Today with Efrat Alony

Zurich Jazz Talks #18

It has been 16 years since her first and last performance with the Zurich Jazz Orchestra. On the occasion of this year’s concert, we talked to Efrat Alony about her experience then compared to today – and about much more: which profession she almost took up, her student days, and how her new album “Händel – Fast Forward” closes the circle. She also tells us about the importance of music as a bridge between different people, her composition process, her long-term collaboration with Ed Partyka, her values as a vocal coach, and about the music business with all its hurdles.

The music of singer, lyricist, composer and bandleader Efrat Alony is as complex as her biography, which has taken her through a wide variety of countries. Efrat Alony sees music as a bridge between people who themselves believe they cannot get along. But anyone who sees the musician on stage today would hardly believe that she once almost took the path to becoming a psychologist. At the time, Efrat Alony was afraid that music was only based on emotions and that she would miss the intellectual aspect in her profession. Nevertheless, she gave studying music a chance – already in the first week of the semester it was clear: “There’s nothing else there’s going to be nothing else”. Today she knows that music combines both aspects, emotions and intellect.

Audio

Video