by Author Charlie UVG

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Wise Words to Gen 22

The UVG are delighted to be back delivering our weekly group singing sessions to young people in the Portsmouth area and providing opportunities for them to develop both musically and socially in a fun, safe, friendly environment. Last month our 'class of 22' had the opportunity to meet one of the 'class of 2012' when we invited singer/songwriter and UVG alumni Evangeline to our weekly sessions at Havant and Portsmouth to perform a short set for our young singers and take part in a Q & A session

Evangeline began attending UVG at the age of 12 and over the years developed her vocal skills at weekly sessions, gigging regularly with the group and becoming a confident performer. In 2015 she was a featured lead vocalist on the track 'Ghost' for UVG’s first EP and in the same year developed a keen interest in songwriting. With support from UVG music mentors, she developed her skills and recorded and released her first single at the age of 15.  In 2018 again supported by UVG she recorded and released her debut EP ‘Kingdom’ and helped coordinate the EP launch at the Wedgewood Rooms. In September 2019 she began studying for a BA in Commercial Music at Bath Spa University and is due to start studying for her Masters later this year. She is a huge supporter and advocate of the UVG; citing the opportunities that it provided her and continues to provide other young musicians. Evie will also be running a songwriting essentials workshop for the young singers in May giving her the opportunity to pass on her practical skills. 

Who helped you in UVG?

I remember my EP launch, I still considered Amba and Charlie [UVG Founders] my musical parents, but everybody would help everyone. Like Amba would kind of direct and teach the harmony but then like within your groups, you'd be like, am I singing this right? No, it's this Yeah. Like, it's just like a big family

Were you nervous before this performance?

Yeah, I do get nervous and the more intimate, quieter gigs and those with younger audiences like this are a bit more nerve-wracking. I’ve also been way more nervous singing in a restaurant than on a stage that has loads of people watching. Because people are talking, and you are like the background music. Also, it’s hard to gauge the reaction, especially with quieter audiences, I'm sure all of you are like, “oh, this is this is nice” but, I know myself when I watch more intimate gigs, I look really miserable. But in my head, I'm like, Wow, this amazing! So, you're constantly trying to remind yourself that people are enjoying it. But yeah, I get nervous all the time

Did you have any vocal training apart from the UVG?

Not as much as I would like to. I had some singing lessons in school with Kate who now leads Portsmouth [UVG] but UVG is kind of been my singing lessons because when I first came, I think I had a pretty good voice but there was so much to improve, and confidence can really change the way that you actually sound. I also got so much out of making friends and singing with other people. 

What's been the hardest part of the journey?

I don't know like this is the thing. To be honest, UVG has made each stepping stone really easy. You think, like I want to sing, and I want to write a song. But t's so hard to imagine getting from A to B, and B being like, a polished mastered track of your song. And so, how do you even go about doing that if you've never done it before? But in a group like this, you're like,

“Oh, I have this song”

“That's cool… ok we’ll put you with someone who can develop your song together”

“Oh, amazing”

“Ok… now you have a finished song. Let's get you in the studio with a professional engineer”

UVG makes that happen! I sound so like I'm trying to sell something but it's 100% true. Like I'm here because I just got so much out of UVG that I wanted to do everything I can to make other people realise how cool it is.  UVG is such a core memory for me because like I said I would have probably still gone down this path of music without them, but I know I would be nowhere near as confident or passionate without the opportunities that I had because of them

But yeah, I guess if there's one thing that's hard, is it's imagining your song with a band. Like before I had a band, I was like writing songs that I could only ever imagine doing solo. Now obviously, a lot of songs are adaptable, like you can have a full band and you can have different versions of different songs. But some songs I write with a band in mind and there's stuff that I can't necessarily play myself or can’t sing and play at the same time. So, once you kind of realise the possibilities of things and you get experience and network with musicians who help you with different things you think, like wow, this is so much easier, but the hardest bit was thinking it was possible to do.

Who is your musical hero?

My absolute hero is Hayley Williams, lead singer with Paramore, and I have loved her since I was 5. They were like pop punky and then went to sort of more like indie rock and now they're kind of electro pop. But there's something about the lead singer of this band, who I think I relate to her lyrically because the most important part of the message that I'm trying to convey in a song is through the lyrics. A lot of the time, the lyrics will come first, and I’ll put a melody to it, or sometimes it's the other way around but lyrics is something that has to be right for me and I have to really relate to them. I’m also really inspired by Ariana Grande as well, like all of her harmonies and backing vocal arrangements.

Have you ever had stage fright and if you had how do you overcome it?

Portsmouth - Yeah, I have one thing that happens to me a lot. When I get nervous, my mouth gets really dry. Like you'll see, I carry around my bottle of water with me everywhere and at the end of the song I’ll just like, chug it but my mouth will stay dry. The nerves are what really make you feel really tense and it makes it really hard to sing.

How do I overcome that? So that's something I'm still working on, but I think overcoming nerves and stuff is just, try and relax, which is really hard when you’re not relaxed. But often my not being relaxed comes from worrying about different things. So, I tried to just be like “look, it's probably going to be fine and if it's not, don’t worry… stuff goes wrong!”

Like I remember we were doing Portsmouth Southsea Food Festival in 2019 and they'd made a stage out of this truck. I hadn't warmed up because we were in a rush to get there, and I was singing this song which had a big belting note at the end? My voice broke, and I just like yodelled! It was so embarrassing that the sound guy even brought me someone else's water bottle and to make things worse Jerry Williams was in the audience, and she was like a massive inspiration, and still is so I’ve not really sung that song much since. But I think, also just finding stuff funny helps. Things do go wrong but most of the time no one really notices so you should worry about it less. That's another thing… often the audience don't know how your song is supposed to go so, if you do it wrong and if you're fully committed to it and kind of play it off, a lot of times they won't even notice.

Havant - To be honest I was really nervous singing for you all today, which I didn’t expect, but yeah, I think taking pressure off yourself is the way to not be nervous. I know that sounds easy and like it's so much easier to give advice than take your own advice. But the less you think about something, the more fun you have and the less nervous you get so just go with the flow

How many songs have you wrote?

Probably like hundreds but some of them are just a way of getting out some feelings but then never sort of turn into anything, and there’s some that I write and take to my band. When I'm in a really good mood I’ve got songs come out of my ears, but I'd say there's probably around like 30 songs that I’ve written that I play. There’s loads more that are, like, half a song that I haven't finished yet!

What did you do in lockdown?

Funnily enough, lockdown is a time where you'd think so many songs would come up because I was always at home and had the time to do it. But I actually found it really hard to write songs in lockdown because it was quite a scary and unhappy time for a lot of people. I find the mood I'm in dictates really whether or not I’m in the creative zone, so a couple of songs came out but actually in lockdown I tried to cycle to Portsmouth and back every day, but other than that, I think I was just relaxing.

What is your favourite song?

That is so hard as there just so many great songs. I don't know why, but the song that's sticking out to me right now is a song called ‘Walk right Back’ by the Everly Brothers who were like this 60s duo. I think it’s because I was listening to it on the way here and because I'm obsessed with harmonies! I absolutely love them and it’s like one guy takes the higher harmony, and the other guy would take the mezzo or alto. It's just so relaxing to me. If I'm in a bad mood, I'll put this on and no matter what kind of day I've had, this song just made me really happy.

Is there anything that you've done that you were really excited about and that stands out to you?

Yeah, I recently jumped on the Tic Toc trend and posted a video of the first time I ever sang in front of people when I was 12 at UVG Havant. I was singing 'Upside Down' by Paloma Faith which was my go-to karaoke song and I just remember being in that moment and thinking afterwards “okay, it's gonna be fine”. I was pretty confident then, but also, like, the amount I've progressed since is unthinkable and you can only see how far you've come by looking back to where you were.

Like at university, there was a Christmas ball at a venue in Bath called Komedia. It has the same sort of capacity as the Guildhall and the commercial music students do a gig there. At the end, they have like the house band that does covers and stuff and I was like, “Jim (my lecturer) please, please, please let us do that!”. So, he was like, okay, and we played the main stage as the headline act, and we bossed it! The thing is I remember being in my room about 13/14 singing ‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody' by Whitney Houston, like miming to it with earphones in and thinking, I don't know what scenario would mean that I would be singing this to lots of people, but it's just gonna be so great if I ever get to do that. So, at Komedia I was like, we HAVE to do that song and we sang it in front of 700 plus people and while on stage it was like a bucket list tick and ‘child me’ was like, this means everything. It was so cool.

Can you explain where you started and what other influences contributed?

My mum's side of the family are really musical, and my Nan is my biggest hero. She was in a band in the 60s called the Furys, and her photo is actually on the wall in the museum downstairs. it's been such an inspirational photo that I got it tattooed on my arm! So, she was in a band and her dad, my great grandad, was the conductor of the Royal Artillery Band back in the day. My Nan had my mum and my two aunties. My mum used to sing, and one auntie teaches dance at college, and the other lives in America, and does voice acting and directs plays and stuff. So, I always was exposed to music, and I'd go with my mum to rehearsals and stuff like that, so I think I always had it around me. And then, I was just like, you know what? I just love singing and I was in school plays and was like I need to do this and need to keep doing this. At one point, I was going to do a Music B Tech as well as a Maths A Level, to keep my dad happy, because he was like, you have to do something more academic, and I did love maths! But then it was like, a bit too much and I was like, there's nothing stopping me from doing music. So, I did music performance and then because of that, Jake [Evie’s partner and guitarist] actually introduce me to Bath Spa University. I also got into a LIPA which is like Paul McCartney's conservatoire in Liverpool, but out of the two auditions, something just drew me to Bath. I do trust my gut quite a lot and there has definitely been some fork in the road moments. Like I almost went to a different college rather than the one I eventually chose and if I hadn't done that, I never would have met Jake or never would have gone to Bath Uni and it was one of those sort of pivotal moments. But yeah, I was constantly exposed to music and there was just something about it that I couldn’t let go and I'm just really lucky that I've been able to feed that kind of desire.

How did you find the confidence to do what you do?

Again, that was UVG like for sure. I remember in school, I was 12 and my friend was like, come to UVG and I went and I was in my uniform, and it was so nerve-wracking because I didn't get the memo that no one wears school uniform and I was the only and everyone was staring at me and we were doing an Ellie Goulding song and it was like stepping stones to confidence like you just can't dive into something that's incredibly scary. But it was singing, and I couldn't sing solo in front of anyone, but I was singing with people together. And then it was like, oh, I'll just stand slightly closer. Or I'll just sing a bit louder today. And I could hear myself louder above all these people and it was like... that feels okay doing that and then it was like… “do you want to take this songline and do a little solo?”, okay, like a two-second little one-line verse, and that kind of felt comfortable and then... okay, I'll do an open mic, singing one of my favourite songs that I’m comfortable with and then, when you get good reactions, it just becomes more comfortable

You shouldn’t do something that terrifies you because that will just like put you off straight away but even the tiniest bit of progress is progress. Like if you can't write one day, that doesn't mean you've failed and can't write songs. You might have written an intro, which then another day, you might be able to add a bit more to it. The way you get from A to B is literally just one step at a time so just do little things that don't seem scary and then suddenly you'll be like “Wow, I can't believe I was over there a minute ago”

You can listen to Evangeline on Spotify and Apple Music