 |
Isabelle Antena (born 28 May 1960) is a French singer and songwriter, and founder of the electro-samba group Antena. [1]
|
Isabelle Antena (born 28 May 1960) is a French singer and songwriter, and founder of the electro-samba group Antena. [1]
Isabelle Antena is a bossa nova and samba-inflected nu jazz and electropop artist. She was a founding member of 1980s French-Belgian synthpop trio Antena, and in the 1990s led another group, the Powaga Sisters, and was with them for three albums between 1993–2004. Alongside these projects she maintained a solo music career, selling over a million albums. As a solo artist Isabelle Antena has found particular success in Japan and the Far East.
Originally Antena were a trio, [2] combining minimal electro, pop and samba styles. In the summer of 1984 Antena signed a deal with Phonogram, who took a shot at the UK singles chart with "Be Pop". At the same time Isabelle moved to London. The second single, "Life Is Too Short", came out in November, but did not bring mainstream success and so Isabelle returned to Les Disques du Crepuscule and a solo career. Her new single, "Seaside Week End", came out at the beginning of 1986, which was then followed by the album En Cavale. Released early the following year, Hoping for Love combined Latin, funk and samba palette and included jazz and acoustic stylings.
Hoping For Love took Isabelle to Japan for the first time, where in 1987 she was voted best international female singer at the prestigious Tokyo Music Festival. She subsequently performed at the Tokyo Dome between spots by Earth, Wind & Fire and Kool & the Gang. Isabelle then released her third solo album On a Warm Summer Night. In Europe this was released as Tous Mes Caprices, and promoted with a Belgian tour supporting Vaya Con Dios, whose bass player Dirk Schoufs would go on to collaborate with Isabelle as a writer and musician, and become her second husband. Isabelle went on to write and record De l'Amour et des Hommes (1988) and Jouez le Cinq (1989) - the latter being re-issued only months later as Intemporelle (1990) - performing live across Europe as well as North America and Japan. Dirk Schoufs left Vaya Con Dios to join Isabelle, bringing with him Vaya drummer Marco De Meersman and Fritz Sundermann, jazz guitarist and son of Freddy Sunder.
This quartet helped her with the next album, Les Derniers Guerriers Romantique, a conceptual work released in April 1991. On 24 May, 1991, when Dirk Schoufs died, Isabelle was devastated. Following a year of reflection, she returned to the studio in 1992 to record a new album called Carpe Diem, released in Japan and France in November. Recorded by Gilles Martin with colleagues including Marco De Meersman and Sundermann in the comfort of Studio Caraibes in Brussels, Isabelle produced the album herself.
Since Carpe Diem, Isabelle has released a further ten albums, spanning jazz, funk, Latin and house styles, as well as writing for and producing for other artists. She has collaborated with Fragile on the Rocks, The Powaga Sisters and the jazz project Pause Cafe. Although as a solo artist Isabelle Antena has often found greater commercial success in Japan and the Far East than in Europe, she remains critically acclaimed in Europe and the United States.
In 1996 the track "Antena" opened the first ESL compilation [3] by Thievery Corporation, and since then Isabelle has worked with many current DJs and producers including Buscemi, Nicola Conte, Ursula 1000 and Yukihiro Fukutomi. Along with Thievery Corporation, all of them contributed to her 2005 bossa mix double album, Easy Does It / Issy Does It (Remixes), and Thievery guested again on the 2006 Antena project Toujours du Soleil. Completing the Antena trilogy, Bossa Super Nova was issued in April 2010.
Albums
Singles
Richard Jobson is a Scottish filmmaker who also works as a television presenter. He is also known as the singer-songwriter of the band Skids.
Latin jazz is a genre of jazz with Latin American rhythms. The two main categories are Afro-Cuban jazz, rhythmically based on Cuban popular dance music, with a rhythm section employing ostinato patterns or a clave, and Afro-Brazilian jazz, which includes samba and bossa nova.
Ultramarine are an English electronic music duo, formed in 1989 by Ian Cooper and Paul Hammond. Their work blends elements of techno, house and ambient music with acoustic instrumentation, the influence of the 1970s Canterbury scene, and other eclectic sources. They are best known for their 1991 album Every Man and Woman Is a Star, reissued on Rough Trade the following year.
Baden Powell de Aquino, known professionally as Baden Powell, was a Brazilian guitarist. He combined classical techniques with popular harmony and swing. He performed in many styles, including bossa nova, samba, Brazilian jazz, Latin jazz and MPB. He performed on stage during most of his lifetime. Powell composed many pieces for guitar, such as "Abração em Madrid", "Braziliense", "Canto de Ossanha", "Casa Velha", "Consolação", "Horizon", "Imagem", "Lotus", "Samba", "Samba Triste", "Simplesmente", "Tristeza e Solidão", and "Samba da Benção". He released Os Afro-sambas, a watershed album in MPB, with Vinicius de Moraes in 1966.
Winston Tong is an actor, playwright, visual artist, puppeteer, and singer-songwriter. He is best known for his vocals in Tuxedomoon and for winning an Obie award in puppetry for Bound Feet in 1978.
Josef K were a Scottish post-punk band, active between 1979 and 1982, who released singles on the Postcard Records label. The band was named after the protagonist of Franz Kafka's novel The Trial. Although they released just one album while together and achieved only moderate success, they have since proved influential on many bands that followed.
Ludus was a British post-punk band formed in Manchester in 1978, which featured artist, designer and singer Linder Sterling. It played jazz-, avant-garde- and punk- oriented material. The band influenced singer Morrissey, later of The Smiths and a solo artist, who remains one of the group's most vocal fans.
Paul Haig is a Scottish indie musician, singer and songwriter. He was originally a member of post-punk band Josef K, active between 1979 and 1982.
Anna Domino is an American indie rock artist based in New York and Los Angeles who released several albums for Les Disques du Crepuscule and Factory Records in the 1980s and 1990s. Domino has collaborated with musicians such as Matt Johnson of The The, Stephin Merritt in The Sixths, Blaine L. Reininger and Steven Brown of Tuxedomoon, Virginia Astley, Luc van Acker and Ultramarine. She is also one half of the duo Snakefarm.
Alan Rankine was a Scottish musician and record producer best known as keyboardist and guitarist for rock band the Associates, which he co-founded with lead vocalist Billy Mackenzie in the late 1970s.
Les Disques du Crépuscule is an independent record label founded in Belgium in 1980 by Michel Duval and Annik Honoré. It also had a prominent associated sublabel, Factory Benelux. Both are now run by former employee James Nice.
LTM Recordings is a British independent record label founded in 1983, and best known for reissues of artists and music from 1978 to the present day, as well as modern classical and avant-garde composition. The label is based in Norfolk, England, and is curated by James Nice.
The Names are a Belgian post-punk band from Brussels, Belgium, formed in 1978 around bassist, vocalist and songwriter Michel Sordinia.
Alison Statton is a Welsh singer best known for her work with Young Marble Giants. Fans of the singer have included Kurt Cobain, Courtney Love, Stephin Merritt, Belle and Sebastian and Renato Russo.
European Sun is a compilation of rare and unreleased tracks by former Josef K vocalist, Paul Haig. The album was released in 1988 on Belgian independent label Les Disques Du Crepuscule.
Kid Montana was a Belgian electropop band that was active from 1981 to 1987.
Frantz Casseus was a Haitian-American guitarist and composer.
Antena: Camino Del Sol is the second compilation album by The Numero Group (NUM002), based on a mini-album originally released in September 1982. It features tracks by French-Belgian trio Antena who were then signed to Belgian label Les Disques Du Crepuscule. Antena featured Isabelle Antena, a pseudonym for Isabelle Powaga, who is a cult figure known for her song "Say I Believe In It." The re-release contains re-mastered tracks, B-sides and two previously unreleased songs.
Blaine Leslie Reininger is an American post-punk, new-wave and alternative pop singer, songwriter, musician, multi-instrumentalist, writer and performer. He is known for being a member of the group Tuxedomoon since 1977 after co-founding it with Steven Brown and, latterly, for a notable music and theatre career, both as a soloist and contributor to other artists' recordings, including the Durutti Column, Snakefinger, Anna Domino, Savage Republic, Paul Haig, William Lee Self's Montanablue project, Devine & Statton and Brown himself.
Swimming is the debut studio album by Belgian post-punk band the Names, released in 1982 by record label Les Disques du Crépuscule. It was produced by Martin Hannett.
| General | |
|---|---|
| National libraries | |
| Other | |
