Rena Jones | |
---|---|
Also known as | Jena Rose |
Born | 1977 (age 46–47) United States |
Genres | Electro-acoustic, downtempo, ambient |
Instrument(s) | Cello, violin, keyboards, synthesizer |
Years active | 2002–present |
Labels | Cartesian Binary, Pok Pok |
Website | renamusic |
Rena Jones [1] (born 1977) is an American musician, producer and audio engineer from Portland, Oregon. She composes and produces electro-acoustic, downtempo and ambient music with an emphasis on live string instruments. She has released six solo albums and collaborated on over 100 albums. [2] Her latest album titled Allegories was released in November 2021. [3]
Jones grew up in Texas and started on classical violin in second grade. She showed interest in writing music and as a teenager pursued electronic music. She said the freedom and flexibility that electronic music offered was very appealing to her. From 2000 to 2002 she studied sound engineering at Ex'pression College for Digital Arts in Emeryville, California. She then worked as an audio engineer and a musician in the San Francisco area. At Digidesign she worked on the development of the Pro Tools audio software. In 2006 she moved to Portland, Oregon. [2]
Jones plays the cello, violin, keyboards, and programs the synthesizer and drums. Her musical style is based on incorporation and "manipulation of string sounds from real acoustic violins and cellos along with purely electronic beats." [2] She has released six solo albums. Each album has a concept: Transmigration is about reincarnation, Driftwood is about the cycle of life, [4] Indra's Web is about the interconnectedness of reality, and Echoes is about duality, drawing inspiration from Rumi's poetry. [5]
Along with running her own record labels Cartesian Binary Recordings and Pok Pok Records, Jones has composed for film and video games such as Dance Dance Revolution under the name Jena Rose. [4] She was part of the Dance Dance Revolution ULTRAMIX 4 alongside artists Juno Reactor, Prodigy and others. Best known for her unique ambient-electronic music, Rena has released original compositions on groundbreaking labels such as LOCI Records, Disco Geko, Iboga, Spun Records, Aleph Zero, 1320 Records, Addictech, Ultimae, and Schematic Records, while also running her label Cartesian Binary Recordings. [6] Jones has performed at several electronic music festivals around the world including Shambhala, Burning Man and the Glade. [2]
Three of Jones's albums, Driftwood, Indra's Web, and Allegories were listed among Echoes radio's top 25 albums of the year in 2006 and 2009, and 2021 respectively. [7] [8] Her album, Echoes, features performances by musicians located remotely in London, Los Angeles and Portland, including Sophie Barker, Earl Harvin, Ilya Goldberg, Matt Robertson, Laura Scarborough and Joshua Penman. [5] [9] The album was listed among the top 25 albums of the month by Echoes radio in May and June 2013. [10] [11]
Year | Album |
---|---|
2004 | Breaking the Divide |
2005 | Transmigration |
2006 | Driftwood |
2009 | Indra's Web [12] |
2013 | Echoes [13] |
2021 | Allegories [14] |
Year | Album | Artists |
---|---|---|
2021 | Xylem | Emancipator, Rena Jones & Flowerpulse |
2021 | Force Multiplier | Rena Jones & KiloWatts |
2024 | Caesura | Rena Jones & KiloWatts |
Year | Song | Album | Artist |
---|---|---|---|
2005 | Autumn (as Rena) | Left Coast Liquid Vol. 1 | Various artists |
2006 | Aurora Borealis | Beneath the Surface | |
2007 | Driftwood | The Echoes Living Room Concerts Volume 13 | |
Autumn Suggestion | Temple of Science | ||
Blueshift | Floating Point 4 | Dovla (2) | |
A Curious Unraveling | Midnight Soul Dive | Various artists | |
2009 | Photosynthesis (Nalepa Remix) | Imaginary Friends | |
2010 | A Thousand Times Over | Document | |
2011 | Ymadyn (as Rena) | Cloud 11 |
Year | Contribution | Song | Album | Artist |
---|---|---|---|---|
2005 | Cello | Better Day | Artifact | STS9 |
2005 | Cello | A Garland of Stars | Sines and Singularities | Bluetech |
2007 | Cello, violin | Straight Heat | Certified Air Raid Material | edIT |
2010 | Producer, mixing, cello, backup vocals | — | On the Horizon | Lynx |
2010 | Mixing | Rising Tide (Ft. Lynx) | Blind Threshold | Beats Antique |
2012 | Cello, viola | Is She Gonna | All the Pretty People | Christopher Norman & The Reverb Junkie |
2012 | Cello, violin, bass, arrangement | Mesmer | Mercury Retrograde | Roel Funcken |
2013 | Cello | Galapagos | Dusk Till Dawn | Emancipator |
2013 | Cello | Light Up Your Lantern, and Liberte | Light Up Your Lantern | Lynx |
Ambient music is a genre of music that emphasizes tone and atmosphere over traditional musical structure or rhythm. It is often "peaceful" sounding and lacks composition, beat, and/or structured melody. It uses textural layers of sound that can reward both passive and active listening and encourage a sense of calm or contemplation. The genre is said to evoke an "atmospheric", "visual", or "unobtrusive" quality. Nature soundscapes may be included, and the sounds of acoustic instruments such as the piano, strings and flute may be emulated through a synthesizer.
The Future Sound of London is a British electronic music duo composed of Garry Cobain and Brian Dougans. They have been described as a "boundary-pushing" electronic act, covering techno, ambient, house music, trip hop, psychedelia, and dub.
Goldfrapp were an English electronic music duo from London, formed in 1999. The duo consists of Alison Goldfrapp and Will Gregory (synthesiser).
Jolie Holland is an American singer and performer who combines elements of folk, traditional, experimental, and rock.
Colleen or Cécile Schott is a French composer of electronic and ambient music based in Barcelona.
Bridget Wishart is an English vocalist, musician and performance artist. She was a member of English rock band Hawkwind from 1989 to 1991. Wishart was the first woman to sing lead vocals in Hawkwind, and is the band's only singing frontwoman in their history. She is an ongoing member of Spirits Burning, and the Chumley Warner Brothers live duo.
The Dead Air Fresheners are a Portland, Oregon-based experimental and post-punk musical group with a somewhat fluctuating membership. They have been described by Portland's KPSU as "A long-time mainstay of the Experimental Rock Scene." They count Sun Ra, John Cage, Sonic Youth, Sun City Girls, and Jandek as influences.
Richard David James, known professionally as Aphex Twin, is a British musician, record producer, composer and DJ. He is known for his idiosyncratic work in electronic styles such as techno, ambient and jungle. Journalists from publications including Mixmag, The New York Times, NME, Fact,Clash and The Guardian have called James one of the most influential and important artists in contemporary electronic music.
Brian Wayne Transeau, known by his initials as BT, is an American musician, DJ, singer, songwriter, record producer, composer, and audio engineer. An artist in the electronic music genre, he is credited as a pioneer of the trance and intelligent dance music styles that paved the way for EDM, and for "stretching electronic music to its technical breaking point." In 2010, he was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Electronic/Dance Album for These Hopeful Machines. He creates music within myriad styles, such as classical, film composition, and bass music.
Selected Ambient Works 85–92 is the debut album by the British electronic music producer Aphex Twin. It was released on 9 November 1992 through Apollo Records, a subsidiary of the Belgian label R&S Records. The album consists of ambient techno tracks that were recorded on cassette as early as 1985, when James was 13-14 years old. On release it received widespread acclaim and entered the Dance Albums Chart at No. 6 on 26 December 1992.
she is a musical project formed in 2003 by the Polish artist, producer and musician Lain Volta Trzaska, and is sometimes credited as shemusic, Lain Volta. As its main producer, songwriter, and instrumentalist, Lain is the only official member, but he brings in vocalists to perform.
Douglas Appling, better known by his stage name, Emancipator, is an American producer and DJ based in Portland, Oregon, United States. He launched his music career by self-releasing his debut album, Soon It Will Be Cold Enough, in 2006 while he was a college student. He has released eight studio albums, two live albums, five EPs and three remix collections. He also founded his own record label, Loci Records, in 2012 and formed a live band called the Emancipator Ensemble in 2013.
Black Submarine, previously known as The Black Ships until mid-2012, were an English rock supergroup formed in November 2008 by former Verve members Nick McCabe and Simon Jones, Coldplay/Goldfrapp collaborator and former The Verve touring musician Davide Rossi, singer Amelia Tucker and drummer Mig Schillace.
Lindsey Stirling is an American violinist, songwriter and dancer. She presents choreographed violin performances, in live and music videos found on her official YouTube channel, which she created in 2007.
AeTopus is a progressive Electronic music project performed and produced by composer Bryan Tewell Hughes. The music has received critical acclaim within the new-age and electronic music genres, and the album Between Empires won the award of Best Electronic album in the 2012 Zone Music Reporter Awards. The album Tempula was nominated in the Best Electronic category in the 2006 NAR Lifestyle Music Awards. Other nominations for ZMR Best Electronic album include the 2013 Extended play (EP) release Angels and Machines, the 2015 CD When, and the 2018 CD Totem Totum. After having independently released seven albums and two EPs between 2002 and 2022, Hughes signed with the Spotted Peccary Music label for the release of the full-length album Cup in 2023.
The music of the 2009 video game Minecraft, developed by Mojang Studios, primarily consists of two soundtrack albums by German musician Daniel Rosenfeld, better known as C418. American composer Lena Raine has also contributed music for four major updates to the game since 2020, alongside Aaron Cherof and Kumi Tanioka who worked on the most recent version in 2024. Music included in downloadable content (DLC) for legacy console versions of the game was handled by British musician Gareth Coker.
Michelle Jacqueline Chamuel is an American music producer, songwriter and vocalist. She has released several works as a solo artist and in partnership with others. Her works span various styles including pop, electronic, acoustic and ambient. Influenced by Imogen Heap and Max Martin, she is also known by her producer moniker The Reverb Junkie. Her recent works include music production for the film Glitter & Doom.
Ramona Andra Langley is an American electronic musician from Portland, Oregon. She has released music under her primary Vektroid alias, as well as others, such as dstnt, Laserdisc Visions, New Dreams Ltd., Virtual Information Desk, and PrismCorp Virtual Enterprises. Langley played a prominent role in the popularization of the vaporwave subgenre with the release of her ninth studio album, Floral Shoppe, under the alias Macintosh Plus. The album helped popularize the vaporwave genre throughout the Internet. Since then, she has continued to release music through Bandcamp and other online platforms.
Olga Bell is an American musician, music producer, composer, and singer-songwriter. She was born in Moscow, Russia, raised in Anchorage, Alaska and is currently based in Brooklyn, New York. A classically trained pianist and self-taught electronic music producer, she has worked in a wide range of genres, including classical, electronic pop, and Russian folk. Best known for Край (Krai), a tribute to her Russian heritage, and Diamonite, an album she produced with Gunnar Olsen and Jason Nazary under the moniker BELL, she has also played in Chairlift and Dirty Projectors and collaborated with Tom Vek under the name Nothankyou. In 2016, Bell released her third studio album Tempo.
Holland Andrews is an American singer, composer, performance artist, and clarinetist. A solo artist who has previously performed under the name Like A Villain, their style of music draws from contemporary opera, musical theater, jazz, ambient and noise music. They also compose music for dance, theater, and film.