Author: leilaadu.com

The video to Leila Adu’s new single, Oriental Finger Trap’ is a dance film directed by choreographer and performer, Katelyn Halpern. The two recently collaborated as part of K A T E S (Katelyn Halpern and pianist, Kate Campbell), composing music for “Two Voices” with text by Halpern and a score for the Dan Trueman’s new software keyboard instrument, the bitKlavier by Adu. K A T E S will perform “Two Voices” at Switchboard Festival in San Francisco on April 8. “Oriental Finger Trap” is the second video single from Leila Adu’s Scary Love Monster EP, out now on Belts and Whistles.

“Between pop, weird jazz, dark lyrics and brainy experimentation at times reminiscent of Brian Eno’s early records…” — NYC Deli

The Scary Love Monster EP is out now on Amazon, Google Play, iTunes, Spotify and Bandcamp

Belts and Whistles proudly presents the release of Scary Love Monster, the brand new EP from Leila Adu. Scary Love Monster is an EP of global urban and suburban romantic ensnarement, impressionist avant- tronica written and recorded in Rome out of a suitcase and houses in Rome, London, Wellington and New York. With sound worlds of Grimm’s fairytales and Toni Morrison, these dark tales hint at moments of light and love.

After four studio releases, this EP is intimate, mostly self-produced, with the help of gear from friends and extra production from London dance producer Alex Morris in London and New Zealand drummer/producer, Riki Gooch and final-mixing in New Zealand. The first video from the EP is Bluebeards and Monsters. NYC Deli‘s New York EP Release Show review says:

Here at The Deli we like to reward unconventinal artists – although unconventionality must be matched by talent – and New Zealand composer/musician/producer Leila Adu definitely belongs to this category. Her new EP “Scary Love Monsters” presents us with six unpredictable tracks (that’s a trendy adjective in these Trumpish days, isn’t it?), fluctuating between pop, weird jazz, dark lyrics and brainy experimentation at times reminiscent of Brian Eno’s early records…

The Scary Love Monster EP is out now on Amazon, Google Play, iTunes, Spotify and Bandcamp

‘Bluebeards and Monsters,’ the single from Leila Adu’s up coming EP, was released with an article on the New Zealand review website, Off The Tracks. The video stars Magnolia Wild and Adu, and was filmed in New Zealand by director, Alyx Duncan, who recently won a shot at the Oscars, with her award-winning film, The Tide Keeper. Watch the full video of ‘Bluebeards and Monsters’ here:

Bluebeards and Monsters from Leila Adu on Vimeo.

Buy, or share, track on Belts & Whistles digi+cassette label on Bandcamp:

Leila Adu performed two main stage nights and on experimental night at Music Matters Festival, a festival dedicated to experimental music and traditional music from around the world in Columbo Sri Lanka. Leila Adu performed her original songs with locally based kiwi bass player, Isaac Smith and Sri Lankan drummer, Sum Suraweera, who are both active in the local new music community, have founded a music school and a local record label. They featured on the front cover of the Columbo Sunday Times and performances were captured by video artist Amila Galappaththi,as part of Ayaale social and creative activist collective.

Leila Adu and Sum Suraweera performing ‘Ode to the Unknown Factory Worker’ on Music Matters Festival Mainstage Day 2.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooGvMDeWJyc

Adu performed with guitarist, Sarani Perera, rapper, Shafni Awam and drummer, Sum Suraweera, as part of Music Matters Festival’s Experimental Night at the Goethe Institut in Columbo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ci0aA9vAV58

Adu also participated in two collaborative music writing and learning workshops with traditional Tamil singers and drummers from Batticolo along musicians from Music Matters Columbo and improvisors from Austria and Germany. See Transcoastal Collective’s debut performance at Music Matters Festival below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAXPai9Pz_Y

On June 20, 2015, Leila Adu, sang her orchestral piece, Rain as Blessings Fall, written as Orchestra Wellington’s Emerging-Composer-In-Residence-2014, to a packed house of sixteen hundred people at Wellington’s historic Michael Fowler Center. Listen to ‘Rain as Blessings Fall,’ Orchestra Wellington with Leila Adu from the live broadcast on Radio New Zealand.

REVIEWS

She stands pretty motionless, expressionless, yet seeming totally self-possessed and confident. I’m sure her demeanour persuaded most of the audience that we were going to hear something unusual and significant, and there’s no doubt about the forces of personality and character that work in her favour in any role she chooses to adopt.

Her voice arrived first and for a moment seemed to dominate the orchestra, even though it appeared not to be amplified: it’s an engaging voice that switches several times into a surprising falsetto which was presumably to reflect the spirituality of the words. After a little while, the shape of the piece emerged: limited amount of melodic material, mostly consisting of descending scales in a rhythm that might be described as part-time jazzy, related more to the idiom of the mid-century American musical than to jazz itself. The words sometimes sounded as if being forced into existing musical patterns…

One had the feeling in the end, trying to weigh the music, assess its value, characterise it, that given its base in Buddhist philosophy and morality, the standards that are applied to western music were irrelevant. That it’s not meant to be judged as we might judge a sonata or an opera, but perhaps rather, a madrigal or a protest song, where the message or the spirit is more important than the artistic clothing in which it’s dressed. Read more: Review by Lindis Taylor in ‘Middle C’

 The thread, always, is her voice. And Blessings featured a Buddhist text by Kalu Rinpoche and revised by Chime Shore (an early meeting with Shore had been a formative experience in Adu’s life) with Leila singing against the rise and fall of the orchestra. It was mesmerising as the voice became a mantra when singing of mantras, as the strings and horns moved around in a constantly modulating piece, tempo shifting, keys changing, it had busyness but never bluster.
Read more: Review by Simon Sweetman in ‘Off the Tracks’

This year I am honored to be part of Musicambia, a project teaching music to inmates at Sing Sing Correctional Facility in New York. I am teaching music theory and vocal techniques along with fellow composer, Elliot Cole; instrument lessons are given by jazz pianist John Chin, brass by trumpet player Thomas Bergeron and strings by viola player and founder of Musicambia, Nate Schram. We have been working hard to create a comprehensive music curriculum at Sing Sing Prison alongside composer Daniel Levy and Carnegie Hall’s Weill Music Institute. It is a life changing project for us and for all the incarcerated people we work with.

We have been raising funds through Kickstarter, as well as Musicambia’s Faculty Concerts, the first of which ias at Rockwood Music Hall, NYC on Sunday December 14. Musicambia is a charitable trust and is only made possible through your continuing generous support.

Love and Mettā,
Leila

Leila Adu received a (PIIRS) Princeton Institute of International and Regional Studies grant towards a visit to Accra, Ghana, for her PhD research on electronic music and hip-hop producers. Leila’s father is London-based a Ghanaian poet, playwright and musician and she is keen to reconnect with her culture on her first visit in fifteen years.

On her stay, Leila is also playing at Republic Bar and Grill, a hotbed of culture for local Ghanaians, many of whom have returned from living abroad, as well as expats. (Read more about Republic’s contemporary take on Ghanaian food in this Guardian article A foodie revolution cooking in West Africa).

Republic has weekly live performances on Wednesdays curated by Omon Blanks, as well as DJs at the weekend, curated by, Akwaaba Music’s Benjamin Le Brave. French/American, Le Brave founded Akwaaba Music in San Francisco, and moved the label to Accra three years ago; Akwaaba (“welcome” in Ashanti Twi) is dedicated to making African music easier to access worldwide through releasing, distributing, licensing and growing an online presence in a way that is fair for the artists.

Leila is collaborating with Accra artists and has recorded two tracks at 2 1 Entertainment with Ghanaian poet, Kwame Write.