Bedouine

Azniv Korkejian, a songwriter born in Syria and now based in Los Angeles, weaves 1960s and 1970s folk and country elements into her luminous yet charged material. Working under the name Bedouine, she started shaping her vintage-tinged indie folk in the mid-2010s. The self-titled debut arrived in 2017 on Spacebomb, followed by the widely praised Bird Songs of a Killjoy in 2019 and Waysides in 2021.

Born in Aleppo, she spent her early years in Saudi Arabia before moving to the United States as a child, living in several locations until she reached Los Angeles as an adult. After studying sound design she took on film work editing music and dialogue, which brought her into contact with figures from both the film and music worlds while she honed her own style. Those encounters helped her form ties with a supportive circle of peers. Her partnership with producer Gus Seyffert began by chance when she dropped by his studio for advice on equipment and the conversation quickly turned into an afternoon session laying down a demo.

The ten songs on the 2017 debut represented the strongest material from roughly thirty tracks she developed over three years. Critics responded strongly, raising her profile and leading her to prepare new work. A two-song single released late in 2018 featured her renditions of Elton John and Linda Perhacs in the hushed, introspective manner that had become her signature. She returned in June 2019 with the Billboard-charting sophomore album Bird Songs of a Killjoy. Early the following year she issued the singles “The Wave,” “It Wasn’t Me,” and “The Solitude,” setting the stage for Waysides, her third album, which appeared that October.