Keren Ann is a singer-songwriter based largely in Paris, New York City and Israel. She plays guitar, piano and clarinet, engineers and writes choir and musical arrangements. She is descended from Russian Jews on her father's side and is Indo (Javanese and Dutch) on her mother's. She lived in Israel and in the Netherlands until the age of 11, when her family moved to France. She retains her Dutch and Israeli citizenship.

In 2000 she began her solo career with La Biographie de Luka Philipsen — produced by Lionel Gaillardin and Benjamin Biolay, who also co-produced its follow-up, La Disparition (in return, she helped write his debut album, Rose Kennedy). The pair also wrote several songs for Henri Salvador's best-selling, prize-winning 2000 comeback album, Chambre avec Vue, including the hit "Jardin d'Hiver" she first composed for iconic performer Henri Salvador.

Her third album, Not Going Anywhere, was released worldwide in 2003, but her American breakthrough came with its follow-up, Nolita (2004). Recorded in Paris and New York — it is named for Nolita, her neighborhood in lower Manhattan — it is sung half in French and half in English.

During the war in Israel and Lebanon in 2006, she traveled Northern Israel, performing for the people who stayed in shelters because of the missile attacks on the North. She is currently dating an Israeli Air Force pilot.

Lady & Bird is a collaboration with Barði Jóhannson, of the Icelandic group Bang Gang.

The Isis Project is a concept album that she wrote with Guy Chambers and was sung by Sophie Hunter.

Keren Ann's fifth solo album, the eponymous Keren Ann, was released in 2007.

The musical style of Keren Ann is sometimes referred to by the recently coined buzzword 'Nouvelle Chanson', suggesting a musical inheritance from the poetically intense forefathers of French Chanson such as Jacques Brel, Charles Aznavourand Barbara. Keren Ann's musical contemporaries - also hailing from France - include artists such as Benjamin Biolay - with whom she has collaborated, Coralie Clement Olivia Ruiz, Francoiz Breut, and Carla Bruni

Well-known contemporary English speaking artists who might also be termed 'New Chanson', in that their musical style is clearly traceable from this same Chanson lineage can be seen in artists such as New York based Martha Wainwright (who recently reprised Barbara's song 'Dis, Quand Reviendra Tu?', Regina Spektor(showing French influence in songs such as 'Apres Moi' and 'Ne Me Quitte Pas'), CocoRosie (originally Canadian, now Paris based) and London-based singer-songwriter Ana Silvera.