About

Soul Trouvère is a Minneapolis Country & Eastern band, performing original and folk music from Eastern Europe and the Americas. Colleen Bertsch is a violinist who studied and performed music in the Transylvanian countryside, and is a co-founder of the Minneapolis Balkan party band Orkestar Bez Ime. A founding member of the New Orleans band the Zydepunks, Juan Küffner performs on piano accordion. Together they sing in multiple languages, including Yiddish, Romanian, Ukrainian, Spanish, French, German, Boyash, Romani, Sorbian, Serbian, Russian, & English.

Juan’s career highlights include opening for Flogging Molly, Balkan Beat Box, and the Hold Steady, performing on stage with Gogol Bordello, and playing at numerous folks and rock festivals including the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, French Quarter Festival (New Orleans), Voodoo Fest (New Orleans), Dranouter (Belgium), Aymon Folk (France), Musikfest (Pennsylvania), Tropical Heatwave (Tampa) and many others. His song “Dear Molly” was used on the soundtrack of NCIS New Orleans.

Colleen is a trained ethnomusicologist who has received multiple artist and scholastic grants and fellowships including a Fulbright to Romania and multiple Artist Initiative grants from the Minnesota State Arts Board. As a member of Orkestar Bez Ime, she was awarded the McKnight Fellowship for Performing Musicians and a Minnesota Emerging Composers Award from the American Composers Forum.

She plays fiddle for the Minneapolis-based Balkan party band Orkestar Bez Ime, Szászka (Transylvanian) String band, and was co-founder and original violinist of the Ukrainian Village Band. She has had the pleasure of backing fantastic acts including Semisonic, The Moody Blues, Jeremy Messersmith, Davis Bain, and substituting for The Laurels String Quartet. Her favorite collaborators include Joe Chvala and the Flying Foot Forum, Ethnic Dance Theatre, Minnesota History Theatre, Mila Vocal Ensemble, guitarist Maja Radovanlija, and the Minnesota Orchestra for their Young People’s Concert Series.

For more info please contact us at hello@soultrouvere.com