Sofia Rei

Sofia Eugenia Koutsovitis, known professionally as Sofia Rei, is an Argentine vocalist, songwriter, producer, and educator. A classically trained mezzo-soprano, Rei's influences include South American folk styles, jazz, pop, new classical and electronic music. Singing in Spanish, English and Portuguese, her voice was described by The Boston Globe as "possessing a voluptuously full voice, comprehensive command of Latin American rhythms, and encyclopedic knowledge of folkloric forms from Argentina, Peru, Colombia, and Uruguay." She was born and raised in Buenos Aires and has been based in New York since 2005.

Five of her albums won Independent Music Awards for Best Album, in the World Beat category and Concept Album. She has worked with John Zorn, Bobby McFerrin, Marc Ribot, and Maria Schneider.

She is the co-founder of El Colectivo Sur, an arts collective based in New York City that aims to increase public awareness of South American music and assemble diverse communities. She curates its flagship program, the New York City South American Music Festival. She teaches at Berklee College of Music's Global Initiatives, including its itinerant program Berklee Latino directed by Oscar Stagnaro and Javier Limón.

Rei was born in Buenos Aires to Andres Koutsovitis, a civil engineer, and Maria Cristina Reigadas, a philosopher, professor and researcher. She began to study music at 4, and as a child she sang with vocal groups and school choirs. She began her professional career at nine as a member of the Colón Teatro Children's Choir, and later joined Argentina's National Children's Choir at Teatro Nacional Cervantes.

Rei stopped performing professionally as she started high school at Colegio Nacional de Buenos Aires. She discovered punk rock, and started to play the drums, but sang mainly "in the shower." She returned to her formal music education in college as a voice major at the National Conservatory.

As an undergraduate, Rei studied opera with Professor Marta Blanco. In 1997, she joined the National Youth Choir of Argentina (CONAJO) under the direction of Maestro Nestor Zadoff, as a contralto. Her musical interests extended beyond the classical world, however, and she led "a double life" as a "properly educated classical singer during the day and everything else at night." At 19, she was exposed to jazz for the first time and began to learn about vocal improvisation, frequently working with young composers and exploring ways to use her voice as she premiered their new works. Fully immersed in improvised music and jazz, Rei decided to come to the United States to continue her education. In 2001, she moved to Boston to study jazz and improvisation at the New England Conservatory of Music. There, her teachers included Charlie Banacos, Danilo Perez, Dominique Eade, Steve Lacy, Bob Moses and Jerry Bergonzi. Encouraged by one of her teachers, George Russell, Rei began to write her own music. While at the conservatory, she met bassist Jorge Roeder, with whom she frequently collaborates. She graduated from the New England Conservatory with a Master's in Jazz and Improvisation in 2003.

In 2003, while living in Boston, Rei, Roeder, and drummer "Coqui" Perez-Albela formed Avantrio to explore the music of Peruvian composers such as Chabuca Granda, Felipe Pinglo and Nicomedes Santa Cruz. The concept was later expanded to include South American folk music, especially from Argentina and Brazil. Rei created the Sofia Koutsovitis Group, an octet which also included Roeder and Coqui Pérez Albela, along with Leo Genovese on piano, Jason Palmer on trumpet, Adam Schneit on alto sax, Dan Blake on soprano and tenor sax, and Richie Barshay on drums.

Rei moved to New York in 2005, and in 2006 toured internationally with the Maria Schneider Jazz Orchestra. Her debut album, Ojalá, recorded with an octet, was released that same year. Composed of arrangements of her own compositions and songs by Argentine, Brazilian and Cuban composers, the album was named one of the year's Top 10 records by The Jazz Journalist's Association. All About Jazz described it as "eclectic and exciting," and wrote that it "exemplifies the recent trends in Latin Jazz and Latin American music in general, and proves why Sofia Koutsovitis is one of the most versatile and in-demand singers in the New York music scene."