Thrilling their audiences with their genre-hopping passport of Celtic reels, flamenco, Gypsy-jazz, Arabic, Cuban, and South Asian rhythms, the Sultans of String celebrate musical fusion and human creativity with warmth and virtuosity. Fiery violin dances with rumba-flamenco guitar, while bass and percussion lay down unstoppable grooves. Acoustic strings meet with electronic wizardry to create layers and depth of sound, while world rhythms excite audiences to their feet with the irresistible need to dance. 

Since forming 10 years ago, Sultans of String’s CDs have hit #1 across Canada on Top Ten national radio charts, and have received multiple awards and accolades, including 3 JUNO (Canada’s Grammy) nominations, 1st place in the ISC (out of 15,000 entries), 3 Canadian Folk Music Awards, plus special guest recordings and sharing the stage with artists such as Paddy Moloney and The Chieftains, Richard Bona, Benoit Bourque (Bottine Souriante), Nikki Yanofsky, Alex Cuba, Ruben Blades, Crystal Shawanda, and Ken Whiteley.

Bandleader/violinist Chris McKhool (Jesse Cook, Pavlo), a Queen’s Diamond Jubilee medal recipient, was raised in a Lebanese-Egyptian household just bursting with music and diversity. Growing up, he was fed a steady diet of delicious musicality alongside Middle Eastern cuisine and violin lessons. With founding guitarist Kevin Laliberté’s (Jesse Cook) rumba rhythm, their musical synergy created Sultans of String’s signature sound – the intimate and playful relationship between violin and guitar. From this rich foundation, the dynamic duo grew, featuring such amazing musical friends as in-the-pocket bass master Drew Birston (Chantal Kreviazuk), guitarist extraordinaire Eddie Paton (Robert Michaels), and jaw-dropping beats of percussionist Chendy Leon.

The band’s US manager and acclaimed promoter Dave Wilkes (Bela Fleck, Emmylou Harris) states, "Over the decades, I’ve worked with numerous top ten and #1 Billboard artists. In all that time, I have not worked with composers more talented than McKhool and Laliberté from Sultans of String. Not only are they a superb writing team, they are also amazing arrangers and performers”.

Sultans of String have been criss-crossing North America and UK for the last several years at many taste-making forums such as JUNOfest, NYC’s Lincoln Center and the legendary Birdland, and Boston’s Scullers, and London’s Trafalgar Square. They recently sold out Koerner Hall (Toronto’s Carnegie Hall), and performed with Toronto, Vancouver, Edmonton, Stratford, Ontario and Niagara Symphony Orchestras, as well with Kingsfield POPS in Maine and Maryland’s Annapolis Symphony. Sultans of String were filmed by MPBN’s Maine Arts! in a feature concert, and have performed live on BBC TV, BBC Radio, Irish National Radio, and the internationally syndicated shows WoodSongs, World Cafe, and on SiriusXM in Washington.