Tatiana Eva-Marie
Tatiana Eva-Marie Bio
Accruing around 80 million views on YouTube, Tatiana Eva-Marie was acclaimed as a millennial shaking up the jazz scene by magazine Vanity Fair. Though her interests have led her to explore a wide range of musical styles, Tatiana Eva-Marie’s craft is always inspired by her own French and Romanian-Gypsy heritage; a love for the Parisian art scene era spanning the 1920s to the 60s; a passion for traditional Gypsy songs; a fascination for New Orleans music; and a deep connection to the Great American Songbook.
Nicknamed the "Gypsy-jazz Warbler” by the New York Times, Tatiana Eva-Marie is a transatlantic bandleader, singer, author, and actress based in Brooklyn. She is known for singing French popular music derived from the Django tradition with Balkan Gypsy and folk influences.
Born into a family of musicians, painters, and poets, Tatiana Eva-Marie began her career at age four, immersed in the world of show business. Before her twenties, she had already recorded several albums; established herself as an actress on the Paris stage; written and directed two musicals; and was pursuing a Master’s Degree in medieval studies at the Sorbonne University. Completely dedicated to an interdisciplinary approach to artistic creation, she developed a fascination for the Renaissance Man archetype and began to travel the world collaborating with artists of various spheres. She soon chose New York as her home base, where she quickly built her reputation as a singer, and started the Avalon Jazz Band, which became overnight the number one reference for French swing around the world. With her musicians, she performed on some of the most important American stages and became the international ambassador of “1930s Paris”.
Temporarily moving back to Europe during the time she cheekily refers to as “the plague”, Tatiana Eva-Marie was incapable of abandoning herself to a pandemic-induced lethargy: she released four albums; starred as guest singer in various projects; wrote the libretto to “Eden Park”, an opera by Swiss composer and childhood friend Gérard Massini; and started an online arts and culture publication – “Shrine Magazine”. In 2023, she could be admired onscreen in the cinemas of France in Gérome Barry’s first feature film “Swing Rendez-Vous”, loosely based on her New York lifestyle – her first role as a leading lady!
Tatiana Eva-Marie returned to New York with a brand new project celebrating the music of guitarist Django Reinhardt, the inventor of Gypsy Jazz. Instead of focusing on the emblematic style that he created, her upcoming album “Djangology” highlights the music of Django the composer, with her own lyrics in French, English, and Rromanes (the Gypsy language) set to her original arrangements, laying the foundations for a Django songbook.
Music
Djangology ()
“I grew up in the jazz Manouche circles, which are dominated by swarms of guitarists – it’s not always easy to fit in as a singer! Most of the music has no lyrics, and the melodies are often too guitaristique to be sung. The microcosm fascinated me and I too wanted to participate in the Django repertoire… I saw only one option: I had to write my own lyrics, tell my own stories, reinvent his music in my own image.”
Tatiana Eva-Marie’s new project celebrates the music of guitarist Django Reinhardt, the inventor of Gypsy Jazz. Instead of focusing on Django the guitar wizard and the emblematic style of playing that he created, her latest album “Djangology” highlights the music of Django the composer, and asks: “What if Django had composed his music for me to sing? What would that sound like?”
Tatiana had long been enchanted by the world of Gypsy jazz, regularly hanging out at Manouche jam sessions as an adolescent in Paris. “All these young bohemian boys with their toys, impressing each other with their fast licks, trading guitar picks… it was adorable!” But the idea of participating in the Django repertoire only came to her years later on a trip to Paris, when she met violinist Daniel Garlitsky and guitarist Duved Dunayevsky. There was an instant spark of friendship. They started frolicking around town, while playing together extensively, and quickly recorded an album of original music that featured Tatiana’s lyrics. She had always been quite shy about her writing endeavors, and she suddenly felt inspired and confident. “Then I thought… all those Django tunes I’ve loved all my life… why not write some lyrics to that!”
And then the pandemic happened. Tatiana decided to use that suspension in time to imagine what a ‘Django songbook” would look like. She tried to imagine the stories behind the melodies, the moods they conveyed. “Some of the songs I basically left intact, but some others just seemed too eager to become a Bossa, or be slowed down, or dance over new harmonies… I couldn’t ignore their wishes.”
Through lyrics in English, French, Romanian, and Rromanes (the Gypsy language), Tatiana shares – with humor and poetry – impressions of her journey from the dark alleys of the Latin Quarter to the chic New York society salons. “It is not only a tribute to Django Reinhardt, but also a love letter to Paris. Eternal Paris. The crossroads of the world, where misfits of every culture and background sought a fantastical harbor from the too-harsh realities of life. The city of lights and dark alleys, of bohemians and lost boys, a city that has kept on existing despite everyone’s attempt to mythicize it. These songs are like new wave short films – fables, observations, and lessons I’ve learned, it seems, always with the music of Django as my soundtrack.”
