Ma'ayan Castel
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Ma'ayan Castel

Los Angeles, California, United States | SELF

Los Angeles, California, United States | SELF
Band Pop Alternative

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This band has not uploaded any videos

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"Featured Artist: Ma’ayan Castel"

One of the many great things about going to a Mighty Mystic show is experiencing some new original music from the other quality artists/bands who perform. On that night in particular we were introduced to this weeks Featured Artist, Ma'ayan Castel.
We had heard some great things about Ma’ayan Castel from friends and other reliable sources so since we’re always looking for a show or a new artist to check out, especially ones with ties to Boston, we were definitely amped to see her perform. Everything about the performance was on point and it was great to see a such a diverse & tight band fronted by a talented and beautiful lady. Her sound was one of a kind, mixing reggae vibes with soulful melodies and pop-friendly lyrics, all powered by incredible, sweet vocals.
Everyone enjoyed her rendition of Roxanne too. Lori fell in love…but stayed in business mode! Its safe to say we found another great artist to add to our playlist. Her track “Now I Don’t” is an absolute JAM and my personal favorite! My only request to Ma’ayan: PLAY MORE SHOWS! Boston’s music scene needs to hear more from this talented woman! You can check out more of Ma’ayan Castel’s music at her ITunes Store and Amazon Store

-SweetPet - Cavata Clothing Co. Music Blog


"WERS 88.9"

There's a major at Berklee College of music called "Music Synthesis." If you're up on that sort of lingo, you know that this involves computers and soundboards and something called a MIDI file. To a layman, however, "synthesis" just means combination or composition; the possibilities of what gets synthesized are more or less endless. Up-and-coming Boston musician Ma'ayan Castel graduated a Music Synthesis major. As for what she's been doing since, it's the non-expert idea of the word that best applies.

"I love world music," says Castel, "and I love the possibility of combining different styles of music, different styles of folk... and making it into something new today." For Castel, this possibility has yielded her debut EP Walk on Water. The music and Castel's voice make themselves available to R&B rhythms, blues-singer melancholy and pop-friendly lyrics. Her songs refuse to speak a single predictable language, musically or literally. "I use a lot of different languages as inspiration for melodies, " explains Castel, who moved to the U.S. from Israel at age nine. She listens to chants and "scat words" from foreign tongues in addition to speaking both English and Hebrew herself. Castel will sometimes perform songs in both of these languages, but the fusion of verbal culture in her music is otherwise subtle. It's all been seamlessly incorporated - synthesized, if you will - into soulful melody.

Ma'ayan Castel's surplus of musical knowledge, talent, and cultural experience place her in front of so many musical and professional possibilities. Listeners who tuned into WERS around 1:00 today for Castel's Live Mix got to join her at this exciting starting point of a career-worth-following. A lively interview led into her smooth singing - a suddenly mature and powerful extension of her listenable speaking voice. Castel performed off of Walk on Water, and also sampled an unreleased track that may very well find its place on a full album soon. Castel, after all, is looking nowhere but forward. "I'm working on a collection of songs that haven't been finished," she says, explaining that she "would like to go into the studio with finished songs rather than works-in-progress" as she did for the recording of the EP. Castel is also part-producer. Having done synthesis (the technical kind) and sampling for the EP, she's composing "with movies in mind," alluding to possible soundtrack work in the future. 

Whatever happens to be ahead for Ma'ayan Castel, now is the time to find a map and mark Boston as her professional starting point. It's this city that has seen most of Castel's musical development, and she says it's a great place for new artists to get started. Ma'ayan Castel has brought together the variant styles, tools, and cultures that have become meaningful to her. How fantastic that, for now at least, she's brought them together here.


-LE Correia

- wers.org


Discography

1.Walk On Water, EP, independently released March 26, 2008

2. Currently working on debut full length album

Photos

Bio

Like her name, one definition of the Hebrew word is "wishing-well", Ma’ayan dives deep when it comes to her music. It's not that she writes/co-writes all her songs, or that she's synth-tweeking Logic-geek who has a music degree, nor that she had an epiphany in the Himalayas about her future in music, it's because she remains true to herself at all costs. Ma'ayan's unique voice has a Sade-esque appeal, but dares to be dark and soulful like a modern day Billie Holiday. Her writing is edgy and outside the box, ever-evolving like her idols Sting, Bjork and Tori Amos. Hers are all natural elements, coming from a real place that puts her steps ahead of the game. Already she's played in front of heavies from Blue Note, Atlantic, and Universal Republic. She describes her music as a "reactionary mash-up of pop+culture" fusing indie-pop reggae and psychodelic-soul into a style that is sure to be identifiable as her very own soon enough.