Mayra Andrade
Mayra Andrade, born in Havana, Cuba on February 13, 1985, is a Cape Verdean singer who lives in Lisbon after having lived in Paris for a long time.
She lived as a child in Cape Verde, then traveled abroad from the 1990s to Senegal, Angola and Germany. As a teenager, she won the gold medal in the 2001 Francophonie Games Competition in Ottawa. She decided to settle in Paris, attracted by the cosmopolitanism of the capital.
Self-taught artist, she composes on guitar. Like the singer and guitarist Tcheka, Mayra Andrade wishes to write her own score, while being part of the aesthetic diversity of the archipelago of Cape Verde. Of these two and some others, we will even speak of “Pantera generation”, the name of the young composer Orlando Pantera, who died in 2001, who smoothly reformed the Cape Verdean music and from which she borrowed four titles for “Navega”.
His first album Navega is only sung in Cape Verdean Creole, except for a song in French, As if it rained, written by Tété.
She has sung in several Portuguese-speaking countries, notably in the Cape Verdean cities of Mindelo and Praia, and in Lisbon.
She has made herself known in France thanks to the title Mas Amor duet with Mc Malcriado.
For her second album, Stória, stória, Mayra chose to lay the groundwork in Paris with Cape Verdian multi-instrumentalist Kim Alves, Cameroonian bassist Étienne M’Bappé and Brazilian percussionist Zé Luis Nascimento. From then on, Mayra Andrade will multiply the tracks, namely to invite musicians from all horizons. All are part of his panorama. In Paris, it will be the Guinean Djeli Moussa Diawara and his kora, the trumpet player Nicolas Genest, the Angolan Zézé N’Gambi and his rhythms, the Brazilian percussionist Marcos Suzano, Jaques Morelenbaum, who signs and directs the recording of strings arrangements and Lincoln Ollivetti, the arrangements of the winds.
His third album, Studio 105, was recorded live at the Maison de la Radio in Paris.
For her fourth album, Lovely Difficult, Mayra Andrade has drawn on artists from a variety of backgrounds: Yael Naim and David Donatien, Piers Faccini, Tete, Benjamin Biolay, Hugh Coltman, Krystle Warren, Pascal Danae, Mário Lúcio and Yann Walcker. The album was named in the category “World Music Album of the Year” at Victoires de la Musique 2014.
