Lena Prima is the youngest daughter of legendary bandleader Louis Prima and his fifth wife and singing partner, Gia Maione. Born in Las Vegas and raised between Nevada and Louisiana, Lena began performing alongside her parents on stage as a young child, with her mother teaching her to play drums, an instrument she still plays on stage today. Her father died in 1978, following complications from brain tumor surgery, when Lena was just fourteen years old.
After briefly attending college, Prima left to pursue a professional career in music full-time, singing in rock bands and eventually recording an album with her own group, Rough Angel. Over more than three decades, she has performed more than 3,000 shows worldwide, including a run of about twenty years singing in Las Vegas showrooms. In 2005, she performed at a Hurricane Katrina benefit concert in New Orleans, and in 2010 she joined her brother Louis Prima Jr. for a Jazz Fest tribute to their father.
In 2011, Prima moved permanently to New Orleans with her husband, bassist Tim Fahey, and held a seven-year residency at the Hotel Monteleone's historic Carousel Bar, named the #1 hotel bar in America by USA Today, through 2018. She has released eight albums on Basin Street Records, including 2014's Starting Something, an all-original funk and soul-pop record, and 2018's Prima La Famiglia, a standards album that debuted at #10 on the Billboard Jazz Chart. Beyond performing, Prima is an advocate for the Italian American community and founded the nonprofit CIAO Women!, celebrating exceptional Italian women.
