Amanzimtoti songstress Alaska Hilton continues to shine as she climbs the ladder to success.
In September Alaska performed as a solo vocalist at the Hilton Arts Festival in Pietermaritzburg.
“It was a wonderful experience. I performed two sets of five songs from different genres. In my jazz performance, people started dancing in the middle of the venue, so I guess they enjoyed it,” said the talented grade 8 Amanzimtoti High School pupil.
Last month the 14-year-old released her demo EP ‘Good Girl’, a five track CD, which resulted in several offers of representation from production companies.
“The five numbers on the demo CD are all cover versions of some of my favourite songs.
I selected them based on the emotions of each song and how they could showcase my versatility in terms of my contemporary, country, Broadway and world style vocal capabilities.
My vocal coach Rosa De Castro Doran of Vocal Vibes assisted me with the song choices and what to add to the demo CD.”
Listen to Alaska perform a cover version of Birdy’s song ‘Skinny Love’.
Alaska’s demo was recorded at MonkeyShine Studios in Howick with Rosa and Don Clarke. Don has created and produced music for most Leon Schuster movies, as well as Sanbonani for PJ Powers.
“He was also a winner of The Great American Song Contest in 2014, so to work with him was an awesome experience.
The five songs will soon be posted on my website www.alaskahilton.com and on social media platforms such as Soundcloud.”
Living up to her reputation as a go-getter, Alaska then took part in the South African Talent Championships (SATCH) at the Hatfield Christian Church complex in Pretoria between 2 and 6 October.
The young superstar achieved six gold medals for her six solo vocal entries in the country, gospel, contemporary, jazz, singer/songwriter and Broadway genres.
“The standard of the talent at SATCH in the 14 to 16-years-old group was very high and the group was also the biggest of all categories, so I wasn’t sure how my results were going to go. I was over the moon with my six gold medals. Considering I competed in the biggest vocal group of the championship, I achieved my objective of a clean sweep.
I then found out I had made the Actors, Models and Talent for Christ team to go to Orlando in Florida, USA in the near future. That was the cherry and icing on top of the cake.”
Alaska’s next project is her debut original album, which she hopes to have completed and ready for release mid-2017.
“I have written the lyrics to 12 songs and have music scores for three of them. We will release the album on completion of the other nine.
We hope to release it with 12 original songs, however we may add one or two cover versions as well.
We are in discussions with several production companies at the moment who are interested in representing me.
I write all my own lyrics and often have a melody going around in my head. I then sit at my keyboard and start with the basic tune before furthering the song in the recording studio.
I also get assistance in terms of the melodies from my vocal coach Rosa, as well as Chanel, Caitlin and Dumi at Glee Academy.”
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