Current news and events of New York-based Karen Kohler – German-American singer, writer, poet, podcaster, mentor and community-builder.
On May 21, 2018, Karen and Robert (Fin and Mac) celebrate 35 years of friendship (and 30 of them married), having met as college students on Long Island. To commemorate the event and to support the cosmic vision of painters Alex and Allyson Grey, the Kohlers sat for Alex at the Chapel of Sacred Mirrors in Wappinger Falls, NY. [...]
In May 2016, Karen founds the international sisterhood Crown Circle, a collective of colleagues and friends in their peak years. To mark the group's second anniversary, Karen organizes the inaugural Crown Dialogue between youth and elder women, on April 28, 2018 at the Sheen Center for Thought and Culture in NYC.
Karen Kohler self-publishes her writing! The Corpses, Karen's first novella, is published in December of 2017 through her own publishing company, Sumya Press. Her debut poetry collection, Petrichor, is released in March of 2019.
The Home I Love: Cabaret from Berlin to Tel Aviv, teams Karen with Israeli singer Noa Levy and acclaimed New York musical director (and vocalist) Tracy Stark. Sponsored by the German Consulate in San Francisco, the show debuts at Temple Emanu-El and showcases a songbook of cabaret classics in German, English, Hebrew and Yiddish.
On May 7, 2015, Karen debuted Suitcase in Berlin: Songs of Brecht and the Poet Troubadours at the Irondale Center in her hometown of Brooklyn, NY. In the program she wove together the story song composers she loves most including Jaques Brel, Nick Cave, Leonard Cohen, Tom Waits and Noel Coward. A few days later she was featured with [...]
In the fall of 2014, Karen's longtime cabaret pal and collaborator KT Sullivan, director of the Mabel Mercer Foundation in NYC, invited her to curate and direct a European offering as part of the Foundation's annual cabaret festival. "Kabarett with a K " was held at the Cutting Room on October 24, 2014 and featured many members of Karen's [...]
In the summer of 2013, following a concert at the German-Heritage Museum in Los Angeles to mark the 50th Anniversary of JFK's historic visit to Berlin, Karen took her longest running (since 1995) cabaret act Das Kabarett: European Cabaret and American Pop and headed to London for a run at the Crazy Coqs Cabaret in Piccadilly Circus. Leigh Thompson accompanied. [...]
During his tenure as Vice Consul at the German Consulate in New York, Stefan and Anna Schlueter and the Kohlers became great friends. When Stefan Schlueter became German Ambassador to Trinidad and Tobago, he twice invited Karen to the Caribbean for concerts and master classes. On both occasions, Karen wore gowns by renowned Trinidadian fashion designer, Claudia Pegus, several [...]
In March of 2011, Karen received a month-long fellowship as Artist-in-Residence at the Global Arts Village/Center for Culture and Consciousness in New Delhi, India.Here she developed and taught a new master class, Beyond the Beautiful Voice: The Art of Performance, employing her own methodology in the art of stagecraft for the first time. At the conclusion of her formal residency, Karen [...]
On March 7, 2010 Karen returns to the political cabaret of her Berlin roots and flexes her revolutionary artist muscle in Foreign Currency: Political Cabaret for Our Time, at Joe's Pub in NYC with Doug Oberhamer (piano) and Gregory Chudzik (bass). The show was originally conceived for the BKA Theater in Berlin in 2005 as an homage to Marlene [...]
