Omer Ashano

Ashano’s musical influences are as cosmopolitan as he is, having lived in several places including Amsterdam, New York City, Athens and various cities and villages in Israel. As a result of these experiences and engaging with different people throughout his travels in Europe, North America and the far East, Ashano was constantly influenced by a variety of cultural inspirations and local communities. This helped shape his eclectic musical identity, which holds traces of Israeli music, African-american music, Classical music as well as folklore music from Africa, Romania and India.

Born in 1993, Ashano started playing violin when he was six years old, later taking up the guitar at age 13. At the time, his guitar teachers were the influencers who exposed Omer to the styles of Blues, Rock n’ Roll and Jazz as well as the ideas and possibilities surrounding improvisation. It was from this exposure that Omer started experimenting with this new knowledge and adapting it for the violin.

Throughout the years Ashano has deepened his knowledge and passion of improvisation in jazz and other genres of music. In addition to his classical and jazz education, he immersed himself in Indian music while learning to play the Sitar and the Tabla. In the following years he went on to receive several awards and scholarships from different internationally-recognized institutions, among them the America-Israel Cultural Foundation grant for outstanding jazz performers which he received in 2014.

In 2016 Ashano moved to New York City to complete his academic studies at The New School for Jazz and to pursue his musical career in the city. Ashano quickly immersed himself in the local jazz community and became a renowned violinist in the NYC music scene, as well as an acclaimed composer and musical producer. While continuing to record and perform internationally with the Israeli folk/rock band OSOG, of which Ashano has been an active member of years, Omer shared stages both as a bandleader and a band member with different bands and artists in the Jazz, Rock, Folk and World Music scenes, hitting stages and festivals such as SXSW Festival, Folk Alliance Festival, Philadelphia Folk Fest, Red Sea Jazz Festival, Summertime Jazz Fest TLV, Detroit Noel Night Festival, NYC Winter Jazz Fest and important venues such as the Memphis Levitt Shell, Smalls Jazz Club, Mezzrow Jazz Club, Shablul Jazz Club, Enav Cultural Center and more. In April 2019, guitarist Dennis Pol’s album “New York City”, in which Omer played a lead part, was published by the prestigious Norwegian gypsy jazz label “Hot Club Records”. In May 2019 Ashano released his own live debut EP “Alive In New York” featuring his quartet playing Ashano’s original compositions and arrangements, to much positive reviews and acclaim. This year he also served as film composer and musical editor for the silent film “Hannah Can You Hear Me?” which won the AFI World Peace Initiative Cannes Award for “Best Arts Film”. In 2020, amidst the Covid-19 pandemic, Ashano have participated in the International Seifert Competition for jazz violin in which he won 3rd prize. Following the competition Ashano has released 4 singles under the title “The Seifert Sessions” of his quartet recordings that participated in the Seifert Competition.

These days Omer is collaborating with various NYC-based and Tel-Aviv-based musicians in touring with his original musical project titled ‘Imma Express’, based primarily on Congolese Rumba music, which facilitates guitar styles from West and Central Africa into Omer’s original compositions. The band has been invited to perform and give workshops in venues and academies across Europe and Israel. In addition, Ashano’s jazz standards album titled “Violin, Shall Swing! recorded in Greece with his trio consisting of guitarist Dion Berardo and bass player Kimon Karoutzos is expected to be released in 2024.

Awards

-The America-Israel Cultural foundation scholarship (2014)

Gear

Violin