In practice, that matters because studio work doesn’t reward hype; it rewards repeatability, tone control, and the ability to deliver structured performances under production constraints. Sirkis also works within recognizable industry infrastructure—his distribution/management history includes The Orchard (Sony Music Entertainment)
