{"id":2229,"date":"2023-03-10T00:00:06","date_gmt":"2023-03-10T00:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/?p=2229"},"modified":"2023-03-07T17:56:56","modified_gmt":"2023-03-07T17:56:56","slug":"tonina-on-making-music","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/articles\/tonina-on-making-music","title":{"rendered":"Create Outside The Box: Tonina on Making Music"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There\u2019s no musical box that can define <a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/artist\/5CNjEQS5vkm6B9BGEDqJ7b?si=FknRfH8wTOm5LsCqmq6J2g\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Tonina<\/a>. Her quartet plays both Tonina\u2019s own compositions and reimagined covers of folk songs from four different continents, sung in three different languages\u2014English, Spanish, and Italian. Musically, she\u2019s informed by jazz and R&amp;B as well as flamenco, bolero, and many other centuries-old traditions. We got the chance to talk with Tonina about the importance of folk traditions in her art, expressing herself indifferent languages, and staying away from boxes to be as creative as possible.<\/span><\/p>\n<h5><b>Sofar: How did you get into playing music?<\/b><\/h5>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Tonina: I started playing symphonic music when I was eight. Creating music with an entire group is the best feeling in the world and I\u2019ve just been addicted to it ever since I was little. Also, I come from a musical family, my father was a drummer and a bassist, my uncle was a drummer, and my other uncle is a guitarist and banjo player. So I always thought a career in music was feasible.<\/span><\/p>\n<h5><b>What made you start Tonina?<\/b><\/h5>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I decided not to go to a symphonic school to study classical music. [Instead], I went to Berklee and it was different from what I was used to. I started playing in smaller bands, jazz combos and playing in quartets [where] I [was] the only person in my section that I had to rely on. I wanted to apply what I was learning in my ensemble classes to my own music; that was really scary but I had written so much music that I didn\u2019t know where to put it. I was like \u2018let me gather a drummer, a trumpet player or a sax player and I\u2019ll play bass and let\u2019s see where this goes.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n<h5><b>You have a lot of influences in your music. How did you find your sound?<\/b><\/h5>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When I was little, I used to imitate all of my favorite artists and singers. Nowadays, I\u2019m inspired by ethnomusicology and folk traditions from around the world. Stylistically,\u00a0 [my music is] inspired by many different folk traditions; blues and R&amp;B are folk traditions in the US and flamenco can be considered a form of folk tradition for Romani people in Spain and different types of rhythms from West Africa. I\u2019m mostly inspired by African [music] but then I spent time living in Spain and I love the vocal gymnastics of flamenco singers and that\u2019s really inspiring for me as well.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Tonina - Que L\u00edo (Baba Fururu) | Sofar Chicago\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/RCwo4yJ-Klo?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h5><b>What is it about these different folk traditions that appeal to you so much?<\/b><\/h5>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It&#8217;s all very raw sounding. For example, I like to cover a lot of folk songs from Sicily and across the board there is a lot of raw emotion, the vocals are very dry, matter of fact, and the songwriting is very confessional. I love how authentic, raw, and organic it is and I want to translate that to my music.<\/span><\/p>\n<h5><b>What are the challenges of singing in different languages<\/b><\/h5>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I mainly just did it to reach as many people as I can with the languages I speak. I want to be intentional in the songs that I choose in Spanish and in English. I don\u2019t really write in Italian anymore because I can\u2019t really speak it anymore like I did in the past. I also like to bring some awareness to the music, like Rosa Balistreri. She\u2019s an artist I covered in my albums and she\u2019s an icon from Sicily.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Tonina Saputo - St. Lost | Sofar Kansas City\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/DZGl_PWBg3k?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h5><b>How do you find the balance of expressing yourself and shining a spotlight to other cultures?<\/b><\/h5>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I like to mix them up. In my last project, I have a straight up cover of Hector Lavoe but then [another] track is a song I wrote that then [incorporates] a Sicilian folk song. I don\u2019t want to be just a cover artist but I like to do my own arrangements of the songs. I think it\u2019s a fun challenge to rearrange them and see where they fit.<\/span><\/p>\n<h5><b>Do cover songs help you find your own voice?<\/b><\/h5>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think it\u2019s like a call to my ancestors that came through the Caribbean or Sicily or Texas who were slaves. It\u2019s very important to me to pay homage because I\u2019m always doing music history research and I\u2019m fascinated by what I find and how we\u2019re all really connected musically in North America, South America, and Africa, and so I kinda want to challenge myself to create things inspired by that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/articles\/5-la-artists\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Read: 5 LA Artists We Love<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<h5><b>What do you think playing your music in many different cities has contributed to your musical formation?<\/b><\/h5>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I would say that traveling and reading are the two things that inspire me the most. Honestly, I\u2019m the happiest when I\u2019m in a new country or a new place and I\u2019m just exploring, it awakens my creative side. When I\u2019m in the same place I get bored so I need a sense of adventure to create. That\u2019s why it\u2019s hard for me to stay in the same place for an extended period of time. That\u2019s why touring is so great because I get exposed to different styles of music. Flamenco is all over Spain but there\u2019s a lot of different genres in Catalonia. I learn about all these things and stray away from my preconceived notions of what I think it\u2019s the music of the place. It inspires the hell out of me to create.<\/span><\/p>\n<h5><b>Do you find that challenging yourself constantly is a rewarding experience?<\/b><\/h5>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Totally! Throughout my whole music career I think I have been in definite boxes, like when I was playing symphonic music or jazz or in a classic rock ensemble or in a Latin music ensemble; I want to stray away from that and bring everything into me that I like about all of that [music]. Because I think when I narrow myself down, my creativity gets narrowed down so I can\u2019t really expand or reach my full potential.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Words by Marcos Hassan<\/p>\n<p><em>Photo credit: Tonina, photo by Jessica Page<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There\u2019s no musical box that can define Tonina. Her quartet plays both Tonina\u2019s own compositions and reimagined covers of folk songs from four different continents, sung in three different languages\u2014English, Spanish, and Italian. Musically, she\u2019s informed by jazz and R&amp;B as well as flamenco, bolero, and many other centuries-old traditions. We got the chance to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":2230,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[233],"class_list":["post-2229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artists","tag-tonina"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2229","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2229"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2229\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sofarsounds.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}