Jazz Articles about Donna Khalife

About Donna Khalife

Interview

Hayeli: Mirrors Unto The Improvising Soul

by Ian Patterson
June 5, 2025

Two double basses is an uncommon lineup, particularly when it comes to improvised music. But Lebanese double bassist Donna Khalifé and Armenian double bassist Khachatur Savzyan are well attuned to one another. Partners in life, their creative philosophy is reflected in each other's approach to improvisation. Not for nothing is their project entitled Hayeli, which means “mirror" in Armenian. Their debut album, Home (Self Produced, 2025), is a visceral, haunting and ultimately uplifting affair. In essence, home means ...

Album Review

Hayeli: Home

by Ian Patterson
June 4, 2025

Hayeli is the moniker of Lebanese double bassist Donna Khalifé and Armenian double bassist Khachatur Savzyan, partners in life as in music. Khalifé is held in high esteem as one of the most progressive voices on Beirut's jazz and improvised music scene--a reputation her highly original self-produced albums Heavy Dance (2017) and Hope is the Thing with Feathers (2019) strongly support. In addition to her conservatoire study in Paris--and like most bassists in the Lebanese capital--she also studied with Savzyan, ...

Profile

A Brief Guide To Lebanese Jazz

by Ian Patterson
October 22, 2024

Lebanon is known for many things--its lush valleys, a fertile coastal plain and a 170 km-long mountain range carpeted with cedar, oak and pine. Beirut, Tripoli, Sidon, Tyre, Byblos and Baalbek--its cities' names resonate with history's vibrations. These are cities that have borne more history than most. It is a country renowned for its love of art and culture. Music is everywhere. Singer Fairouz, one of the most famous and instantly recognizable of Arabic voices since the early ...

Album Review

Donna Khalife: Hope is the Thing with Feathers

Read "Hope is the Thing with Feathers" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
January 14, 2020

Two-and-a-half years after her powerful debut, Heavy Dance (Self- Produced, 2017), Lebanese double bassist and singer Donna Khalifé returns with another sparkling statement. It is not an especially long time between releases, but there are significant differences between the two recordings. Heavy Dance, with guitar and saxophone to the fore, was a frequently stormy affair of edgy dissonances, odd metres and punchy angularity. Hope Is The Thing With Feathers, by contrast, is a more melodious experience. Its colors are brighter ...

Interview

Donna Khalifé: On The Silent Wings Of Hope

by Ian Patterson
January 9, 2020

Ask any jazz musician in Beirut who stands out on the scene, who is doing something adventurous, something different, and the first name that comes to everyone's lips is Donna Khalifé. Classically trained in Beirut and Paris, double bassist/singer Khalifé turned her back on that world to dedicate herself completely to jazz and improvisation. Her debut album, Heavy Dance (Self-Produced, 2017), was a feisty, odd-metred affair of strikingly original compositions and bold improvisations where angularity and beauty went ...

Album Review

Donna Khalifé: Hope is the Thing with Feathers

Read "Hope is the Thing with Feathers" reviewed by Hrayr Attarian

by Hrayr Attarian
January 6, 2020

Lebanese vocalist and bassist Donna Khalifé is a consummate jazz artist. In addition to mastering singing in all its aspects, including scatting, she is a distinctive composer and an accomplished instrumentalist. On her second release Hope Is the Thing with Feathers she leads her quintet on intriguing interpretations of standards and her own originals. This stimulating album opens with a unique take on Rodgers and Hammerstein's “My Favorite Things." After Khalifé's chant-like vocals, which the group's expectant refrains ...

Rethinking Jazz Cultures

Lebanon: Jazz And The Revolution

by Ian Patterson
December 19, 2019

When people's anger and frustration spill onto Beirut's streets, music is one of the first things to suffer. Every few years, it seems, roads are blocked, and crowds swell the downtown area--angry at Syrian intervention or political assassination, enraged by Israeli attack, sick to the teeth of inadequate garbage collection. There's always something to arouse the ire of the Lebanese people. In such times of unrest, when explosions of violence are always a possibility, gigs inevitably, ...