Biography
Born Judy Levine on 19 February 1958 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the musician who performs as Lewis began classical piano lessons at seven and soon captured prizes across the Midwest. While enrolled at Columbia University in New York she shifted her focus from music to religious studies. At twenty she relocated to Israel, where she continued concert appearances alongside an ongoing search for spiritual purpose. Though her performances met with success, she stopped playing altogether in 1981 to devote herself to spiritual pursuits and to wed a fellow student. A decade later, now raising four children, she returned to the piano. After her marriage dissolved in 1995 she resolved to resume a professional music career; having earned teaching credentials from the Rubin Academy of Music during the nineties, she sustained herself and her family through instruction.
Finding the classical repertoire unsatisfying, she gravitated toward jazz by the middle of the decade. The decisive spark occurred in Los Angeles at her first jazz concert; thereafter she practiced intensively, absorbing the approaches of pianists such as Chick Corea, Bill Evans, Tommy Flanagan, Red Garland and Keith Jarrett. She also began writing original material, assembled the Back Alley Jazz Quintet and made her jazz debut in 1996. The following year she reduced the ensemble to a trio. Her standing grew steadily within Israel and, through subsequent European tours and American engagements, extended abroad. A solo recording, Waiting On A New Day, appeared in 2002. In 2003 she launched the fusion project Phoenix Over Manhattan, performing on keyboards; initially electronic in texture, the band turned acoustic in 2004, when the album No Expectations earned favorable critical notice.
Lewis’s energetic and committed approach has infused jazz with a vitality that many listeners found refreshing amid the smooth-jazz climate of the early 2000s. She also runs her own label, Visionary Insomniac Records.
Finding the classical repertoire unsatisfying, she gravitated toward jazz by the middle of the decade. The decisive spark occurred in Los Angeles at her first jazz concert; thereafter she practiced intensively, absorbing the approaches of pianists such as Chick Corea, Bill Evans, Tommy Flanagan, Red Garland and Keith Jarrett. She also began writing original material, assembled the Back Alley Jazz Quintet and made her jazz debut in 1996. The following year she reduced the ensemble to a trio. Her standing grew steadily within Israel and, through subsequent European tours and American engagements, extended abroad. A solo recording, Waiting On A New Day, appeared in 2002. In 2003 she launched the fusion project Phoenix Over Manhattan, performing on keyboards; initially electronic in texture, the band turned acoustic in 2004, when the album No Expectations earned favorable critical notice.
Lewis’s energetic and committed approach has infused jazz with a vitality that many listeners found refreshing amid the smooth-jazz climate of the early 2000s. She also runs her own label, Visionary Insomniac Records.
Albums
Singles
