About

Named one of the TOP 10 RISING STAR JAZZ Vocalists in the 2021 Downbeat Critics’ Poll

“A Gift for Sculpting Words…and agile vocalizing…” | The New Yorker

“An Anomaly in the vocal jazz world, a strong original songwriter…she sings your life back to you." | New York Music Daily

"Levy is the new pinup girl for cool." | MIDWEST RECORD

"If Allegra Levy is not yet on every jazz listener's radar, this new album should rectify the situation." | Jazzhistoryonline.com

After 15 years in NYC, West Hartford, Connecticut-born Allegra Levy has appeared at most of the city’s top jazz venues, including Birdland Theatre, the Blue Note, Zinc Bar, Drom, and the Bitter End. She has released five albums on the historic SteepleChase record label, which has been releasing international jazz since 1972 featuring legendary artists such as Shirley Horn and Dexter Gordon.

“Fresh … exotic… and far beyond the ordinary,” declared The New York Times of 2014’s Lonely City, her debut album released at the age of 24. Ever since, she has continued to pen a collection of harmonically adventurous-yet-familiar originals steeped in the Great American Songbook. Looking at the Moon was an Editor’s Pick in both DownBeat and JazzTimes. Lose My Number: Allegra Levy Sings John McNeil — featuring her own lyrics set to the tunes of renowned trumpeter John McNeil – was lauded in The New Yorker as “a showcase for Levy’s…agile vocalizing and her gift for sculpting words.”

After giving birth to her first child, a daughter, Levy ventured into jazz for the juvenile set with an internationally acclaimed original children’s album, Songs for You and Me, lauded in Jazz Weekly, All About Jazz, and The Syncopated Times.

2024’s Out of the Question, however, featuring Allison Miller, Carmen Staaf, Mimi Jones, Roxy Coss, Andrew Baird, and Aubrey Johnson, is strictly PG… or maybe even R, for rousing, riveting, and downright raunchy when it comes to her bluesy take on the ‘80s punk rock classic, “Should I Stay or Should I Go?” by The Clash.

Meanwhile, Allegra continues to accumulate accolades. Named one of the Top Ten Rising Stars among jazz vocalists in Downbeat’s 2021 Critics’ Poll, she has been dubbed a “double-barreled talent” by JazzTimes and called everything from “sophisticated, worldly, and swinging” to “the new pin-up girl for cool.” Her original song “Man in the Moon” (from the film Astronaut Hour by Leslie Gauthier) won the Platinum Award for best Original Song at The International Independent Film Awards in 2019. She was a finalist in the John Lennon Songwriting Competition for Best Children’s Song and Best Jazz Original Song. She was also a 2023 finalist in the International Songwriting Competition’s Children’s Music category for her song “It’s So Hard to Be You.” Allegra is a Recording Academy Member.

A graduate of New England Conservatory, she serves as the Program Administration Manager at The New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music in NYC and is also on the leadership team of the Women in Jazz Organization. She currently lives in Manhattan with her hubby JP, her two kiddos Stella and Otto, and her schnoodle, Luna.

“Her lyrics are uncommonly smart, full of striking imagery and a pervasive angst... If there’s anybody alive to sing these songs fifty years from now, many of them will be part of the standard repertoire.” — New York Music Daily