Onra is the recording name of French producer and beatmaker Arnaud Bernard, who is from Trier in France. He works in instrumental hip hop, future funk and hip hop, and he is based in Paris.

Career

Onra releases his first album in 2006 with Quetzal, also known as Al Quetz, another French producer and friend. The record is a hip hop tribute to soul music and receives repeated radio play from Gilles Peterson and Benji B, as well as coverage on Okayplayer.com.

In the same period, he begins working with American keyboard player Byron The Aquarius. Together they release The Big Payback in 2007 on the Japanese label Circulations. The project draws on futuristic hip hop, spaced-out sounds and jazzy broken beats, and the pair also appears on the compilations Beat Dimensions and New Worlds.

Chinoiseries and related work

In 2006, Onra travels to Vietnam for the first time and brings back around 30 old records of Chinese and Vietnamese origin from his grandparents’ country. He uses this material to make Chinoiseries, which becomes his most critically acclaimed album and the release most closely associated with his name. Its track “The Anthem” is chosen for a Coca-Cola television commercial for the Beijing Olympics.

He is also part of Irish label All City’s 7x7 series. His 2008 project 1.0.8 takes its inspiration from Bollywood music and is named album of the week by several shops across Europe.

Live performance

Onra performs live with two MPC1000s and tours with that setup. He performs in Japan, China, Spain, Scotland, Ireland, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, England, Austria, New Zealand, Vietnam, Switzerland, the Netherlands and France.