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Marianne
Marianne's Kitchen
Marianne
was born in Belgium. She lived there for 3 1/2 years
before she moved to the United States with her parents.
Already as a toddler she expressed her affinity with
music for she would sit motionless next to the speaker
listening to the classical music her parents played for
hours. If anyone tried to turn it off before any given
piece of music was finished they would have to deal with
an angry child.
Growing up she maintains her interest and takes a few
piano lessons, (she absolutely had to learn how to play
"Fur Elise" by Beethoven) and teaches herself
how to play guitar.
In school she participates in every school play (always
musical) and was in the school choir every year as well.
The american children she grew up with were pretty much
all musically inclined and a lot of time was spent
playing together and sharing what each had learned with
one another. Of course all of these people had an
influence on her musical development, certainly as much
as the music that she listened to such as Fleetwood Mac,
Steely Dan, Janis Joplin, The Rolling Stones, Alice
Cooper, Traffic, The Eagles, Joan Baez and many more.
In 1984 she returns to Belgium and very soon she starts
to play in small clubs alone with her guitar. In one of
these clubs she attracts the attention of a presenter of
Radio Phoenix and he dedicates an entire show to her live
performance and interview.
During this time she meets Beverly Jo Scott who is to
become a very close friend for many years to come. B.J.
takes Marianne by the arm and leads her into the studio
scene where they will work together doing backing vocals
for Alexa Wacu in the remake of "There is a Rose in
Spanish Harlem" and for an advertisement single for
Smirnoff vodka. With B.J. and Dani Klein, Marianne tours
in Germany with the band "Catalogue of Cool".
She will later work for Dani in Vaya Con Dios as she does
backing vocals for the maxi single "Don't cry for
Louie". She also at this time does a lot of backing
and pilot vocals for studio "Graffiti" in Mons,
a lot of radio adverts for Studio 43 in Brussels. In 1985
she decides to audition for Talent Productions who was
producing Sabena vision and audio. She was chosen among
+/-300 candidates and was given the oldies show, but
after about a year of work they gave her 2 other inflight
audio shows and trusted her with the voices of about 1/2
of their video productions for long haul carriers.
Her last musical experience before deciding to start a
family was doing backing vocals for some on stage
performances with Sandra Kim.
1996 is the year Marianne turns in her apron for a guitar
and starts writing her own music and in1997 her first 12
track CD is recorded "WHlTE ROSE lN THE RAlN".
"WHlTE ROSE lN THE RAlN" manages to get
Marianne appointments with a great deal of major record
companies in London as well as in Belgium, but they all
back out because of her age.
Marianne does not give up, new songs are being born all
the time and she is convinced that it is not for nothing.
She gets a band into shape and starts to play clubs in
Brussels to try to build the band's reputation and behind
the scenes she works like a fury to find a means of
distribution.
In order to have a high quality product to offer she
presses a 5 track CD herself in New York.
She is now spending all of her energy organizing
concerts, trying to get press promotion and still looking
for traditional distribution that will facilitate
promotion.
Her music can also be bought at FNAC (Brussels),
Metrophone (Passage St Honoré, Brussels), Caroline Music
(University street in Liège), The Beat (Willimantic,
Connecticut, U.S.A.), Sam Goody's Music Store (Manchester
and Stamford, Connecticut), Borders (Manchester,
Connecticut) and through the websites "www.peoplesound.com" and "www.marianneskitchen.com".
She has been invited to perform live promotion of this CD
on the Wayne Norman show, radio WILI, Connecticut, U.S.A.
She has been invited by Philippe Longtain to perform 2
songs live plus an interview on "Conviviale
Poursuite" show on the Belgian television RTBF. This
show was on the air December 23rd 1999 and occasionally
many times during the following months.
The year 2000 is already begining with a series of
concerts in Brussels.
Marianne is now more than ever looking to expand her
audience and plans to organize concerts in the Flanders
as well as in France this year.
In January and July 2000 she went back to the States to
make some promotional work there and to give some few
concerts. The unexpected success of these events has led
her to organize a larger tour for the month of October
2000.
Photo by Selcuk Ayar