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News
| Concert |
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Check out Mya performing live in Sacramento, CA on August 26th, 2004 at The California
Expo Center 1600 Exposition Way Sacramento, CA 95852.
[posted 7/24/2004 U.S.A.] |
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| Lifetime |
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Mya lands a role on the Lifetime television series "MISSING". She begins filiming in
Toronto on July 26th. Keep a look out for the new television series on your Lifetime television network.
[posted 7/24/2004 U.S.A.] |
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| Havana Nights on DVD |
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Catch Mya as Lola Martinez in Havana Nights, Dirty Dancing II on DVD in stores now!
Song "Do You Only Wanna Dance" is also featured on soundtrack.
[posted 7/24/2004 U.S.A.] |
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| Dreamworks animated film |
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Mya teams up with producer Tricky Stewart "Case of the Ex"
on Dreamworks "Shark's
Tale" soundtrack. The animation stars Will Smith, Angelina Jolie, Robert De Niro, and Renee Zelwegger. Coming to theaters
soon.
[posted 5/8/2004 U.S.A.] |
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| MOODRING IN STORES NOW! |
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[posted 7/23/2003 U.S.A.] |
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| Mya makes MTV's Top 40 Videos of 2003! |
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See where she placed on Saturday, 12/20 @ 4:00pm-8:00pm, 1:00am-5:00am
12/23-9:00am-1:00pm
[posted 12/19/2003 U.S.A.] |
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| MTV.com's Best of 2003! |
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Both of Mya's Videos, "Fallen" and "My love is like...Wo" from the MOODRING album have
been chosen by MTV.com as THE BEST OF 2003!
'Fallen' has won honors in Best Soul Video, and 'My Love Is Like.. Wo' in
Best Pop Video.
Check out Mtv.com for more info. | |
Contributed by Lakeisha
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Gossip
Mya is a dancer turned smooth urban R&B vocalist who released her eponymous debut in the spring of 1998, when
she was just 18 years old. |
Mya was born in Washington, D.C., where she took dance classes as a child. After briefly losing interest in the art, she returned
to dancing in her pre-teens, eventually joining the dance troupe T.W.A. (Tappers With Attitude). She left the group after
a short while, heading to New York to study at the Dance Theater of Harlem with Savion Glover, best known as the choreographer/mastermind
behind the Broadway spectacular Bring in da Noise, Bring in da Funk. Her passion for improvisation made her a favorite of
Glover, who had her perform solo at the Kennedy Center.
Although Mya was best known as a dancer, she was also musically inclined, learning how to sing and play the violin as a child. When her
father -- a professional musician -- learned that his daughter could sing and was serious about a musical career, he shopped
around the demo tapes, eventually earning the attention of Haqq Islam, president of University Music. Impressed with Mya's audition, Islam signed her to Interscope Records.
Mya and Interscope spent the next two years working on her debut record, hiring an impressive list of collaborators, including
Darryl Pearson, Babyface, Diane Warren, Raphael Brown, Wyclef Jean, Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott, and Sisqo and Moko from Dru Hill. The resulting album was a smooth urban song cycle about love and growing up; it was released in April 1998. Two years later,
her more mature second album, Fear of Flying, which featured collaborations with Lisa "Left Eye" Lopez, Jadakiss, Wyclef Jean, and Swizz Beatz, arrived. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide
Over the past three years, Miri Ben-Ari has carved out a unique niche as the hip-hop violinist for
artists including Jay-Z, Wyclef Jean and Kanye West. Soon, however, the 26-year-old may be calling on some of her rapping
friends for musical assistance at her own shows. Miri will release an album this year.
The project, she said, is "hard to explain. It's one-of-a-kind. There's nothing
like it. The only thing I could compare it to would be Carlos Santana's projects, because he's an instrumentalist who mixes
different elements like pop, rock and Latin music. And I'm doing the same with classical and hip-hop."
Ben-Ari, whose last
name means "daughter of a lion," is still at work on her untitled project and getting her guest stars together. Mya, Scarface,
Lil' Mo, Fabolous, Anthony Hamilton and Kanye West have all agreed to appear on the LP.
"I'm actually producing," Ben-Ari said of her album. "I've been producing for
some time. Sometimes I do it from scratch. Sometimes I collaborate with other producers. Sometimes I get a track and flip
it. Sometimes I start a track and we develop it. And sometimes I'll hear a track, fall in love with it and do it my way. It
all depends."
Her first foray into hip-hop isn't her debut opus. She released the jazz album Sahara in 1999
and the live Temple of Beautiful in 2003. Miri grew up playing classical music, fell in love with jazz at 16 and branched
out into other musical genres. She moved to New York from Israel in the late '90s hoping to use her classical training onstage.
"What
I really wanted to do was improvise," said Ben-Ari, who recalls being introduced to rap through Notorious B.I.G. and Jay-Z.
"I'm a stage addict. I love to perform. New York is the best place to express yourself musically, to check out other music
and find opportunities to get on different stages."
Miri first played hip-hop and R&B on her violin at open-mic
gatherings, and then began attending jazz classes. Famed trumpeter Wynton Marsalis soon took her under his wing.
Introduced
to Ben-Ari by a mutual friend, Wyclef Jean was so taken by Miri he asked her to perform with him during a "Showtime at the
Apollo" taping and a Carnegie Hall gig. Appearances on BET's "Rap City" and "106 & Park" followed, and the floodgates
opened when Jay-Z had her play during his historic 2001 Summer Jam set. Jigga subsequently featured her on his live Showtime
concert early last year.
"I loved it," she said of Summer Jam. "It was amazing. So much energy, so much love. Working
with Wyclef and Jigga was tremendous. They're both brilliant and know what they really want. They're not superstars just because
they have mad talent."
Miri's been working a lot lately with another mad genius, Kanye West. She just played on a track
he produced for Janet Jackson, and her violin is heard on approximately 90 percent of his recent The College Dropout.
"We
started trusting each other after spending so much time in a studio together," Ben-Ari said of recording West's album. "He
doesn't need to talk to me anymore when he gives me tracks. He knows what I do and trusts me. When I do my thing, I always
know what to do. I never need to think about anything, I just do me. Music comes to me. I don't process any thoughts
when I play music. I always like to hear things instantly."
This report is from MTV
News.
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On Tuesday, Mya was in a Los Angeles studio with producer Damon Elliott working on a song called
"People Change." It's not the catchiest or most representative cut she's ever done, but the title sums up the tone of her
next album.
The still-untitled disc, due February 25, reveals the 22-year-old singer transforming from an innocent
young woman into a liberal, self-assured adult, exposing her in a more intimate light. Unlike Fear of Flying (2000),
which addressed somewhat superficial relationship issues, the new stuff is real and personal, largely because Mya's writing
her own lyrics this time, said Elliott, who produced six songs on the disc.
"It's like when Pink stepped out with her
second record," he explained. "She got to express herself a little more than she did on her first album. Mya's grown up, and
the things she's talking about deal more with real issues. It's not like someone coming in with a song that's already written,
where the lyrics and music are from another person's perspective. We co-wrote the stuff that we did. So it's more from her."
Like Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake and Christina Aguilera, Mya is dealing with more provocative subject matter
these days. For example, one of two songs produced by Christopher "Tricky" Stewart is about fiery relationships on the road.
"She's
like, 'I'm in town for the night,' and she's got this guy that lives wherever she [happens to be that night], because Mya
travels. So she's like, 'I'm in town tonight, let's get it on.' You don't expect to hear that from Mya."
Elliott said
Mya's lyrical development isn't a shock tactic or an effort to keep up with her racy peers — it's more a sign of her
own maturation and her interest in being honest and open.
"It's the natural progression," Elliott said. "We're all
growing up. I mean, your first album usually is kind of kiddie because you're usually pretty young. But Mya's not this little
girl anymore who's just piggybacking off of other people. She's grown up, and she wants to talk about what she goes through
every day with guys."
The first single from the record will likely be "Get Up," Elliott said. "It's a real uptempo
song I did and it's got a party club vibe. It's the kind of song you'll hear at a basketball game when it's time to pump the
crowd up."
In addition to the six Elliott productions and the songs by Tricky, Mya's album will feature at least one
song produced by Timbaland and one by Missy Elliott.
"The Missy song is very Missy," laughed Elliott. "She wrote it,
so it's got a lot of her influence."
Other songs on the album include "Come," which Elliott describes as a "flirty,
teasing" song, and "Take a Picture, which he originally wrote for Pink's last album. "What happened was there was such an
overflow of songs, so a lot of songs didn't make the cut because she wanted the record to have a certain flow. It just so
happened that this song flowed perfectly with Mya's record, so we cut it for Mya."
Unlike Fear of Flying, which
included guest spots by Jadakiss, Beenie Man and the late Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes, the new Mya album probably won't feature
any collaborations.
"Mya can stand on her own," Elliott said. "Her album is gonna be off the chain. It's gonna be off
the hook, man."
This report is from MTV News.
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