Music
Press
"...making a dazzling debut with her aptly titled Tangos & Tantrums, a collection of 12 tart, intelligent tunes... a sound and style that suggest 1920s cabaret overlapping 1950s bohemia and overlaid with postmillennial dynamism..." HEAR/SAY FEATURE - Jazz Times (April 2005) OUT NOW! - Jazz Times
"...with material that channels Porter, Berlin, and Gershwin...Lewis' ethereal vocals, aching with melancholy and discontent, coupled with her keen knack for creating rich lyrical imagery, are proof that she is the sole owner of her very own artistic kingdom." SPEEDWAY FEATURE - Venice Magazine (March 2005) - Venice Magazine
"The London-born chanteuse's wry, worldly twist on relationships springs from numbers styled in cabaret, jazz, ragtime and waltz, held togetherby her rapturous, dusky vocals." - Los Angeles Times (February 10, 2005) - Los Angeles Times
“...Los Angeles-based Briton Sylvie Lewis may not cultivate the sort of willful peculiarity that has helped garner headlines for Nellie McKay, but in many ways, the music she makes on Tangos & Tantrums , her debut album, is every bit as striking...thanks to Lewis’s conversational flow... and supported by her band’s spare yet colorful orchestrations... If Lewis’s subjects are effectively variation on time worn themes – head-over-heels romance, lost love, dissolute partners and so on – her perspective is distinctly of the moment.” - Time Out New York (February 3, 2005) - Time Out New York
"...Sylvie Lewis delivers songs in a meandering style reminiscent of Rufus Wainwright, with a sweetly expressive voice... her piano-laden debut disc, Tangos &Tantrums, is filled with tales of lives and loves." - New York Post (February 4, 2005) - New York Post
"...Lewis lights a torch of love and longing on this set of ragtime, tangos and 1930s-inspired chanson... [songs] unfold with style and glamour." 3 out of 4 stars - Los Angeles Daily News (February 4, 2005) - Los Angeles Daily News
"[Lewis] explores the highs and lows of love on her debut CD, Tangos & Tantrums (Cheap Lullaby Records),a breathtaking collection of romantic, 1930s-inspired cabaret chansons." - San Francisco Examiner (November 8, 2004) - San Francisco Examiner
“When Sylvie Lewis sings, everyone should stop and take notice. She has the goods in spades...” - James Combs, Producer, new ground, KCRW - KCRW
“There are loads of well-hyped singer-songwriters who show up with two decent tunes to their name. Sylvie Lewis is an under-heralded member of the s-s society who has filled a whole disc with memorable songs.” - Providence Phoenix (February 24, 2005)
- Providence Phoenix
"Every track on Tangos & Tantrums... sounds as if it should be crackling out of an antique Victrola, or playing quietly in the background of a grainy, black and white 1930s romance." CD REVIEW - Venus Magazine (Spring 2005) - Venus Magazine
Discography
Tangos and Tantrums
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Bio
The similarities between herself and her postwar predecessors are not lost on Lewis. Raised in London and educated in Switzerland and Italy, she grew up listening to the songs of European cabaret legends like Kurt Weill, Noel Coward, Lotte Lenya and Serge Gainsbourg. She confesses a similar affection for the music of George Gershwin, Cole Porter and Irving Berlin. When its noted that Gershwin, Porter and Berlin were themselves European expatriates, Lewis responds sympathetically. They came over here to get a little American spice, just like me, she says, laughing.
Looking to add some spice, Lewis landed stateside in 1995 to study at the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston. She took a year off to study and travel in East and South Africa before moving back to the States. In 1999, the restless singer-songwriter relocated to Los Angeles, where she became a regular at The Hotel Cafe and other local venues.
In 2001, her independently-produced EP found its way to Cheap Lullaby Records. The company liked what it heard and ignited Lewis career in earnest.
Now, with the release of her first full-length album, the British songstress comes full circle. Going against the coarse grain of modern musical convention, Tangos & Tantrums is a confident, literate and humanistic recording that commendably takes the contempt out of contemporary.
I definitely feel that I am an anachronism -- that I was kind of born in the wrong time, Lewis confesses, with a laugh. But at the same time thats OK, because maybe it makes my voice more unique than it would have been 80 years ago. Maybe theres something to be said for being in the right place at the wrong time.
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