Tally Koren takes more pride in the inclusion of one of her songs in the Reform siddur than she does in her part in the new 'Bond' flick.
By LEO DAVIDSONTally Koren 88 248(photo credit: Courtesy)
Israeli singer-songwriter Tally Koren has been hearing voices for years - but they're all her own.
She released her debut album, Timeless Melodies, in the UK last week, and she is featured as the voice of an Israeli agent in the latest James Bond movie, Quantum of Solace, which opens Thursday.
The new album is comprised mostly of Koren's lyrics set to or based on classical melodies, which she describes as "like cowriting. It was a very natural process."
It may seem odd that a singer-songwriter should make her debut album using music that others have written, and she admits that many of her friends told her she was "crazy - and they were right."
The project started while she was playing around with Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata on the piano, and she began to improvise lyrics. After doing the same with Erik Satie's compositions, she was approached by a record company, who asked her to do a whole album.
However, she chuckles, they requested that the other songs be "more cheerful. What I had written was quite dark."
Koren, in her mid-30s, is now based in South West London, but she has also lived in the US, Mexico, Israel and North London ("the Jewish part"). As a child, she moved around the States and Mexico with her parents, and she returned to Mexico before serving in the IDF to model. She moved to London about 10 years ago. As a result, she muses, she is "not a typical sabra"; she believes that her music, as well as her artistic temperament, reflect her wandering.
"I like to combine things together; I love the mixture. Hence the classical music album."
She points by way of example to the bossa nova rhythm of one of her own melodies on her album, "Free Will," which she attributes to the aspects of Latin music that she encountered as a girl in Mexico. In addition, she mentions that she is half-Ashkenazi, half-Sephardi and feels the influence of "my Polish heritage as well as the Syrian/Lebanese side."
"Whatever I may think of [Israeli music], I've got it inside of me."
TRYING TO make a career for herself in London was a "hard journey," even though "London smiled to me."
She recalls her loneliness, which was softened slightly by the fact that she worked alongside other Israelis at the publication A-London (for Israelis living in London), noting that "in England the mentality is very different."
She is glad, however, that she has had the time to develop as an artist: "It doesn't matter where you are; until the artist is ready, it doesn't happen."
While trying to establish herself as a singer-songwriter in a foreign country, she simultaneously worked as a voice-over actress ("to keep me going") in contexts as diverse as advertisements, Fisher Price toys and, most recently, the latest James Bond installment.
Her 007 foray is a fairly small part, Koren is quick to point out, especially in the final edit, but she describes it as "an amazing experience. I didn't know it at the time, but I was actually working with [the movie's director] Mark Forster. If I had known, I would have been shaking!"
As it was, she was already nervous; because she is so widely traveled, she doesn't have a typical Israeli accent - and her part was supposed to sound Israeli. So she exaggerated it at the beginning of the audition, but was told that her accent "sounded too much like German." Koren soon relaxed, however, and she found out that she had gotten the part a few hours later.
Despite all this, she is prouder of her work as a songwriter. In particular, she refers to the inclusion of her song "Shiru Ladonai" in the official siddur of the Reform Movement as "a bigger achievement than the James Bond."
A graduate of Leo Baeck College, Koren feels very connected to her Jewish and Israeli identity, to an extent which sometimes surprises her. "Looking back at [a recent gig at] Pizza on the Park, I found that the song that touched me the most was 'Jerusalem of Gold.'"
She intends to write and sing more in Hebrew, now that she feels more confident. In addition, she promises that her next album, on which she hopes to start work once she has finished promoting the current album, will be "very happy": Koren has recently married, and she implies that her new happiness will be evident in her future work.
The story of when she met her husband, Simon Edwards, is a case of life imitating art, as she remarks that it was just like her song, "You Are My Only One" (which is based on Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake).
"We met for a split-second at a party, but I couldn't stop thinking about him."
Eventually, she called Edwards under the guise of seeking professional assistance (he works as a life coach/therapist), but from their first proper meeting, she relates, it was immediately clear that their relationship would be a romantic one.
Owing to her marriage to an Englishman, Koren has become "more English," while her husband is currently in the process of converting to Judaism - something which, she is keen to stress, was a decision that "came entirely from him."
Koren is hopeful that Timeless Melodies will be released in Israel as soon as possible, though it is already available on iTunes (under the name "Taly Koren") and on her Web site. She also intends to visit Israel early next year.
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