London-based singer-songwriter Tess Cunningham answered a few questions for WHERE MY GIRLS AT? about her influences, creative process, experience as a woman in the music industry, as well as advice for aspiring young female musicians. She is about to release her debut EP, Let's Compare Scars and has created all the music videos and art representing her work. Check out the music video below for the single "Let's Compare Scars" and stream the EP via SoundCloud. You can also follow her on Twitter and like her on Facebook for updates.
What/who are some of your main influences or role models?
"I wouldn't say that I have any particular musical influences that have shaped the way my music sounds...maybe Prokofiev...and Prince, I love Prince! My formative influence was growing up in a house with five older brothers, rock music blaring constantly, among them self taught guitarists...I looked up to them.... Apart from my own personal experiences I'm inspired by a whole range of influences and role models...Patrick White, Peter Carey, Margaret Atwood, Maurice Béjart, William Blake and Emily Dickinson. Maurice Sendak, Dr. Seuss. I started classical ballet and piano lessons at eight...classical music has always been an influence."
What does your creative process look like?
"I write at the piano, usually I'll have a really strong lyrical idea or words, I pretty much always start with words and poetry…what I want the song to be about. At some point I'll draw the song, and choreograph to it. I like to make a video as a visual representation…so there's an entire concept with a thread running through. It would be rare that I'd write something that I couldn't imagine moving to. I love to write string arrangements."
Tell me about what your experience has been like as a woman in the music industry.
"I've been determined that people would get me and understand me through my music, some of the things that I couldn't talk about, I've expressed through music, and that's the thing that's most important to me. The fact that I am a female should be secondary to this, I want to be taken seriously for my writing. Also, coming from a ballet background, where you are conforming to an extreme female physical ideal, dictated often by someone else's taste... you are a template for another person's ideas. So my own words and music were freedom to me and very powerful... I didn't want to go back to being a template! It becomes apparent in music though that there are rules that seem to apply too, but the stronger you can be in your own artistic vision the easier it is to function within it, particularly in the internet age. I'm lucky at the moment that I have a great deal of artistic control, to shape how I want something to sound and look. I've generally had positive experiences working within the music industry so far, and people have respected me and my music without gender coming into it. It's important to know what defines you and that should be dictated by you."
What messages do you hope to send to aspiring young girl musicians? What advice do you have for young girl musicians?
"I hope my music is unique to me and that more girls are inspired to bring themselves and their unique characters to their music. Advice would be..just..be strong. Work hard. Be fearless creatively."
"I wouldn't say that I have any particular musical influences that have shaped the way my music sounds...maybe Prokofiev...and Prince, I love Prince! My formative influence was growing up in a house with five older brothers, rock music blaring constantly, among them self taught guitarists...I looked up to them.... Apart from my own personal experiences I'm inspired by a whole range of influences and role models...Patrick White, Peter Carey, Margaret Atwood, Maurice Béjart, William Blake and Emily Dickinson. Maurice Sendak, Dr. Seuss. I started classical ballet and piano lessons at eight...classical music has always been an influence."
What does your creative process look like?
"I write at the piano, usually I'll have a really strong lyrical idea or words, I pretty much always start with words and poetry…what I want the song to be about. At some point I'll draw the song, and choreograph to it. I like to make a video as a visual representation…so there's an entire concept with a thread running through. It would be rare that I'd write something that I couldn't imagine moving to. I love to write string arrangements."
Tell me about what your experience has been like as a woman in the music industry.
"I've been determined that people would get me and understand me through my music, some of the things that I couldn't talk about, I've expressed through music, and that's the thing that's most important to me. The fact that I am a female should be secondary to this, I want to be taken seriously for my writing. Also, coming from a ballet background, where you are conforming to an extreme female physical ideal, dictated often by someone else's taste... you are a template for another person's ideas. So my own words and music were freedom to me and very powerful... I didn't want to go back to being a template! It becomes apparent in music though that there are rules that seem to apply too, but the stronger you can be in your own artistic vision the easier it is to function within it, particularly in the internet age. I'm lucky at the moment that I have a great deal of artistic control, to shape how I want something to sound and look. I've generally had positive experiences working within the music industry so far, and people have respected me and my music without gender coming into it. It's important to know what defines you and that should be dictated by you."
What messages do you hope to send to aspiring young girl musicians? What advice do you have for young girl musicians?
"I hope my music is unique to me and that more girls are inspired to bring themselves and their unique characters to their music. Advice would be..just..be strong. Work hard. Be fearless creatively."