Allan Soberman is a singer/songwriter/musician and cantor’s son based in Toronto, Canada. He started his career as a bassist with many of the folk acts in and around Toronto in the early to mid 1970’s. He has accompanied people such as Grammy award winners Dan Hill and Ben Mink, Bill Hughes (of Lazarus), Canadian stalwarts Stringband, Brent Titcomb , Nancy White, Marie-Lynn Hammond and others while touring Canada , the United States and Mexico. He has appeared with acts opening for the likes of Billy Crystal, Billy Joel, Maria Muldaur, Sonny Terry and Brownie Mcghee, Steve Goodman, J.J. Cale , the Paul Butterfield Blues Band and Eric Weisberg. Always interested in record production, he began work in the mid 1970’s for record producer John Capek (who co-wrote hits such as “Rhythm of My Heart” for Rod Stewart and “Pieces Of Ice” for Diana Ross) , garnering production experience and doing many background vocal sessions which he put to good use during the early 1980’s as a session vocalist in many television and radio commercials and on record for people such as Sylvia Tyson (formerly of Ian & Sylvia) and Nancy White . Additionally, he scored several educational films with Grammy and Juno award winner, multi instrumentalist, Ben Mink (k.d. lang’s co-writer and co-producer). He also produced a fusion jazz/folk instrumental album for Mink engineered by Daniel Lanois (noted producer of U2, Bob Dylan, Peter Gabriel, Robbie Robertson, Emmy Lou Harris) . Allan had two singles released in 1981 on Toronto’s Boot Records (a rootsy label founded by Stompin’ Tom Connors) which garnered widespread Canadian airplay. Commuting to Nashville in the 1980’s, he co-wrote with many veteran hit songwriters such as Dickey Lee (George Jones, Brenda Lee), Tommy Rocco ( Anne Murray), Casey Kelly (Tanya Tucker, Kenny Rogers) ,Byron Hill (George Strait, Alabama), Robin Lerner (Faith Hill) and Susan Longacre (Neil Diamond).
In the early 1980’s , some of his recorded material with Beach Boy-esque harmonies caught the ear of Beach Boy and producer, Bruce Johnston who took on the publishing of some of the material with his partner Terry Melcher (producer for the Byrds/Paul Revere and the Raiders) . During the same period , Allan was working with Juno award winning children’s entertainer, Bob Schneider , playing on the records and appearing on TV specials aired in Canada and on PBS in the U.S.
Recently, after completing a tribute compilation CD to his late father, Cantor Morris Soberman, he recorded a traditional Friday evening zmir (song), Shalom Aleichem, that his family would sing around the Sabbath evening dinner table (along with millions of others around the world). It was basically done to make a musical connection with his father, using the traditional melody but producing it his own way.
After receiving encouraging responses from friends and colleagues, he completed an entire CD entitled “Searching for My Voice”. It encompasses prayers that he learned as a child, putting their original traditional melody in a unique contemporary setting . In order to maintain the intimate connection to his father, he recorded this project by himself, singing all the vocal arrangements and playing all the instruments. He has now completed a second liturgically based and rock influenced CD entitled “The Quest Continues”. A secular rock CD entitled “Hold Tight” is also available on the Internet.
Now, in response to the recent US election, a bit of a “political and ecological rant” of a single entitled “Tunnel Vision (We’ll Get What We Deserve)” has been made available on the Internet.
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