THANKS to everybody who tuned into my birthday concert today!
For my birthday this year I am giving my first online concert of original songs and covers on Sunday, April 14 at 7PM Eastern Time. I’ll be performing on my Steinway parlor grand. By going to this link (http://goo.gl/cVMvk) you can watch the concert live. I hope you can be a part of this special night!
International Musician
Dec. 2012
Here is an interview about my musical background and the album “Satellite,” published in Dec. 2012 International Musician Magazine.
Anna Dagmar: Blending Styles
By Kayla Turo
One of the greatest benefits for musicians today, is the high respect the population has for eclectic music. Now more than ever, musicians can happily dip into all of the genres that they love, in order to please listeners across the nation. Singer/songwriter, Anna Dagmar of Local 300 (Lowell, Massachusetts), has pleasantly landed herself in the midst of jazz and American folk music. Dagmar, who started as a student of jazz piano, let the integration of music cultures throughout her travels mold her into the musician that she is today. “Having a background in jazz has meant that my composing consists of a lot of rich and interesting harmonies,” explains the 34 year-old Dagmar. “I like the chords to move in unpredictable and refreshing ways. At the same time I like songs; I like melodies that you can remember, that are catchy and are fun to sing. So I’ve always bordered that line between something that is artistically interesting and something that is more accessible to a wider audience.”
These two genres have benefited Dagmar who focuses on the chord conjunctions and intricate harmonies that have symbolized jazz music, while also utilizing the creative and focused storytelling method that popularizes folk music. This utilization has led to the growing popularity in the young artist who has recently released her 4th album titled Satellite, in which she demonstrates this combination of jazz and folk music.
“My lyric inspiration often comes from personal relationships. Sometimes if I meet someone that really makes an impression on me (even if I don’t fully know them) I might imagine a story that surrounds them. So there will be a certain amount of exaggeration in my lyrics that’s not necessarily based on fact,” Dagmar laughs brightly. “It really is an expression that comes out of a need to express. When I write lyrics it is because I have feelings that I want to let out into the world.” The title song of her album tells the story of her parents, using the metaphors of the Garden of Eden, followed by the Big Bang Theory, and ultimately the metaphor of herself as a “satellite” which, being at a great distance, is able to see the world from a wider viewpoint. These metaphors are contributed to her parents from whom Dagmar attributes her broad views of science and spirituality.
Dagmar was raised by her parents in St. Albans, England before moving to the United States at the age of six. She took up classical piano at seven years-old and gleaned her talent from two instructors, one specializing in classical music and the other in jazz. Dagmar was deeply affiliated with all of her high school’s musical performances and organizations and she joined the American Federation of Musicians while still enrolled in high school. “I had all of these experiences as a younger person, and it was almost like professional training. My parents were very supportive of that as an idea and their thinking was even though it is a challenge to create a life as an artist, if you work hard and you learn the most that you can and you keep pursuing it and stay organized and responsible, you’re going to find a way to do this,” Dagmar says. After high school, Dagmar pursued a dual degree in Classical Music and Music Education from Eastman College in Rochester, New York.
Today, Dagmar is a freelance musician in New York City, performing at least 50 concerts a year across the country, composing, recording, and accompanying, all while teaching piano to 20 private students. Over the past year, Dagmar was awarded a finalist position in two lyric writing contests, including the Rocky Mountain Folk Festival lyric contest in Lyons, Colorado. Dagmar will continue to compose her original music, record albums, and tour across the country, performing her personal blend of music.
Interview with Dan Nosheny.
Here is a new interview with Dan Nosheny on his podcast Sound Decisions. I admit, we did geek-out a little on music theory. But hey, I’m playing a toy piano and talking about chords in the song, “Satellite.” It was a delightful experience!
“Let the Waves Come in Threes” by Anna Dagmar, featuring original string quartet accompaniment.
Featuring Sarah Briggs (violin), Joe Jewett (violin), Delores Thayer (viola) and Perri Morris (cello). Videography by Joel Patterson of Mountain Top Studios.
Special thanks to my concert host, Robert Dewar!
New article in the Discmakers Blog.
I’m enjoying the opportunity to share some of my thoughts on musical styles and influences and how we define ourselves as independent artists. In this article I explore the crossover between jazz, classical, pop and folk sounds in my music and make some suggestions for how other artists might describe their own work. Read the article here:
http://blog.discmakers.com/2012/10/what-makes-you-so-eclectic/
Interview with Anna Dagmar
I was recently interviewed in A Voice To Hear, where I talk about the defining moment that made me want to become a professional performer and what I see as the power behind music to influence positive change in the world. You can also find out what kind of shoe I think best seems like me!!! Read full interview here:
http://www.avoicetohear.com/2012/06/simply-six-anna-dagmar.html
Here is an excerpt of an article I wrote about writing lyrics that was published in DIY Musician:
One of the biggest discoveries I made during the process of recording my fourth album, Satellite (2012) was that my lyrics had changed in style quite a lot from of my earliest album, One More Time in the Air (2001). When I began writing songs at about age twenty, I had a lot of emotions that wanted to come out somehow, but I was very shy about revealing myself too much. So, I turned to poetry. I turned to the world around me and looked for symbols or metaphors to describe the way I felt…
[Read the entire article on DIY Musician.]
Anna performing in the Songwriter Showcase Finals at the Rocky Mountain Folk Festival in Lyons Colorado on August 17, 2012.
I wanted to share this short interview broadcast on WHUD with DJ Kathy Millar. The focus of the interview is on the track “We Were Children” from my new album Satellite, as well as my musical background. The new CD has garnered some great recognition, including Gold Prize in the Mid-Atlantic Songwriting Contest, Finalist in the Kerrville New Folk Festival and Finalist at the Rocky Mountain Folk Festival. You can listen to “We Were Children” and the other tracks from Satellite by clicking on the music player on the right side of this page. Enjoy!
