Music: - Vocal or instrumental sounds combined in such a way as to produce beauty of form, harmony, and expression of emotion.

  • Christiana Drapkin
  • Christiana Music Samples

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Jazz vocalist Christiana Drapkin has been performing in New York and on the East Coast for over twenty years. She now makes her home in the Washington, DC area, but keeps coming back for gigs in the Big Apple. She is noted for her lyrical and highly personal delivery of ballads and for her abandoned yet artful scat improvisations. Christiana's singing is deeply immersed in the rich traditions of Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald and Carmen McRae, as well as in the vocalese fireworks of Anita O'Day, Annie Ross and Eddie Jefferson. With her focus on Jazz Standards, she highlights improvisation and harmonic development, carrying on and developing the tradition of Bebop and musicians like Charlie Parker, Lester Young, Thelonious Monk, Lennie Tristano and Dizzy Gillespie.

Christiana came to the US as a Fulbright exchange student from Germany, studying in New Orleans where she got her first immediate exposure to Jazz. Moving to New York provided her with her ideal artistic home, where she became part of a vibrant local jazz scene. She studied jazz with pianist Charles Sibirsky and vocal coach Barbara Feller. Christiana has drawn a lot of inspiration and support from workshops with Sheila Jordan, Mark Murphy, and, more recently, Tierney Sutton.

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