Born in Egypt, raised in Montreal and fluent in five languages, Chantal Chamandy is a pop singer born and bred to cross borders, ignore boundaries and fuse the accessible with the exotic. Her new studio album, Beladi, and her historic DVD Beladi: A Night at the Pyramids showcase a lavish, romantic, entertaining and inclusive musical vision that bridges gaps and brings musical cultures together with love and celebration.
When many in the West are curious and apprehensive of Middle Eastern culture and society, Chantal—who recently received the Excellence in the Arts award from the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee—refuses to surrender to fears, stereotypes or negative portrayals. Instead, her music is a refreshing reminder that at its best, music has the power to bridge our differences and inspire listeners the world over. Chantal writes and performs a vibrant style of alluring, danceable pop music that has been a hit on dance floors and pop charts internationally, with a stylish approach that celebrates our commonality, not our differences. Said Great Britain's Evening Standard, “Chantal mixes East and West to emerge as a strutting talent who exudes both breathy sensuality and vocal control worthy of Celine Dion.”
Chantal was born in the port city of Alexandria, Egypt to parents of Egyptian, Lebanese and Greek descent. She moved to Montreal as a child, and learned French as her first language. (English, Italian, Arabic and Spanish would follow; she sings in all of those languages, and more.) Her parents were both musical—her father played piano and her mother sang in church—and at home her family listened to what she says was “a little bit of everything”: French music, Arabic music, North American pop music… At a young age, she was singled out after performing in a talent show—and in addition to her vocal training with noted voice instructor Carmen Mehta, she studied extensively in musical theater, stage and film acting, choreography, and many styles of dancing. By the age of fifteen, she was also writing her own music.
Chantal enjoyed brief success in a pop group in Canada, at one point receiving a Juno Award nomination. But straightforward pop music wasn't her true passion, which was to spice cosmopolitan beats with more exotic touches drawn from the music of her ancestral roots. Her sound first came to fruition when she recorded the 2006 single “You Want Me,” a Top 5 fixture on the U.K. dance charts that was certified platinum in Canada and attained “breakout” status on Billboard magazine's U.S. dance charts.
After the success of “You Want Me,” which included remixes from top international producers and DJs like the Grammy-winning Brian Rawling (Cher's “Believe”) and influential Latin club DJ Norty Cotto (Ricky Martin), Chantal set her sights on a historic achievement. On September 7, 2007, she became the first person ever granted permission by the Egyptian Ministry to perform and film a concert at the base of the Pyramids on the Giza Plateau in Egypt. The evening, documented on the 90-minute DVD Beladi: A Night at the Pyramids, found Chantal performing for a crowd of 5,000, backed by the Cairo Symphony Orchestra. Her dancers included Canadians, traditional Egyptian “tanoura” dancers, and Ahmed Nabil, the principal dancer of the Cairo Opera House Ballet Company. Her collaborators for the show also included some of the top names in cutting-edge theater and musical entertainment: director Gerard Pullicino is responsible for shows by Beyonce, Celine Dion and Madonna, among others, while choreographer Genevieve Dorion-Coupal and set designer Guy St-Amour are veterans of Cirque du Soleil. (Dorion-Coupal choreographed the company's Grammy-winning Beatles show Love, currently a sensation in Las Vegas.)
The concert is being broadcast on PBS stations nationwide beginning in March, 2008; the DVD contains additional footage not included on the PBS broadcast, including a feature-length documentary, “The Journey,” with behind-the-scenes footage that follows the creation and staging of this extraordinary event.
Chantal's studio album Beladi is a companion piece to the DVD, with studio recordings of most of the songs she performed at the Pyramids. She wrote most of the songs herself, often collaborating with the noted Indian musician Subir Dev. Driving and danceable one moment, sensuous and alluring the next, her music speaks with passion and intelligence of an artistic vision that recognizes no boundaries as it draws from all of Chantal's experiences and influences.
“If I could take a little bit of every country, put it in a salad bowl and mix it up, that would be my sound,” she says. Chantal Chamandy's music is a vibrant brand of pop that draws inspiration from every step of her wide-ranging and varied journey in life.
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