Everything about Suzanne Vega totally explained
Suzanne Nadine Vega, born
11 July 1959 in
Santa Monica,
California) is an
American songwriter and
singer known for her highly literate
lyrics and eclectic
folk-inspired
music. Record companies saw little prospect of commercial success in the beginning; Vega's demo tape was rejected by every major record company—twice by A&M. In 1984 she was finally signed by A&M, and she's now a Grammy nominated artist. Two songs of Vega's (from her second album –
Solitude Standing 1987) that were very popular are
Luka and
Tom's Diner, which has been interpolated into many recordings by various artists.
Biography
Vega's mother, Pat Vega, is a computer
systems analyst of German-Swedish heritage. Her father, Richard Peck, is of Scottish-English-Irish extraction and works in graphics. Her stepfather,
Ed Vega, is a writer and teacher from
Puerto Rico.
When Vega was two and a half, the family moved to
New York City. She grew up in
Spanish Harlem and the
Upper West Side. At the age of nine she began to write
poems; she wrote her first song at age fourteen. Later she attended New York's prestigious
High School of Performing Arts, now on Amsterdam Avenue between 65th & 66th Street in
Manhattan. (This school was seen in the
film musical Fame). There she studied
modern dance and graduated in 1977.
While majoring in
English literature at
Barnard College, she performed in small venues in
Greenwich Village, where she was a regular contributor to
Jack Hardy's Monday night songwriters group at the
Cornelia Street Cafe. In 1984, she received a major
label recording contract.
Vega's debut
album,
Suzanne Vega, was released in 1985 and was well received by
critics in the
U.S.; it reached
platinum status in the
United Kingdom.
Produced by
Lenny Kaye, Steve Addabbo and
Steven Miller, the
songs feature Vega's
acoustic guitar in straightforward
arrangements. Vega's
writing often featured
vignettes of characters and even inanimate objects, such as in
Small Blue Thing. A
video was released for the album's song
Marlene on the Wall, which went into
MTV and
VH1's rotations. During this period Vega also wrote lyrics for two songs on
Songs from Liquid Days by composer
Philip Glass.
Her next effort,
Solitude Standing (1987), garnered critical and commercial success including two hit
singles:
Tom's Diner, and
Luka, which was an international success.
Luka is written about, and from the point of view, of a battered child—at the time an uncommon subject for a
pop hit. While continuing a focus on Vega's acoustic guitar, the music is more strongly pop-oriented and features fuller, more sensual arrangements. The
a cappella Tom's Diner was later a hit again,
remixed by two
British dance producers under the name
DNA, in 1991. The
hip hop music duo Felt have a song titled
Suzanne Vega on their first album; the song references both
Tom's Diner and
Luka.
Tom's Diner
Vega's song
Tom's Diner was used as the reference track in an early trial of the
MP3 compression system (earning her the distinction of being "The Mother of the MP3").
Tom's Diner takes place in Tom's Restaurant at 112th Street and Broadway in New York City. Exterior shots of the same restaurant appear in the television
sitcom Seinfeld as the eatery where Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer hang out.
On
11 February 2006, Vega married Paul Mills, a
lawyer and a
poet. They originally met each other at Folk City on
West 4th Street in 1981. In their own words, Mr. Mills proposed to Miss Vega in
May 1983, and she accepted his proposal on Christmas Day 2005.
On
3 August 2006, Vega became the first major recording
artist to perform live in the Internet-based virtual world,
Second Life. The event was hosted by
John Hockenberry of public radio's
The Infinite Mind
.
On
17 September 2006, she performed in
Central Park, as part of a benefit concert for The
Save Darfur Coalition. During the concert she highlighted her support for
Amnesty International, of which she's been a member for nearly a decade.
In early
October 2006 Vega took part in the Academia Film Olomouc (AFO) in
Olomouc, the
Czech Republic, the oldest festival of documentary films in Europe, in which she appeared as a main guest. She was invited there as the subject of the documentary film by director
Christopher Seufert, that had a test screening at the festival. At the end of the festival she performed her classical songs, and added one brand new piece called
New York Is a Woman.
Vega is also one of the interviewed persons in the book
Everything Is Just a Bet which was published in Czech in October 2006. The book contains twelve interview transcriptions from the talk show called
Stage Talks that regularly runs in the Svandovo Theatre in
Prague. Vega introduced the book to the audience of the Svandovo Theatre, and together with some other Czech celebrities gave a signing session.
She signed with
Blue Note Records in the spring of 2006, and released
Beauty & Crime on
17 July 2007. The album was produced by Jimmy Hogarth, which won a Grammy for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical.
In 2007, Suzanne Vega, following the lead of numerous other mainstream artists released her track
Pornographer's Dream as
podsafe. The song spent two weeks at #1 during 2007 and finished as the #11 hit of the year on the
PMC Top10's annual countdown.
Discography
Studio Albums
Compilations
, 1998 - UK #46, AUS #96, GER #58
, 2003 - UK #27
Singles
Marlene On The Wall, 1985 - UK #83
Small Blue Thing, 1985 - UK #66
Knight Moves, 1985
Marlene On The Wall second release, 1986 - UK #21, AUS #39, Ireland #9
Left Of Center, 1986 - UK #32, AUS #35
Gypsy, 1986 - UK #77
Luka, 1987 - UK #23, US #3, AT #9, AUS #21, FR #24, SWE #2, NZ #8, Ireland #11, Canada #5
Tom's Diner, 1987 - UK #58
Solitude Standing, 1987 - UK #79, US #94, AUS #91, NZ #45
Book Of Dreams, 1990 - UK #66
Tired of Sleeping, 1990
Men in a War, 1990
Tom's Diner (DNA remix), 1990 - UK #2, US #5, AT #1, AUS #8, FR #16, GER #1, SWI #1, NZ #8, Austria #1, Ireland #2
Rusted Pipe (DNA remix), promotional, 1991
In Liverpool, 1992 - UK #52
99.9F°, 1992 - UK #46
Blood Makes Noise, 1992 - UK #60, AUS #61, NZ #42, Canada #27
When Heroes Go Down, 1993 - UK #58
Caramel, 1996
No Cheap Thrill, 1996 - UK #40
Birth-day, promotional, 1997
World before Columbus, 1997
Headshots, promotional, 1997
Book & a Cover, 1998
Rosemary / Remember me, 1999
Widow's Walk, promotional, 2001
Last Year's Troubles, promotional, 2001
Penitent, promotional, 2001
(I'll Never Be) Your Maggie May, promotional, 2002
Frank & Ava, promotional, 2007
Ludlow Street, promotional, 2007
Unbound, promotional, 2007
Pornographer's Dream, podsafe, 2007 - PMC #1
Compilation Albums
Stay Awake: Various Interpretations of Music from Vintage Disney Films, 1988 (one of Various Artists), performs the title trackFurther Information
Get more info on 'Suzanne Vega'.
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