songs and soundscapes

Alony´s music is a world of atmosphere and secret, spinning around along the edges of jazz, swelling with string quartet and organ sounds, touched by rock and electronic influences.  

 

Efrat Alony’s songs have been praised by the press for years. Some call them “popular art songs, highly expressive,” others speak of “pop songs that mysteriously come out of jazz ” or “a chamber-jazz parallel world.” Austrian Jazzzeit wrote: “Singer Efrat Alony does not only have an interesting voice but she is also a composer and lyricist who has created her own language, through-which she delivers her strong massage.” The Bavarian Radio comments: “She is a musician of a unique refinement. She loves the melting of sound-elements rooted in jazz, rock and electronic music, and using her poetic lyrics and her warm dark alto voice she turns it into a very individual and personal statement.”  

 

Produced by her long-time musical partner, pianist Mark Reinke, in a co-production with the Bayerischer Rundfunk (Bavarian Radio), “Dismantling Dreams” is Efrat’s fourth album with her band project Alony. Now reduced to a trio (plus a string quartet), the band mixes acoustic and electronic elements into original sound designs that are strongly and deliberately influenced by current pop music concepts. Embedded in these adventurous soundscapes, Efrat’s fascinating voice gains a new, fundamental clarity and an emotional depth never reached before. This unique form of singer-art-songwriting manages to seamlessly cross musical borders. “The compositions are formed like collages of feelings,” says Efrat, “like little films for the ear.” 

 

“Dismantling Dreams” is a further proof of an uninhibited, bewildering talent. 

 

Efrat Alony

Born in Haifa, Israel, in 1975, as a daughter of Jewish Iraqi new comers, singer Efrat Alony studied composition, arranging, jazz singing and classical singing in Israel, Germany and the U.S. and took additional lessons from the likes of Joe Lovano, Bob Brookmeyer and Steve Gray. Efrat was a featured as a soloist with many big bands such as the United Women’s Orchestra, the Sunday Night Orchestra (CD “Overcast”, 2008), the Jazz Orchestra of the Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), the Radio Big Band Frankfurt (HR-Bigband, upcoming CD) and the Zurich Jazz Orchestra.  

 

Efrat has worked as a musical director and vocal coach for various theater productions, such with the renown American director Robert Wilson. In 2006 she was awarded the Jazz Performance Prize of the Karl Hofer Society and the Jazz Institute Berlin (the prize was set at 5000€) . in 2008 she received the City of Berlin Jazz Award. Her forth CD “Dismantling Dreams”, released by Enja Records (as a co-production with the Bavarian radio) will be followed by a CD Release Tour in Germany in Austria. 

 

Efrat uses Neumann microphones 

Mark Reinke

Born in Düsseldorf in 1976, Mark Reinke studied Jazz piano in Arnheim, Netherlands, at the “Hanns Eisler” college of music in Berlin and at Berklee college of Music, Boston with Rob van den Broek, Aki Takase, Steve Gray and Richie Beirach. 

 

Aside of being the co-leader of Alony he has worked amongst others with Katja Riemann, Sonja Kandels, Hermano Lobo, Tilman Ehrhorn and Johannes Haage. He has participated in various theatre productions as a pianist and musical director, such as the play “saints and singing”, directed by the famous American director Robert Wilson, that toured all over Europe. 

He also works as a sound designer for the music software company Ableton.  

Mark has been influenced by very different musical styles, such as Jazz, minimal music, African music or alternative Rock and musicians such as Django Bates, Steve Reich, Radiohead or June Tabor. 

 

Mark Reinke uses Nord keyboards and Ableton Live. 

Christian Thomé

Christian Thomé began playing drums at age 14, he had been studying the clarinet and piano from up age 6. Born in 1970, he grew up in Düsseldorf, Germany, playing music ranging from  pop, rock and fusion to swing. In 1991 he went to Arnhem, The Netherlands, to attend the Arnhem Institut for the Arts, where he studied with Joop van Erven and René Creemers. During this time he let his own bands and consolidated his skills in composing and arranging. In 1997 he moved to Cologne, Germany, and has since become one of the most in demand drummers in germany's jazz/new music scene today. 

 

In addition to co-leading and composing for the groups Lühning and Arnie Bolden, Christian records and tours extensively with diverse groups including Sebastian Gramss' Mad Michel,  Efrat Alony, Trio Stockhausen/Comisso/Thomé, Thomas Heberer Trio, Nanoschlaf, Jürgen Friedrich's bits and pieces and the worldmusic band "Schäl Sick Brass Band". 

 

Christian is currently recording with his electronic trio Radio Köber, his latest cd "hauptstrom" and debut album as a leader with his septet Tomatic 7 is available on JHM Recordings. He also performed with musicians, including Lee Konitz, Peter Kowald, Evan Parker, Michael Moore, Dhafer Youssef, Michel Godard, Rainer Winterschladen, Ike Willis, John Goldsby, Markus Stockhausen, Claudio Puntin, Guillaume Orti, Till Brönner, Dieter Manderscheid, Frank Chastenier, Hans Lüdemann, Henning Sieverts, Achim Kaufmann, Sebastian Hess, Hartmut Kracht, Céline Rudolph, Michiel Braam, Wilbert de Joode, Jorrit Dijkstra, Oene van Geel, Peter Fessler, Moritz Eggert, Sebastian Gramss, Nils Wogram, Matthias Schubert, Rudi Mahall.