“ If you feel like you wanna sing, cause singing is your thing, sing on, sing on...Cause whatever you do, oh, you’ve got
to do your thing ”
Lana is a prolific songwriter and experienced recording artiste, with session work and collaborative songwriting projects under her belt plus an extensive catalogue of original songs. Her natural styles to sing and write are jazz, blues and folk, but her songs have fitted comfortably with rock, electronica, dance and most other genres- a good song will transcend any category!
On this page you’ll find her archives- a chunk of her musical life portfolio in no particular order (there’s not quite room for all).
Here’s her story.
It started at 12. Poems with melodies. At 15 a guitar was added. At university in Leeds there was inspiration all around. Playing live almost weekly she watched Corinne Bailey Rae, Cara Robinson, John McCallum, Rachel Modest, Haggis Horns and JD73.
Isaac Hayes changed her life. When she heard his song, “Do your thing”, she shed the shyness that plagued her for years and, well, did her thing.
She cut her teeth singing with jazz/hip hop outfit Thelonious with Bill Laurance, funk/rock band Doctor Octopus and trip hop/soul/funk band The Bluefoot Project as backing singer for Rachel Modest who she’s still completely in awe of. She recorded her first demo in 2001 at Sponge Studios. Before then no one knew she sang or wrote.
Back in London, Lana continued writing and performing her own music, whilst signed to Monumental Management who took her to Radio 2, Radio 6 Music, Glastonbury Festival and Secret Garden Party and on tour with Nell Bryden and Gabby Young as well as performing guest spots and backing vocals with jazz singer Fiona Renshaw, drum n bass band Virtigo, Sephardi band Los Desterrados, plus regular shows with Tricity Vogue, Tom Mansi & The Icebreakers, Ian Beetlestone & The Drowning Rats and The Dapper Dudes. In the meantime she regularly performed jazz at cabaret nights, bars, hotels and private events around London and beyond.
Lana has written songs for JD73, Tom Mansi & The Icebreakers and all the songs for children’s book series ‘Jungle Jam’ plus her own childrens albums (she entertains kids too as Ilana Banana which complimented her kids’ early years).
Recently she's collaborated on an exciting writing and recording project with incredible Israeli musicians Adar Avisar, Haim Romano and Yaron Gershovsky plus Tal Bergman and Yossi Fine, with a solo album to be released soon.
After a few years’ break to raise a family, Lana is back, with her passion and flair for writing songs stronger than ever and Isaac Hayes still ringing in her ears.