About Marlena

Marlena was born and raised in Duluth, Minnesota where she took an interest in the saxophone at age 14. Before ever picking up the horn, she spent most of her time in her room listening to rap albums. Honestly, this hasn’t changed much.

While most of her early training was in the realm of straight-ahead jazz, Marlena quickly took interest in the sounds of free jazz after hearing Alice Coltrane and Pharoah Sanders. Her sound concept is centered around modal and non-western tonalities, as well as multiphonics.

During her time in Duluth, Marlena began experimenting with jazz fusion and the avant-garde. She formed her first group as a bandleader under the name “pink marlena” with bassist Emanuel Eisele and Ian Hopp, where they specialized in performing collectively improvised music from scratch. She also performed as a sideman for various groups including AfroGeode and the Gemstones, The Christian Moreno-Cova Jazz Ensemble,Terrestrial Lifeforms, and New Salty Dog. She appeared on several studio recordings with MN-based bands ranging from post-rock to rnb.

Marlena earned her Bachelor of Music in Jazz Studies from the University of Minnesota-Duluth in 2022, where she studied with Dr. Theodore Schoen and Ryan Frane. Currently, Marlena is pursuing a Master of Music in Improvisation at the University of Michigan, studying with Andrew Bishop, Ed Sarath, and Marcus Elliot. She is currently active within the Detroit and Ann Arbor jazz scenes, performing with her new trio featuring Stephen Castiglione on bass and Chris Pyke on drums. She also frequently performs with LuFuki and the Divine Providence, The Astro Mystic Sama Ensemble, and The 11th Hour.