Thana Alexa & HRT Jazz Orchestra
MSU Zagreb, Croatia
LIVE
EDUCATION
• PRIVATE LESSONS
• MASTERCLASSES / WORKSHOPS
• THE NEW SCHOOL FOR JAZZ & CONTEMPORARY MUSIC FACULTY
• NY JAZZ ACADEMY FACULTY
Photo by Franco Moret
GEAR
Check out Thana’s gear:
• TC Helicon VoiceLive Touch 2
• BOSS RC 505
• Telefunken M80 Microphone
Thana Alexa is endorsed by TC Helicon,
Roland/ BOSS and is a VIP friend of Telefunken Microphones
What’s New
Thana Alexa & Antonio Sanchez are commissioned by CSUN and The Soraya to write the music for EXISTENCIA, a new performance together with Los Angeles based dance company DIAVOLO: Architecture In Motion about natural disaster, destruction, community rebuilding and human resilience.
PONTA LOPUD JAZZ FESTIVAL
Thana Alexa is co-founder and artistic director of the Ponta Lopud Jazz Festival in Croatia
Thana Alexa is on Downbeat Magazine’s 2023 Critic’s Poll for Female Vocalist
Winner International Songwriting Competition
Thana Alexa is the WINNER of the 2021 International Songwriting Competition Jazz Category for her song “ONA”!
Winner UnsignedOnly Music Competition
Thana Alexa is the WINNER of the 2021 UnsignedOnly Music Competition in the Jazz Category for her song “ONA”!
Thana Alexa nominated for Female Vocalist of the Year by the Jazz Journalists Association!
Thana Alexa’s ONA receives two GRAMMY® nominations!
• Best Jazz Vocal Album (ONA, 2020)
• Best Improvised Jazz Solo for Regina Carter’s performance on “Pachamama”
Vocalist and loop artist Thana Alexa and her husband, multiple Grammy award-winning drummer Antonio Sánchez, are no strangers to performing together around the world. Their original strategy of keeping their work and personal lives separate proved to be futile when she joined his band, Migration, in 2014. They had been forced to acknowledge a simple truth: They both naturally enriched each other's musical concepts.
Before the quarantine, the couple was about to kick-off an ambitious tour in celebration of Alexa's latest recording, ONA -- a release discussed in-depth on WBGO's The Checkout podcast. Here, they perform the title track for our Alone Together Duets series.
DOWNBEAT MAGAZINE
The Pulse of Antonio Sánchez & Thana Alexa
Cover story: Antonio Sánchez & Thana Alexa ‘Our Ears Together’
On a chilly January night in New York City, drummer-composer Antonio Sánchez plays a full-body phrase. He hangs back in the measures before repeating it—a provocation. Alongside saxophonist and EWI artist Chase Baird, vocalist Thana Alexa stretches vowels around quarter-tones in extend-ed moments of dissonance on the Blue Note stage. She recites a wordless incantation she’s never delivered—one she’ll never repeat. These moments of intensity are typical for a show by the band Migration.
FORBES
Master Jazz Musicians to Play Live in a Virtual Jazz Camp This July
It’s been a challenging three months for the jazz community with the cancellation of concerts and in-person teaching opportunities. But despite these setbacks, jazz musicians everywhere are adapting to the new reality. “We’re used to looking in the unseen places between the notes and given a set of rules, tend to break them,” says Grammy-winning saxophonist and composer, Jane Ira Bloom. “So we’re well-positioned to take on the challenge of online spontaneity. Improvising together online with all its timing difficulties is a dangerous opportunity for musicians who are used to playing without a safety net.” Bloom’s gigs in San Diego and NYC were cancelled when the pandemic began.
WALL STREET JOURNAL
The Staying Inside Guide: Taking Improvisation to a Whole New Level
Live-streamed concerts by jazz musicians reinvent the typical performance for times of lockdown