Then

CINDY SHAPIRO began singing at a very young age (she was fortunate enough to have had stellar teachers, including Elaine Russell, of the Western Wind Ensemble and the Philip Glass Ensemble). She studied Bel Canto singing, and then she took all she knew about proper vocal work and sought to break every single hard and fast rule when she started her rock bands in New York City. To wit: scooping to a note, breathy tones, sounds forced through the nose and manipulated in the mask, grinding the vocal chords together to get split tones. Things like that. She could also, at will, launch back into a fully authentic Bel Canto voice. 

"ART" ROCK It became apparent to her that the human voice is an extremely flexible instrument, and she sought to use it as such in her art rock work. If you listen to her singing with her bands, The Card Game and 2.5D, you can hear just how crazily eclectic her vocal choices are. 

ETHNIC SINGING She also wondered how in the world they do that..? “That” being melismatic singing i.e. the many notes on one syllable that she heard regularly in ethnic singing. It is earthy singing, spiritual singing, athletic and difficult singing. So, being teacherless in this realm, she bought recordings of Koran chant, Ethiopian pop singers, Tibetan monks, Andes throat singers, Pakistani music, classical Indian music, and Bulgarian singing, and did an exhaustive personal study of how they did “that”. On the other end of this study (although it is ongoing), she could sing like them! This was another exciting element that she added to her singing-rule-breaking bag o’ tricks in her band. (Listen to the song “Persia”, for example.)

JEWISH MUSIC & CHAZZANUT One day, Cindy turned 30, and then, even older! Even though she had a development deal with Capitol Records at one point, she was pretty sure that rock stardom was not in her cards. But that was quite all right, as she felt that there would be some other highly appropriate place to situate and nestle her vocal work. And there was. And that was the cantorate. Cindy became the Cantorial Soloist at Wilshire Boulevard Temple for six years, taught music at the elementary day school there, and was on full pulpit rotation, meaning every Friday night, Saturday morning, and Festivals. This was delicious work for her. She became very close to the congregants and her students at Wilshire, loved being with them at crucial and meaningful times in their lives, and felt deeply connected to the ancient liturgy and music of Judaism. She spent some very precious time studying the ancient vocal art of chazzanut with Hazzan Noach Schall, the world authority of such, in New York City. Since then she has performed concerts of chazzanut at universities, singing, and lecturing on, the beauty and history of this dying art form. 

SOUNDTRACK WORK During her years as a singer, Cindy has been called upon to sing and collaborate on video game and documentary film sound tracks. She loves being in the studio working hand-in-glove with composers. 

SOLOING WITH SYMPHONIES Cindy was privileged to tour as a soloist with Video Games Live, and has sung all over the world with the greatest symphonies in the greatest performance venues. She is VERY lucky.