Wendy Colonna

In 1997, at the age of 19, Colonna began recording her debut CD, “Girls of Stone” with TP Records in Lake Charles, Louisiana. Many of the songs for this album were composed while playing in a duo around Louisiana, Texas, and Arkansas alongside another gifted young singer/songwriter, Hannah Vincent. The two were attending a small liberal arts college in Natchitoches, LA where they were discovered playing a jazz festival and were invited to record a live CD with TP Records. Immediately after the live show, TP Records executive Perry Sanders was so impressed by the girls’ performance that he offered them a recording contract. Colonna and Vincent created separate CD’s, but performed on one another’s projects. After recording half of “Girls of Stone,” Colonna moved to the Netherlands and spent the next year in school, traveling Europe and South Africa, and making frequent trips to the US to complete the album. “Girls of Stone” was completed and released in 2000.

Her second release, “Red,” delivers a raw and direct expression of Colonna’s re-association with southern American folk culture. Where “Girls of Stone” has a more urban tone, “Red’s” tone is bright and clear, deep and raspy, and definitely delivers a more rural character. The independently produced CD delivers a refreshing, authentic sound. Colonna’s voice cracks and soars atop the tracks, creating a haunting, resonant intimacy in every song. The songs on “Red” travel from lamentations of living in and leaving a spoiled industry town (“Dirty Wife”, “Sodom”) to gentle, spunky, longing love songs (“Coffee Today”, “Brad’s Song”, “Gypsy”) to introspective and raw desperation (“We All Die Alone”, “Judas”, “Something New”). Overall, “Red” creates a rejuvenating space in which Colonna’s melodic and lyrical gifts are well accented, natural and refreshing.