Song # 10: “My Creation” by Jeneen Terrana

Hello Friends:

 

“My Creation” by Jeneen Terrana is the tenth song in The FIRST Alive with Clive Top 20.

 

Jeneen has appeared on Alive with Clive twice, and performed “My Creation,” the last of thirteen songs on her second CD titled My Creation, during her first interview on Alive with Clive on May 9, 2008.

 

Here is a picture of me with Jeneen that was taken in the TV studio before her interview on Alive with Clive on May 9, 2008:

 

 

 

Clive Swersky with Jeneen Terrana

 

 

 

 

 

As mentioned in her Bio on her Web site, www.jeneenterrana.com:  

 

Jeneen’s music is driven by her haunting vocal style mixed with alternative rock and blues akin to artists such as Patty Griffin, K.D. Lang and Lucinda Williams.

 

She grew up in Buffalo, New York, and was strongly influenced by her Sicilian grandfather who sang every Sunday after dinner.  “My grandfather would put on a full opera,” Jeneen says. “He played all the characters himself.”  After studying music and moving to New York, Jeneen became involved with the local music scene and started writing.

 

In 2002, she released her first CD, Just Me.  The album is a mix of gentle melodies (“I’m Fine,” “Are You Still In”) and sarcastic wit (“FU,” “Goodbye”), each song reaching for a specific resolution and finding it.  The follow up release, My Creation, has a new wisdom (“My Creation,” “Little Fish”) as well as the sarcasm we loved in the first album (“New Book,” “Money Tree”).  The Howl Brothers, three talented musicians add their own special flavor with western guitar riffs and driving bass lines, and even some backing vocals on one of the tracks.

 

For the last couple of years a nice buzz has been steadily brewing over the emerging music scene in Long Island City, Queens. Jeneen is one of its most popular performers, appearing at hip new and upcoming venues such as The LIC Bar, Lucky Mojo’s & The Creek.  One of the architects of the new music scene in Queens is Silbin Sandovar, booking and promoting shows and nurturing and uniting a rapidly growing network of talented musicians. And as a songwriter, Sandovar has written and recorded with a variety of musicians, including Shane MacGowan from The Pogues. 

 

In early 2009, Jeneen had an idea that bit her like a musical bug: why not offer the world a little sample of this new musical landscape?  She approached Silbin with the idea of a two-week tour in the UK and Ireland. As the two pooled their collective talents and resources, the tour grew into a month long endeavor with additional stops in The Netherlands and Belgium.  Armed with nothing more than two acoustic guitars and their voices, Jeneen and Silbin took their little piece of the American musical pie and served it to European audiences for the first time. The tour was a huge success with appearances on BBC Radio with Simon Evans, Brendan Hickey’s On The Verge in Dublin and Barry Everitt’s House of Mercy in London. 

 

It is still the live shows that keep her fans coming back.  Her easy rapport with her audience, catchy lyrics and her lilting vocals wrapped around her acoustic melodies always leave them wanting more.

 

Jeneen began 2010 by announcing that she wanted to raise the funds to record her new CD through RocketHub with a campaign she called “10 Days of Treats.”  She undertook to meet fans in different parks in Manhattan (Union Square Park, Bryant Park and Central Park) and Queens to play for them, sometimes in bitterly cold weather, and provide them with a wide variety of scrumptious cakes and other treats she baked in return for fuel for her CD.  She also performed at a house concert hosted by Holly Yee in Ardsley, NY, and provided different bonuses, depending upon the level of contributions, to obtain additional fuel.  While she shared her baking and singing with her existing and new-found fans for several weeks, she publicized her campaign with endearing videos recorded in her kitchen and posted on YouTube.  She ultimately raised the funds necessary to create her new CD, See The Light, which she is about to promote upon her return from gigs on cruise ships for ten weeks in Alaska, the West Coast of the United States and Europe.

 

“My Creation,” in my opinion, is a song that is destined to become a timeless classic.  The lyrics to the song emphasize that we all have within us the power to choose what we want to create for our lives every day, without being shackled by decisions of the past – and themes of love and peace, as well as being courageous and fully self expressed, reverberate throughout the song.

 

Here is one of the key verses from My Creation:

 

Well, what will I choose today

Will I be haunted by words

I heard someone else say

Or open up my heart, listen to my soul

It’s my world, my creation 

 

And here is another:

 

I choose to feel love today

I choose to be peace today

I choose to love full out, live full out

Take a chance and step out

I choose not to play it safe

 

I am so inspired by “My Creation” that I learned the lyrics and believe that one of the best ways to start every day is by listening to the song or singing it to yourself!

 

Here’s the video clip for you to enjoy of Jeneen performing “My Creation” on Alive with Clive:

 

 

Video clips of Jeneen singing “New Book” and “Money Tree,” other superb songs from her CD, My Creation, are also available for you to see on The Alive with Clive TV Channel on YouTube, which you’ll find when click here.

 

You can learn more about Jeneen Terrana and hear a few of her other songs at www.jeneenterrana.com and www.myspace.com/jeneenterrana.

 

Jeneen is currently in 11^th place in The Alive with Clive Top 20.  To vote for Jeneen to move into the top spot in The Alive with Clive Top 20, click here.

 

To see who else is in The Alive with Clive Top 20, click here.

 

Best regards.

Clive

 

(914) 274-8280

 

www.alivewithclive.tv — raising at least a billion dollars for people affected by HIV/AIDS in South Africa!