The Internet is rapidly changing our reality and how we experience life. As media changes from print to technology, the same is happening with music. We’re seeing a much more innovative approach with the introduction of a whole new music model emerging and local recording artist Cyra Morgan is enjoying the ride.
Originally from Rhode Island, Morgan has spent the past eight years performing in both New York and New England. A featured artist on SoundCloud, an Internet venue for independent artists with over 5 million users, Morgan has had over 70,000 plays in the last six months.
“I would post a track and positive comments would fill up so fast there was no room for anyone to leave more comments," Morgan said. "I was contacted by artists around the world wanting to collaborate and play my music.”
Described by a fan as, ”A true and natural genius, talent to die for, angelic, heavenly, prolific, hauntingly beautiful and brilliant”, one doesn’t need to throw a stone too far to locate a Cyra Morgan fan.
Morgan knew at a very early age she wanted to be singer/songwriter and as the daughter of a music man was offered encouragement and inspiration.
”When I was four or five my dad played guitar and banjo in bands,” Morgan recalled. “He often propped me up in front of the microphone and had me sing John Denver’s Country Roads for the crowd and that’s when I knew what I was meant to do. I fell in love with singing then.”
Morgan attended Catholic school and after a taste of performing with her father, offered to sing for every event and there was so much singing to be done—choirs, talent shows and family gatherings—she did it all followed by attending the University of Rhode Island and then going off to New York to pursue music and acting.
“Coming from a small town, moving into the city was an awakening, it was amazing and it’s where I found myself,” Morgan said.
Playing weekly on the Upper West Side while putting the hours in bartending, serving Edward Norton and working with Elizabeth Banks and Jennifer Garner, also subsisting on restaurant work in pursuit of a dream, Morgan could sing but was limited without playing guitar and after relocating part-time to Stonington, decided to learn and give herself one big push toward her dream.
“I wanted more nature in my life and for me it’s about the balance—I need the city but I need a place to be that has some serenity and calm and this is it,” Morgan said. “The thing about this town was the charm and the water. I remember coming into Mystic as a child so on a whim I drove into Mystic as an adult and I decided this is it—this is where I’d like to be.”
Morgan is collaborating with artists on upcoming releases in the United Kingdom, heard on radio stations in Luxembourg and Brazil and is currently working on an independently produced album, using the new music model, which is allowing her to circumvent cultural and geographical divides.
“Creating music online and having a platform like SoundCloud reinforces the fact that music is a universal language and it’s giving me the ability to be heard all over the world without being dependent on a label or fitting into a box,” Morgan said.
In the meantime, Morgan continues picking up momentum, making her magic and according to comments by many of her SoundCloud fans, is expected to become a household name in the very near future.
