Ashley Maher’s “Brand New” connects in new ways

Over the course of seven albums Ashley Maher has carved out a unique presence, with a remarkable voice that soars and dips as easily as a breeze. Her self-penned songs are as lyrically complex as they are musically; balancing sharply-observed folkish narratives with complex Senegalese rhythms.

Her music spans American and African culture and continents, but with the arrival of COVID-19, she was forced to pivot in unexpected ways.  “Last April I was scheduled to be doing some shows in Dakar … in preparation for an upcoming tour of Morocco with the Senegalese musicians I have been recording and performing with there.” However, Covid canceled everything. At home watching live streams, seemingly sidelined by the quarantine, it occurred to her that COVID is connecting us in new ways, and she decided to write a song about that.

“At the time, I thought, ‘OK, how to keep moving forward?’ The pandemic was bringing the world closer together, with everyone sharing the common experience of this threat, the isolation, the fear… AND the opportunity to reflect on how we have been living so mindlessly. What habits would we change when the ‘Brand New’ chapter opened up again? How could I write a song that was positive, rather than a doomsday anthem?”

The COVID nightmare that transformed how we live was particularly hard on artists, but also opened up possibilities that Ashley took in stride, beginning with “Brand New”.

She reached out to Lornoar, one of Cameroon’s leading vocalists (“Moment in the Sun”, "Façon Là”). They met at the MAPAS Festival in Tenerife in 2019. Another song, a cover of the Pape Djiby BA & Star Band de Dakar’s “Cheri Coco” caught her ear and she invited the young singer, Amira Abed, to the project. Together the trio weaves a vocal tapestry on the video, backed by Ashley’s Senegal-based band. The video’s frames echo the transatlantic, multinational production, cutting from Cameroon to Senegal to Southern California.

“ I wrote the song and sent a demo, one by one, to the musicians in Dakar: (Ibou Mbaye -Keys, Thierno Sarr - bass, Amady Sidibe - guitar, and Ibou Calebasse - calabash) and they recorded at their houses and sent their tracks to me. I sent a rough mix to Lornoar and Amira with their parts, and money to pay the studios to record themselves. Once I had gathered everything together, I sent all the tracks to Papis Konate in Dakar, who mixed the final version.”

“Brand New” opened endless possibilities. Virtual sessions improvised with artists from around the world followed during the past year under quarantine. While it was an unexpected development, it is one she was well prepared for.

Montreal-born and California-raised, Ashley was drawn to African music at a young age, particularly after living in London at a time when legendary artists from the continent on stage were almost a nightly experience.

She has recorded several albums in Senegal and performed with Youssou N’Dour among others. At home in Los Angeles, she has performed vocal improvisation for ten years with the LA-based vocal improvisation group Fish to Birds. All this prepared her for this project, freeing her up to push aside all preconceived structure and create in the moment. These improvised, haiku-like flashes of brilliance,  created by pinballing music back and forth with artists around the globe, are grounded in her real-life experience. 

New works include a collab, “Nenam”, with Leergui Acoustic (a wonderful duo from Dakar), a duet with Brazilian guitarist Andre Hosoi. Senegalese bassist Etu Dieng sent her a groove to vocalize over, she wrote lyrics and a melody to go with Peace Diouf’s guitar on “Niami,” a Senegalese song and vocal improvisations with Shivaraj Natraj (The Nonnakai BeatBoxer). For now, the collaborations can only be seen on her Facebook page or her Youtube channel, but there’s more to come.