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Vocalist, Producer and Songwriter; Executive Production and Development of Independent Music; Music Business Consultant; Promotion & Publicity; Artist, Career and Image Development; Booking & Management; Graphic Design; Travel Photographer Lian is a renaissance woman and entrepreneur who has pursued many creative endeavors. Her current focus is on completing her first musical release, due early 2010. A life-long vocalist, Lian's music features an eclectic mix of her heartfelt singing, unique songwriting and rhythm rich world-soul arrangements. She is currently recording her debut of original material, which features David Manley, Esperanza Spalding, Neal and Al Evans of Soulive, dj Cheb i Sabbah, Didi Gutman of Brazilian Girls, David "Fuze" Fiuczynski, Ryan Parker, Gbatokai Dakinah, Elie Katz, Daniel Sadownick, and Adam Rogers. Lian was featured on the Hector Zazou & Harold Budd album "Glyph" (Crammed Disc Records), and her contribution, "And She Stepped Aside" was a popular favorite on "Morning Becomes Eclectic" on Los Angeles radio station KCRW. She also vocally guested and composed for the 2001 release KiF by David Fiuczynski & Rufus Cappadocia. Singing and performing since she was a child, Lian is the daughter of noted Bay Area jazz vocalist and vocal coach and graphic artist Maye Cavallaro, who has been her great inspiration. Descended from a musical family, she is the granddaughter of a concert pianist on her father's side and an opera singer on her mother's, and grew up in Marin County, CA. She has studied music at Berklee College of Music in Boston, and New School/Mannes Jazz Program in New York. Lian has a deep interest in many different styles and the sounds of many countries, and has explored Indian, Balkan, Asian, Arabic and African music as well as more conventional styles such as jazz, soul, blues, pop and opera. |
Lian is also co-founder and CEO of independent record label FuzeLicious Morsels, where she has functioned as executive and co-producer, live DVD producer, graphic and web designer, publicist and promoter, overseeing every business aspect of ten CD releases and a double live concert DVD for guitarist David Fiuczynski and his groups Screaming Headless Torsos and KiF. She has also worked extensively in live entertainment, having booked, produced and tour managed seven European and Latin American tours. An executive producer and consultant for independent artists, Lian assists with studio and live recording planning, production and arranging, performance plotting and repertoire, design and branding, image development, print promotion and publicity, internet promotion and sales, booking and touring, merchandise manufacturing, and domestic and international distribution. She works through her independent music consultancy, production and management company, Lotus Flower Productions. Lian's graphic design is unusual and offbeat. She is a self-taught designer who has created web sites, CD covers, logos, T-shirts, advertising and promotional items, as well as having worked freelance in New York City at advertising agencies BBDO, J. Walter Thompson, Ogilvy & Mather and others. |
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Considering long-term world travel a vocation, Lian has visited 30 countries and spent a number of years overseas traveling in India, Africa, SE Asia, Mexico, the Mediterranean and Europe, in 2008 returning from five months in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. Although a casual photographer with a point and shoot, her travel photos are as quirky as her design sense. Lian has been an award-winning actress, who's starring debut in "Longshot", a pioneering feature length video "mockumentary" which she co-wrote, was shown on PBS nationwide, selected as an outstanding film of the year at the London Film Festival, and won the Grand Prize, Montbéliard Festival, France and the Prize Publique, Montreal Video Festival. The Village Voice opined that "the most compelling aspect is the leading performer, Lian Amber... while the facts may be invented, the self that Amber exhibits for the camera is unmistakably her own." In the 1990's, Lian was a music and arts features journalist for Associated Press, an editorial contributor to numerous music magazines, and a hip-hop and soul columnist for San Francisco music publication NMP. She worked extensively as a live DJ in the Bay Area, spinning world music, funk and soul at many venues. A lifelong music collector and enthusiast, she has amassed a 5000 title collection of LP's of many genres from every corner of the world, which she draws upon extensively in her work. |
