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Laila Salins

Laila Salins grew up just beyond the skyline of New York, immersed in the cultural heritage of the Latvian émigré community. She has enjoyed a richly diverse performing career, performing jazz, chamber music, world music, cabaret, and music/theater, starring in the premieres of a multitude of contemporary music pieces. She has performed in Switzerland, Germany, England, Sweden, Australia, Canada and the US, as well as performing extensively in Latvia. She is co-founder of the music ensembles Kolibri, Ecliptica, Cat’s Eye, Ballistic Cabaret and TālaMana. In the fall of 2012 Laila completed her new CD - Elevator Into the Sky - her arrangements of Anne Sexton’s poetry for a jazz chamber music ensemble. She is also developing material for the world music ensemble TālaMana, which creates music which draws from – and is inspired by – cultures along the ancient amber trade routes. She received her B.A. from New England Conservatory and her M.A. from SUNY at Stonybrook.

Awards

Laila's creative collaborations have been supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, CEC Artslink, the Experimental TV Center, HERE Arts Center, the Soros Foundation and the National Music Theater Conference. The American Latvian Cultural Foundation supported her highly acclaimed recording project of Latvian ballads and drinking songs (Saskandinot).

Laila Salins: Elevator Into The Sky

Read "Elevator Into The Sky" reviewed by C. Michael Bailey

by C. Michael Bailey
March 12, 2013

On Smash, pianist/composer Patricia Barber wrote songs quite reminiscent of the late American poet Anne Sexton's (1928-1974) poetry: abstract and almost, but not quite, inaccessible. On Elevator Into The Sky, Latvian-American singer/composer Laila Salins adapts poems by Sexton for her lyric book, backing them with a competent and far-reaching band. This project is as ambitious as easily imagined. Sexton's confessional free verses are not easily tamed musically. Salins approaches Sexton's craggy images by presenting them juxtaposed against pianist Jamie Reynold's ...

“Ms. Salins captivated the crowd with her tender performances of these melancholy songs.” (Anthony Tommasini, The New York Times)

“Laila Salins sings with great intensity, with a vocal command that is characteristic of world music – with strong vibrations and varying timbres. Her phrasings were like the ebb and flow of small, irregular waves, telling of the heart’s restlessness and longing for what is lost.” (Ieva Gintere, Musical Sun, music quarterly)

"Exceptional in her singing ability, feeling for style and performing intensity was Laila Salins in the part of Arsamenes." (New Zurich Times, Switzerland)

“Ms. Salins captivated the crowd with her tender performances of these melancholy songs.” (Anthony Tommasini, The New York Times)

"Exceptional in her singing ability, feeling for style and performing intensity was Laila Salins in the part of Arsamenes." (New Zurich Times, Switzerland)

“Ms. Salins is such a passionate performer that her cabaret transcended mere show. This is a voice which jumps up almost three octaves. But not for showing off her talents, but because the emotions call for the agony and the ecstasy together.” (Harry Rolnick, ConcertoNet.com)

"Miss Salins is an engaging and communicative singer who colors words imaginatively and phrases with great sensitivity." (Peter Davis, The New York Times)

“Laila Salins crosses all the old barriers to open a door to the riches of a culture where deep, ancient and ancestral strains meet the contemporary worlds of folk and popular music, all in a mix that is as true to its roots as it is original, moving and articulate for our latter day." Eric Salzman (composer, producer, and author)

"Miss Salins bewitched the audience with her sensuous, cat-like Carmen." (Literature and Art, Riga, Latvia)

“Ms. Salins surely has one of the most remarkable vocal ranges of any singer I’ve heard… it is as clear and limpid as a pinot grigio at the top and as earthy as a merlot at the bottom… only a heart of stone would not be undone by these wonderfully romantic songs.” (The Southampton Press, Southampton, New York)

"Highlights of this year's season... include Laila Salins' concert of 20th century song literature in the Ave Sol Concert Hall." (Anita Uzulniece, Literature and Art, Riga, Latvia)

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Primary Instrument

Vocals

Willing to teach

Intermediate to advanced

Credentials/Background

B.A. New England Conservatory M.A. SUNY at Stonybrook Laila has taught vocal lessons and master classes at: State Univeristy of NY at Stonybrook Music in Chappaqua (private music school) International Youth Music Festival in Latvia Offers private lessons