Alex Elena was raised in the back streets of Rome, Italy. His father, a drummer, and mother, an artist, often entertained and temporarily housed various musician friends from all around the world who would come to play jam sessions and record at their home. These multi-cultural artist souls fast became the much older brothers and sisters to this only child, who first picked up a drumstick at the age of 3 and notoriously slept in the bass drum of his father’s drum kit until he got too big to fit. Like his father, Alex excelled at playing the drums and he ended up on stage for his very first gig at the age of 6, in front of a couple of thousand people. At age 17, he moved to London after landing a part in Bruce Dickinson’s (front man for Iron Maiden) solo project band. He later moved to New York at age 23 and worked as a session musician playing on Avril Lavigne’s multi-platinum debut album “Let Go” as well as on records by Belinda Carlisle and Adam Holzman and Brave New World (ex Miles Davis). His most significant collaboration may have been with musician-producer Tarka Cordell, son of the legendary Denny Cordell, who handed his TriBeCa studio over to Elena during a lengthy stay in England. It was during this time that Elena began honing his production skills. Elena says of Tarka Cordell, “He was the first person who saw me as a producer. Once Alex got behind the console he couldn’t stop producing and he began to collect equipment and experiment with recording techniques, always in search of that perfect sound as well as fresh new talent to nurture and develop. He also wanted to stir things up stating, “When you have a great pop song to begin with, why would you want to simply follow the modern trends of production? I don’t find that challenging.
My job is to open up new doors and create the circumstances that allow my artists to fully express themselves”.