Kristi Martel

"a fine musician...incomparable!" - Utah Phillips, Folk Artist

"An excellent singer, she chanted, warbled, improvised, throwing off multi-phonics with the greatest of ease." - Rita Felciano

Kristi Martel - Brave Enough (Sealed Lip Records, 2001)
"There's this thing Kristi Martel does with her voice. The first time I played 'Brave Enough,' it shut me up and made me say, 'Damn!' That's just her voice. As a pianist and songwriter, Martel does not shy from her feminism. She seems to shy from nothing. Her voice sometimes evokes Bjork's but it is more soulful, more post-punk Laura Nyro. She looks head-on at issues like feminine body image and self-esteem, sex, dying, the power of community, and the challenges and favor of intimacy. But as the liner notes wisely recommend, 'play this thing loud.' 'Brave Enough' is part groove diary, part social exegesis, and a whole lot of fun." - Cesca Waterfield

Kristi Martel -- Ravengirl: "In this arresting, intense and surprisingly uplifting album, Martel works out some of her feelings about her lover's suicide...raw awareness, bemused and hurt but grateful and joyous, ...makes Ravengirl so compelling. The album begins with the eerie instrumental "Oya," a sort of rite of passage easing us into Martel's psyche. Martel then wraps us in the gentle "Day of Rain," a song about the day you realize the crying is finally over and are able to look back, calm and clear-eyed. The collage of memories that follows is tinted with the full spectrum of emotion, and Martel's nimble voice constantly shifts with the music... "I am doing fine, I am doing fine," she bubbles; it's not some ironic mantra or attempt at manifesting, just a cheerful chorus of simple truth. She's doing fine indeed, and the album soars way above fine." - Brian Jewell

"Got Range
Kristi Martel can handle rock vocals, or folk, or the RI Philharmonic.

Kristi Martel finds joy in overcoming pain. Kristi Martel's got that grin again. It fills her whole face, girlish and disarming, like she's gotten away with something and you're in on her secret now. She grins when she's being goofy, but also when she's on stage, singing her heart out.
Kristi Martel loves life, and the joy she gets out of it exudes from her every pore. She can be singing about the darkest things in the world -- betrayal, self-hate, death -- and yet somehow, coming from her, it feels hopeful and uplifting."
Take one of her newest songs, "Ravengirl," about life since the suicide of her partner, Littlebird, almost two years ago.
"You made me the raven girl," she sings, "touched by death, touched by grieving."
It's a pop song, light and upbeat.
"'Ravengirl' is quirky and fun to me," she says when asked about it, grinning again. It's not about lamenting the tragedy. "It's, 'Oh my God. I've gone through all of this and I'm OK. Isn't it amazing that I've healed enough that I can be cheerful?' It's like, woo-hoo! I did it."
Martel, 32, has been through a lot, and it's all over her songs, which are as intensely personal as those by Tori Amos or Tanya Donnelly. Alone with her electric piano, or accompanied by guitarist Kevin Silvia, she retraces old relationships, family times, arguments and flirtations.
In "Even Free," one of her stage favorites, she sings about an 8-year-old black girl who loves Martel's red hair and hates her own.
"I try to tell her how I see her nappy hair braided and twisted and free," Martel sings.
But her own head tortures her the same way, shouting "ugly, too fat, too weak, too thin."
In "Silver," she sings about her grandparents, who "didn't even know what sex was when they got married. Can you believe it? They figured it out together. I want something pure like that. I want something that turns into 50 years, just like theirs."
And in "Harder Than Dying," she sings about returning to Rhode Island after Littlebird's death, to "this tiny state where the sky is smaller," and struggling to live on, which is "harder than dying."
She won't fly after her, she tells Littlebird, but "You are my truest home still."
Martel grew up in North Smithfield, the only child of a single mother. At school, she was "a complete outcast," she says, wildly unhappy. But her Meme encouraged her to sing since she was tiny, her mother signed her up for guitar lessons, and her father took her to the theatre in Boston, and bought her a piano for her seventh birthday.
She knew early on that this would be her life, Martel says, and she wasted no time: She enrolled at Bard College, in New York, instead of doing her senior year of high school, and studied music composition, theater and dance there. Then she moved on to Mills College, in Oakland CA, where she perfected her vocal style with an opera teacher.
All along, her teachers nudged her toward classical music, but pop was her passion; she just used their techniques to write better songs, and learn how to do vocal acrobatics like Kate Bush, whose work "was the first music I ever heard that sounded like the music in my head."
And like Bush, Martel enjoys playing with her voice, a deceptively girly little thing that grows, on stage, into an impressive and versatile instrument. Its high, bell-like quality makes people assume she's a soprano, she says, but just this month, she was singing low alto as a guest artist in "Carmina Burana," at Veterans Memorial Auditorium.
"I have this big range," she says, grinning again, "and I like to get to use it."
Her favorite performance venues, however, aren't big theatres or clubs, but small, intimate spaces such as Pawtucket's Stone Soup Coffeehouse. She likes it when people listen to every word -- and no, it doesn't scare her to be so intimate with strangers.
"I don't feel vulnerable," she says, or at least not in a way that bothers her. "I feel more present on stage and more alive than at almost any other time."
Kristi Martel's latest album, "The Mule," is available through her Web site, www.kmetal.net, which also lists her schedule. She and Kevin Silvia are now recording a new album together." - Marion Davis

"She grins when she sings. Watching her perform, it's impossible not to get swept up in the sheer joy of music -- in her deft piano playing and soaring, soul-rhythm-and-blues voice, love emanates from every note." - Vienna Teng

Kristi Martel - Give Me a Little... (Sealed Lip Records, 2000)
"Kristi Martel is a breed unto herself in the world of singer songwriters. She sounds like no one else. Unafraid of the quirks in her character, she mines her inner conflicts in an unembarrassing and daring way. Her musical vocabulary is wild and varied without ever being beyond control. ...smart-hearted artist." - Patrick Arena

Kristi Martel - The Mule (Sealed Lip Records, 2004)
"Kristi Martel is refreshing and unique among singer-songwriters today. She employs post-classical piano and the dramatic vocal style of Twentieth Century Music art song in delivering the lyrics of real life. She is a middle point between Tori Amos and Diamanda Galás. Fans of Laura Nyro will also appreciate this powerful, dynamic musician that combines exquisite technique with a hip, natural style." - Tom 'Tearaway' Schulte

"There must be a ton going on in Kristi Martel's head. You'll get this impression from the structure of her music. In nearly every song in her 2006 release 'Ravengirl,' the intricacies are so slight but strongly crafted...The depth and diversity of her music should be no wonder, really...She plays directly to the emotion of every track. Best of all, she's a startling lyricist to compliment her trained voice. To aid her anti-folk, somber-sounding music, she puts together beautiful arrangements of dark words...Her music will undoubtedly merit her assimilations to Fiona Apple. Her voice will shoot her comparisons to Bjork. Her lyrics will, and have, draw her Ani DiFranco fans. But, need not worry, she's not Ani DiFranco-depressed yet. She album is filled with a lot of quirk and a fair amount of fun...'Ravengirl' has already earned a 'highly recommended' from the Providence Journal. The Providence Phoenix, usually a tough crowd, bragged of her 'meaningful lyrics, passionate performances, and an emotional mission.' You'd worry that this could get to her head and maybe effect her music. But, in the head of Kristi Martel, there may not be enough room left for arrogance." - Ben Collins

"For many, the tired adage 'honesty is the best policy' is just that, an antiquated expression. But for Kristi Martel, it's been one of the keys to her success... fans...will be truly ecstatic after hearing Ravengirl... Martel proves that she's a powerful storyteller, with meaningful lyrics, passionate performances, and an emotional mission." - Bob Gulla