Brought up on a dairy-farm near Tokoroa, Linn Lorkin got her first piano lessons from her mother and dropped out of a doctorate at the Sorbonne to become a singer. Her first professional gig was singing for sailors and prostitutes in a low dive on the Copenhagen waterfront. The early '70s saw her playing Fender Rhodes on the Auckland club scene and she went on to play the famous Ronnie Scott's jazz club in London.

This was followed by eight years playing piano-bar in New York 1977-85 where she became a prolific songwriter. Returning to New Zealand, Lorkin established herself as one of the most versatile and creative performers on the local scene, singing and touring with - and writing for - many bands, including French Toast and The Jews Brothers Band.

She took her original music theatre show "Hey, Piano Bar Lady!' to Edinburgh and Berlin and went on to win the Best Cabaret award with it at the 2013 United Solo Festival in New York.

It was recently reprised at Auckland Writers Festival, 2018. In Wellington she received acclaim as the featured singer (with the Jews Brothers) in World of WearableArt 2015, singing in French and Russian. Lorkin was the recipient of a Variety Artists Club NZ Scroll of Honour in 2014.