Alicia Keys: Music with no beginning, no end

How do you make a follow-up on an album that has garnered awards, sold 10 million copies worldwide and is recognized as one of the most important new arrivals on the global recording scene?

If you are Alicia Keys, you can. She looks at her work as an expression of her life experiences. And, while mindful of the impact her first album made, she keeps creating music that reflects who she is and what she’s about.

A rare artist in her generation, a singer, songwriter and extraordinary pianist who combines classical training with an old school sensibility and a direct relationship with today’s mix of hip-hop and R&B, Alicia relates to music much in the way legends like Stevie Wonder and Prince have always done, seeing their work as a continuous, ongoing journey rather than a collection of songs for a new album, always recording more material than could possibly fill one record. Not that Alicia herself would presume to be included in the category of such musical masters, but certainly if her first award-winning multi-platinum album (2001’s Songs In A Minor) and her latest epic, The Diary Of Alicia Keys, are any indicator, she has clearly taken the first few steps in a career that shows infinite promise.

On the eve of her much-anticipated sophomore album’s December, 2003 release, Alicia reflects on the fast-paced events of the past three years: "It hasn’t been that hard dealing with all that’s happened because I’m really a pretty simple lady and most importantly, I keep the people who’ve been around me for years. That keeps me very focused. I’m blessed with a family and a good circle of positive people who help me keep perspective. If I believed the hype, I would never have been able to make an album."

Reflecting on her latest project, Alicia notes: "My music doesn’t have a beginning or end. It’s continuous, I didn’t stop writing after the first album came out and everything I wrote ever since came from my life experiences, of being on the road, traveling, dealing with different situations. Once I got to the studio, I began to let those things out of me. By the time I started thinking about how I wanted the new album to be, I had so many songs. You see, I don’t put myself in any kind of box; I speak freely with my music. I knew the second album would naturally be different from the first because of all the growing up I did during the past three years."

For the native New Yorker Alicia, the choice of the right recording environment for working on her all-important second J Records album was critical. "I normally record out of my house but I was moving so I had to find a studio which would be like my home away from home. I decided I’d try this one place that had been recommended to me. It was a spot in Noho, downtown Manhattan, and I figured if I did one song there and the vibe was good, I’d do the album there. The song was Nobody Not Really and it was perfect. It was private, quiet–no platinum records on the wall, kinda Zen-like. And that’s where I did most of the album over a period of about eight months."

Included in the album line-up are Nobody Not Really, Samsonite Man, Dragon Days, Feeling U Feeling Me, Diary, Karma, Slow Down, If I Ain’t Got You, When You Really Love Someone, and You Don’t Know My Name, the album’s first single. She also did her own version of the ’70s hit of Gladys Knight & The Pips If I Were Your Woman. The album opens with Harlem’s Nocture, an instrumental interlude which Alicia claims "is my own interpretation of classical music and a reminder of my classical training at New York’s Professional Performing Arts School." The album also includes the bonus cut, Streets Of New York featuring Nas and Rakim.

"It was tough deciding what to leave off the album because in all, I must have recorded 32 songs! But what I appreciate about my team – my manager Jeff Robinson, my partner Kerry brothers and Peter Edge at J Records – is that they all told me, ‘you have to make the final decision.’ Then, Clive Davis (Chairman and CEO of the RCA Music Group) totally allows me to be who I am creatively, giving me different perspectives, while seeing the artist in me."

With The Diary Of Alicia Keys, the music-buying public gets to see once more this amazing, multi-talented artist fully expressing herself with a dazzling array of new compositions.

"When I heard the final album, I was ecstatic," Alicia states. "I really felt the energy of the songs and hearing them as one piece of work, I was able to say ’yes, this is who I am right now.’ I’m very proud and very happy and I’m excited about letting the album into the world."

Erik Santos At CEU Malolos

Love is still in the air…and what better way to spend the love month than with two of the hottest hunks in the entertainment scene – Piolo Pascual and one of the hottest young balladeers today, Erik Santos.

On Feb. 28, be serenaded by Erik as he guests in a variety show topbilled by Piolo Pascual at CEU Malolos’ Centrodome in Malolos, Bulacan. Other guests are Michelle Ayalde, Monina Bagatsing, Ashley, the Cross movers, Avenida and Joy Viado.

The grand prize winner of the recently-concluded Star In A Million, Erik Santos has been busy with shows all over the country and is slowly carving his niche in the local music scene. His powerful version of This Is The Moment and I Believe I Can Fly, which are among the tracks in the Star In A Million album released by Star Records, are fast becoming a favorite among radio listeners.