Faustina

Faustina Abad was born in Tashkent,
Uzbekistan in the former Soviet Union, in 1990. Her origins are Latin
American and Russian-Jewish. In 1993 she immigrated to Israel and begun
her professional musical career at the age of 8. She performed all over
the country with her mother-Lana Sokolov, who is also a musician.   At
the age of 11 she won the 1st prize of the Israeli national children
competition "To be a star". At 12 years old, singing the famous hit "I
Will Survive”; she won the 1st prize of the well known TV competition "BRAVO (2002)".


After being active in the pop scene, Faustina decided to focus on
her Jazz singing career. She performed with highly accomplished
musicians including pianist and composer Ruslan Sirota (Stanley Clark,
Seal, Brian McKnight), drummer Kim Thompson (Beyonce, Mike Stern, Kenny
Barron). After having different experiences in performing at jazz clubs
and local jazz festivals, Faustina sent her demo recordings to the
Italian Jazz producer- Paolo Piangerelli, who was highly impressed by
Faustina's voice and invited her to participate in the International Massimo Urbani Competition-for Jazz Soloists in Italy (2005)
in which she won both 1st place and the people’s choice award. She also
participated in a Berklee College of Music program in Italy, from which
she gained the opportunity to represent the school in the Umbria Winter Jazz Festival 2006 in Italy.
Soon after she recorded her first full album with Philology record
company. In 2006 she was awarded a scholarship to attend the Berklee
College of Music-5 week program in Boston. In 2007 she was invited by
the well-known Russian conductor and violinist Vladimir Spivakov to
perform in the International festival- "Moscow Meets Friends" in Moscow, Russia.


In Fall 2009 Faustina started her official BA studies at Berklee in
Boston. While completing her degree she had the chance to release her
first R&B original EP“Faustina” (2011)
performed
under the direction of Michael Bearden, who worked with Michael
Jackson, Madonna and other acclaimed artists.  Faustina had the
opportunity to be one of the first students to study in the Berklee Valencia campus in Spain.
At the opening of the new campus attended by the president of Valencia,
she performed with musicians from Egypt and Syria, singing a
Jewish-Sephardic song in the ancient Ladino language. She also had the
chance to share the stage with the great bassist Victor Wooten and
Grammy winning Flamenco guitarist and producer Javier Limon.

Faustina
released another EP- "Flower in the Wind" in 2014, in that project she
explored new sounds combining traditional Hebrew texts, Ladino and
modern sophisticated jazz harmonies interacting with Latin rhythms. in
Her band were the accomplished young jazz musicians, Cory Cox on drums,
Zwelakhe Duma Belle-pere- Bass and Jiri Nedoma-Keys, and Sagit Zilberman
-Saxophone.


Currently
she is working on her first full length album featuring original Pop
melodies exploring different musical teritorries that come from the
places she have lived in- U.S.A- Spain- Israel.