NEWS

THE MYSTERIES: A NEW Full Length is COMING

I’m nearing the end of recording The Mysteries my fourth full length record. For the first time I feel I’ve made something that really captures my vision and sounds how I’ve always imagined.
It’s taken a long time to get here, many years of working on my voice, songwriting, and arranging skills.

One person who helped immensely is Joe Chiccarelli (U2, Elton John, White Stripes, Morrissey etc.) who mixed the record. The word “Mixing” doesn’t begin to capture what he made happen.
He is a producer as well and he brings that vision and knowledge to his mixing. My very rough mixes were elevated beyond what I could have hoped for. He made an indie recording sound major.

You probably know that the challenges of the streaming age has put increasing pressure on musicians to adapt to compensate for the drop in compensation. But most don’t know that musicians
earn just $1 for every 750 Pandora streams.

This makes it very hard to finance new music for those who aren’t financially well off or at the top 1% of the music industry.

I’ve attempted to meet this challenge by learning to Engineer my own records at home instead of in a studio, recording digitally instead of to analog tape, playing most of the instruments, doing all
the songwriting, arrangements, artwork, and production. Wearing so many hats has a cost. Things take a lot longer, and it’s pretty tiring!

Once it’s released I would be so grateful if you would share a few songs with like minded people. Without a big promotional budget this is really the way it will have an audience and be heard.

I want so much for this particular work to be heard by as many people as possible. Please spread the word!

PHOTOS WITH TODD HIDO 2023

Todd Hido’s photography has haunted me for years. His work is incredibly evocative and psychological. He has made music videos for a tribute to Joy Division and The Ravonettes. He kindly took time out of his busy schedule to shoot some portraits of me. It was a highlight of the past year and I look forward to sharing them with you!
Learn more about his work here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFE18gxHFGE

THE GUGGENHEIM
Presents Romantic Songs of the Patriarchy 2021

The Guggenheim museum in New York chose to put this piece on for the second time. It was a meaningful and thought provoking experience, which reflected the divisive and divergent viewpoints of our time.

THE CHRONICLE FEATURES
Romantic Songs of the Patriarchy 2018

Ragnar Kjartansson is widely considered to be one of the most significant performance artists of his generation. It was an honor
to be a part (with 30 other women) of his duration performance piece Romantic Songs of the Patriarchy. Sigur Ros’s keyboardist
Kjartan Sveinsson was the musical director & Kendra Mckinley was the band leader.

Tracy Chapman attended, which was incredible.

I was also lucky enough to be the featured photo in the Chronicle’s DATEBOOK article on the show.
Thanks Yalonda M. James & Emma Heath of the Chronicle.
READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE:
https://datebook.sfchronicle.com/art-exhibits/women-sing-supposed-love-songs-with-dark-twist-in-light-of-metoo

KQED FEATURE

Reevaluating the 'Romantic' Hit Songs of Pop Music's Patriarchy

Thank you Emma Silvers for this extremely insightful article on the performances this weekend!

READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE: https://www.kqed.org/arts/13844829/pop-music-patriarchy-a-reevaluation-of-romantic-hit-songs

RAGNAR KJARTANSSON
"Romantic Songs of the Patriarchy"

I’m very honored to have been selected alongside an incredibly talented group of women to participate in Icelandic Artist Ragnar Kjartansson’s 3 day durational musical performance at The Women’s Building in San Francisco’s Mission District.

The program will feature women singing familiar and what at first seem to be innocuous love songs, but when listened to more carefully reveal more complex attitudes towards women. It is a humorous, poetic reflection on the state of our culture in the midst of the great turbulence called our times. Ragnar’s work has been featured at SFMOMA.

November 9 to 11, 2018, Women’s Building in the Mission, SF
PLEASE NOTE: Odessa will NOT be performing her own songs.
TICKETS https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ragnar-kjartansson-romantic-songs-of-the-patriarchy-tickets-49557841839
ARTICLE https://news.artnet.com/art-world/san-francisco-performance-art-space-ragnar-kjartansson-1283753

NEW SINGLE
WHEN TIME RUNS OUT 2018

A music video for the single When Time Runs Out is in progress but the music is available to buy on BANDCAMP now! This single is a collaboration with composer Max Stoffregen featuring Max’s musical arrangements and instrumental performance and my songwriting and singing.

NEW WEBSITE

Welcome to the new website. I’ve chosen to go with something that’s easy to update and has greater security than my old website and hope you find the simple design easy to navigate.

NATIONAL NUTELLA COMMERCIAL

Session singing is a fun way to use my voice in new ways and hear it in different contexts. The commercial market is very saturated and opportunities in the Bay are rare but this year I landed my first National commercial. Justin Pinkerton wrote and produced the track for Dan Miller of They Might Be Giants who now produces original music for advertising. Most of the track is instrumental but I’m there at the end. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nakJJJ4syhc

COLLABORATION WITH NURIA

My collaboration with the musicians in Nuria began while I was recording my very first solo record and continues today.
I’m pleased to have been asked to write and perform vocals on their forthcoming record and I’m excited about how it’s progressing. https://www.facebook.com/nuriaband

COLLABORATIVE TRACKS ON
BADMAN & SAINT MARIE RECORDS

Odessa sang and wrote her part of the track Want Me on Nyles Lannon’s Falling Inside (Badman Records).
https://badmanrecordingco.com/products/n-lannon-falling-inside-cd

Odessa sang on several songs on Carta’s The Faults Follow (Saint Marie Records).
http://www.saintmarierecords.com/products/516346-carta-the-faults-follow