Dramatic Dark Dissonant Piano with Raw and Ethereal Vocals
The contemporary classical, heavy rock/metal influence pianist comes from a very musical & artistic family. Her father Bill is a successful visual artist and art teacher & her mother Mary a violin teacher, guitarist, folk singer songwriter. Scarlett has been playing piano since the age of 4. But it was at age of 13 she took more after more readily to songwriting grunge alternative rock guitar sounds and started her performing career at age 16 as a solo acoustic guitarist vocalist. There after, she went on to play some of her previous and new works in a 3 piece grunge rock band called ‘Autonomy’.
Guitar, grunge and heavy metal rock had paved the songwriting foundations for Scarlett and in 2002 she returned to approach the piano creatively to soon discover it was her strongest and most cathartic songwriting instrument. The melding of her folk upbringing, heavy aggressive guitar influences from her teenage years and classical, jazz and boogie woogie piano education, lead Scarlett to develop a an unconventional and original approach to the piano and produce a strong body of work that truly reinvents the concept of ‘Piano Music’.
“Piano Power” could be an easy way to describe her original style of combining rhythmically complex neo classical cyclical treble right hand phrases with heavy power chords and octaves in the bass, emanating sounds much like a heavy rock guitar. The plethora of unusual minor keys and dissonance used is enough to keep a knowledgeable music theorist on their toes.
Aggressive is not usually a synonym that springs to mind with the piano, but with Scarlett’s thirst for justice and social commentary in her lyrical content, she answers the long debated question of whether the piano is actually a percussive instrument, and it’s a very clear ‘Yes’, with some of her stand out heavy rhythmic pieces like “New Victim”, her 2016 single “User”, and her instrumental piece “The Prophet” which won Flinders University Art Prize in 2003.
Her 2012 EP Songbird exemplifies her softer introspective side with melancholic, emotionally provoking poetry and melodies and ends with a gentle haunting cinematic instrumental piano cello piece, “A pause for lament”
In 2020 Scarlett plans to release her debut full length album entitled “Requiem for the Earth” which will feature piano, vocals, cello, string quartet, bass and drums. It will be a collection of her more earthy and environmentally conscious songs, proving her degree in Environmental Management studied back in 2003 to have also been a philosophically transferable skill.
The first single “Mi Corazon" from the forthcoming album was released September 2019 and is Scarlett’s most poppy, tender, melancholic piece that builds with cello and drums into a lusty crescendo. scarlettcook.bandcamp.com/track/mi-corazon
Her latest single “Predator” released March 8th 2020 is some of her finest most original work. Heavy, aggressive, swirling and percussive piano. Raw, blunt, spine tingling topic and delivery in the vocals. She hits all the issues of the ‘Me Too’ movement head on and does not leave a beat to do it meekly. scarlettcook.bandcamp.com
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