Tag Archives: Israel

A conversation with Itamar Fintzi, lead singer of Tel Aviv based band Monti Fiori:

Dingus: Is that indeed a sample of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly at the introduction?

Fintzi: Actually, no.. it was all recorded by us, but obviously  Mr. Morricone was our main reference at the introduction.

Explain being Israelis playing Italian music?

It’s hard to explain, I believe we are the only band from Israel that plays Italian music. We really love the San Remo and 50′s -60′s Italian pop, as well as Italian soundtracks from that era and after composing the music, English or Hebrew just didn’t feel right Italiano did…

It’s not every day I get to chat with someone who knows the Israeli music scene, what’s it like?

It’s a tough scene with not a lot of money involved.. but still there are some great bands and singers, mainly underground. We are fortunate to somehow make a living out of it. The main focus is in Tel Aviv – where we live.  Outside the big city there aren’t really too many places for gigs except sometimes Jerusalem or Haifa.

What is the rest of the scene like aside from you?  What genres are most popular there?

The most popular genres are different kinds of pop (rock, dance, and so on) like in any other place.  But just like you have country music which is really popular at the states, we have “Mediterranean pop” or in hebrew – musica mizrachit.  In Israel, as most places, the reality shows also set the tone, so we have a lot of reality singers… At the underground there are really good dj’s and electronic music, people here really like to party.  Tel aviv is really a city that never “sleeps”.. the night scene is really happening!  Also there are a lot of indie bands, some are good and some aren’t..