The violin cascades, as polyphonic multidimensional vocals tease you with a flavor of other worlds…
In flows a sultry, yet innocent voice – stunning and subduing you with the power of its vulnerability. Enchanting melodies play hide-and-seek, with luminescent harmonies anchored by hypnotic beats…
The lyrics slowly denude stories hidden deep, captured by your protected soul. They prompt a flood. A flashback of what feels like all of your life’s memories. You sense in your veins the beauty of being born on Earth…and feel the tug of a distinct memory called home…
She is åMBe.
Check out the interview :
Tention Free : Tell us a little bit about yourself, your background, education, etc?
åMBe :
I was born in a small Russian town Belgorod, it’s on the border with Ukraine. But I grew up in Ukraine. All my family is very musical. My both parents are professional musicians: my mom is a singer and pianist (for the last 15 years she’s been working as a fitness coach though) and my father was a classical pianist and composer. I was growing up listening to my dad playing the piano: I remember him playing Rachmaninov etude-pictures, Grieg piano concerto.. and I remember him working on his music – instrumental and vocal.. And I remember my mom singing with him.. His songs and jazz… bossa-novas… I also remember them talking and arguing about music a lot.. They could be sitting in the kitchen till early morning, just talking, singing, playing some music..
No wonder I started to sing before I started to talk. And as long as I remember myself I always wanted to be an artist. To sing on a big stage. I started to learn the violin and piano at the age of 4. When I was almost 6 I was sent to a special music school for gifted children – a boarding school in Kharkov in Ukraine. I was the youngest child they ever had attending the school. I started to compose some music and songs at the age of about 7 years old. With my first two songs “Autumn” and “Lullaby”, written on the poems of two famous Ukrainian poets, I won the International contest of young composers in Kiev when I was 7. Since then there was some more winning and some more losing.. but there was definitely more music and more songs.. Until I was about 12-13 years old I was writing primarily instrumental music. I’ve started to write songs again at the age of about 13, when I started to write my own lyrics.
Tention Free : Lately we’ve been hearing more and more people talking about you and your music. How does it feel to start gaining so much attention?
åMBe :
I haven’t been feeling any specific way because of this.. I can just modestly hope that my music is going to have a chance to be heard and loved. I am not about getting attention. I am about being an artist who, like any artist, wants to simply bring their art to the audience, to share your music world and hopefully to be understood.
Tention Free : Tell us something about your ready-to-be-released album “Enemy of the People”.
åMBe :
I really love this music that me and my producer Brian Forbes worked on for almost 3 years. We had no limits and no boundaries. We just were as free to express our creativity and feelings in these songs as possible. This album is my absolute artistic, musical and poetic embodiment. This is “how I sound”. This is how my inner Universe sounds. I feel very proud and blessed having a chance to give this music and this album a birth.
There are 8 tracks on the album. We are going to release the songs single by single, along with the music videos.
Tention Free : What other artists are your inspirations?
åMBe :
There are many musicians who I admire and who inspire me. In modern pop and electronic music my first gurus were Bjork and Tori Amos.. Then I also fell in love with Imogen Heap, Burial, James Blake… Lately I’ve been very much into Frank Ocean’s new records. I am always open to learn something new, to fall in love with new, to try new experiments and then possibly to create something truly new.
Tention Free : How did you start working with a producer Brian Forbes?
åMBe :
I met Brian through our mutual friend, a great guitarist Ryan Parrino. He was basically like: Brian, meet Maria. Maria, meet Brian. You guys two need to work together.
And we started to write music together straight away. Our first song “Of Your Crimes” just came out of us during our very first improvisation session. We write and produce a lot together. We both are leaders so we tend to argue in the studio a lot, “smile”. But eventually it always comes out for the very best, in service of the music that we are working on.
Tention Free : What are you working on now, and where do you feel your music is headed?
åMBe :
Right now when “Enemy of the People” is finished we are working on a couple of music videos for it. We are planning to have them come out in the next few weeks. Also we are planning to release a few more singles, and then to have a full album drop on ADIM Records in late September-October. My new live show is in the works as well. I plan to start touring America and Europe in early 2017. I have also already started to work on my new album. So there is a lot going on. And my music is just floating, following and reflecting my feelings… and all the changes I’m going through myself form themselves out in my music as well. So I never know where it’s headed.
Tention Free : Everyone needs time out. What do you do in your free time?
åMBe :
Well, if I do have this “free time”.. For example, often it’s hard to say ether I’m working, listening to some new music, or it’s a part of my “homework”. But I love listening to music, thinking, dreaming.. I can spend hours laying back and staring at the ceiling.. just imagining something. Often it’s how the beginning of my writing process looks like. I also love nature. I adore the ocean. I can spend hours looking into the horizon.
Tention Free : How can people find you and follow you online?
åMBe :
You can find me @ambemusic on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Soundcloud:
