Afro-pop, Violin & Nomads

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Led by award-winning jazz violinist Omer Ashano, Imma Express' music is born out of the blend of guitar driven Central African Sebene music with the improvisational sensibilities of jazz musicians of different backgrounds to create compositions that push the envelope of several African music styles and modern jazz yet a performance which is energized and approachable by anyone. The sounds of Tel Aviv’s central bus station, encompassing the music of the city’s African diaspora and refugees community, inspire the core voice of Imma Express’ music. “Imma” and its various variations signify “mother” in numerous languages - a universal symbol of grounding, love, and connection to our roots, which Imma Express' music encapsulates.

Imma Express is a multicultural band comprising Ashano's musical colleagues, all distinguished jazz and world music performers in the vibrant musical scenes of NYC, Tel Aviv, and Berlin. They infuse their music with an innovative and contemporary flair while preserving its profound connections to African traditional and popular music.

The interleaving lines played by multiple guitarists in Congolese Rumba derivative music such as soukous and sungura music naturally create a strong rhythmic motion.
Imma Express' compositions are mainly based off this unique guitar playing and composition technique, commonly referred to as ‘shona’ guitar or ‘sebene’. These lines, when joined by the rhythm section, create a solid beat which is contrasted by the violin’s vocally inspired melodies and improvisations.

Despite growing up in an Ashkenazi-Jewish family in Israel, band leader and award-winning jazz violinist Omer Ashano, has always been fascinated by other genres of folkloric music. Growing up, he loved entertaining himself musically by attempting to play new styles of non-classical music on the violin. Early on, it was African traditional music that particularly intrigued him while later in his musical explorations he discovered additional contemporary-urban African genres like sebene, Tuareg blues, sungura, chimurenga and tigrigna music, being exposed to some of these various musical genres played in businesses, bars, churches and parties of African diaspora communities residing in the neighborhoods surrounding the New Central Bus Station in Southern Tel-Aviv.

As Omer says: “To me the sebene guitar lines are the African equivalent of the classical European counterpoint, and I am always fascinated to see how modern African musicians take this rather complex composition technique and make it sound so high-energy yet concise. Furthering the borders of this guitar style while facilitating the violin in the genre feels to me like a great opportunity for discovering new sounds that had not yet been explored while keeping the music very approachable to people of all backgrounds”.

Imma Express has been touring since 2021 offering concerts and workshops worldwide and had already shared their music in Beton label studio, Orankelichter festival, FMW, Budapest Jazz House, Interurban festival and more…