WENNThe ‘Harriet’ actress keeps her creative juice flowing during the coronavirus lockdown by stepping into the recording studio to work on her delayed studio album.
- Jun 21, 2020
AceShowbiz – Singer/actress Cynthia Erivo has used her time in lockdown to record the album she was hoping to make last year 2019.
The British star had a very busy 2019, promoting and earning multiple nominations for her film “Harriet“, in which she played former slave and abolitionist Harriet Tubman, and filming HBO series “The Outsider“, and she couldn’t find the time to lay down tracks.
So when the coronavirus pandemic began, her record company bosses were quick to call.
“When this first happened (COVID-19), I started recording,” she tells Deadline’s New Hollywood podcast. “My (record) label was like, ‘You’re at home, you’re not going anywhere which is great because you’re always going somewhere. We’ve got you in one place, we need you to record that album. Thank you!’ So I’ve been on and off recording that.”
Asked to describe her sound, the double Oscar nominee admits it’s a mixture of styles because she has a lot of different influences.
“Because I sing and I act there are, like, people who are a combination of both of those things. I was obsessed with Barbra Streisand, I was obsessed with Judy Garland, obsessed with Aretha Franklin, obsessed with Donna Summer.”
“Let’s call it emotive… It’s about emotions, heartache and love and all those things that we experience as human beings. That’s what it’s about.”
The 33 year old, who will play Franklin in the upcoming series “Genius: Aretha“, is also thrilled to be signed to Verve, the same label another of her heroes Nina Simone recorded for.
Citing her love of “the imperfection of the way she embraces music,” Cynthia shares that she really identifies with the “My Baby Just Cares for Me” hitmaker’s passion.
“For her (Nina), it wasn’t about making a pretty sound, it really was about communicating a message, communicating the cause at the time, how she felt, how people felt as a nation. She had a wonderful way of using her music to do that and more and more it became about freedom for her.”
Source: Music - aceshowbiz.com
