Sandra-Mae Lux was born with a natural ability for musical instruments. She played the piano at age 6, took up saxophone at age 11, and guitar at age 13. By the time she was in high school, this multi-instrumentalist was a seasoned jazz and concert band performer. But in high school Sandra-Mae was bullied and music became her safe place. She says “music and the arts literally saved my life” by allowing her to be her authentic self without judgement. With encouragement from her high school music teacher, Sandra-Mae would see that a career in music was a real possibility.
After graduating high school with honors, Sandra-Mae received a Bachelor of Arts in Jazz Studies on Saxophone with a Minor in Education. She has received numerous awards including Outstanding Achievement in Music for five consecutive years, and the Phil Nimmons Scholarship for Outstanding Achievement in Jazz.
For 2 successive years, Sandra-Mae performed at the Ottawa International Jazz Festival sharing the stage with internationally recognized artists. After playing for a few years in Vancouver with different bands, she broadened her genre scope to pop, R&B, Brazillian, EDM, and 70s Soul and Disco music.
In 2017 she moved to London to write her first album, Happily Ever After. The album reached #14 on the UK Soul Chart, and #11 on the Global Soul Chart upon its release. Sandra-Mae was nominated as Best UK Artist in the 2020 Bright Star Awards. She was also nominated as Jazz Artist of the Year in the Boisdales Music Awards presented by Jools Holland. Sandra-Mae debuted as a producer with her 2022 single, “You Me and Tomorrow”, which reached #1 on the UK Soul Chart Breakers.
Sandra-Mae is a voice actor of note who has appeared in video games, cartoons, and radio ads. She has also performed in audio dramas like Neil Gaiman’s #1 New York Times Bestseller, “Sandman” and played multiple roles in Audible’s “Aliens – Sea of Sorrows”. Additionally, she had a feature role in Collingwood & Co’s multi-award winning film, “Candle Cops”.
The South London artist has a lot of new music planned for this year. She has written singles in the pop genre and is working on a new album.
I recently interviewed Sandra-Mae about her new single, production processes, experiences as a voice actor, collection of masks, why 70s Soul and Disco music are her true loves, and much more.
Congratulations, Sandra-Mae, on your latest single, “The Last Time”. Your vocal is very soothing and sultry, and your lower register is quite captivating. What was your vocal training background?
Thank you for the lovely compliment! I’m actually not trained as a vocalist, it just came naturally to me. My mom said I sang before I spoke, so I guess singing has always just been in my blood.
Your 2022 “You Me and Tomorrow” single was your debut as a producer and made it to #1 on the UK Soul Chart Breakers. How did that make you feel?
I was totally surprised! There are so few female producers out there, so to make it to Number 1 on the UK Soul Chart Breakers was quite an honour – especially as a production debut!
What are the advantages and/or disadvantages of producing your own music?
The advantage is that you have total control of your work, and the disadvantage is that you have total control of your work haha. It can be overwhelming, the choices are endless! It’s nice to be able to tinker with a track that you’ve written, but sometimes you can over-tinker until it becomes something that might not honour the original song. I’ve realised that it’s a good idea to have another set of ears listen to the track to get a different perspective, and to put some distance between you and the track. I find producing someone else’s track is easier than trying to produce one I’ve written myself.
Explain your production process.
After writing the song with my writing partner and getting a very rough demo on voice memos, we’ll record a very stripped-back version of the track on our DAW (digital audio workstation), usually just guitar or piano and voice.
If all the instruments are live, I’ll send that off to our drummer and bass duo in Canada and have them lay down a couple of versions of the groove. Then I’ll send that on to my guitar player (also in Canada) and he’ll lay down his guitar bits. At that point I’ll see if it needs any other live instruments (like organ, strings, keyboards, percussion). If I feel like my keyboard/piano playing isn’t up to snuff, I’ll get in a pro player to do a pass.
After all the live instrument bits are gathered, we’ll load it all into the DAW and start comping all the instruments to get a good balance – making sure that all the instruments can be heard, the vocals are the highlight, and the track doesn’t sound too busy. If I’m producing a track from scratch, I’ll build the song one instrument at a time, usually starting with drums and bass and then filling it out with other instruments and fun tidbits.
When the track is really starting to sound good, then I’ll track the vocals starting with backing vocals first. I find that recording lead vocals last is a really great approach, because the lead vocalist can relax into the song and vibe off the rest of the instruments.
Finally, I’ll get the track mastered by a professional. WARNING – never master your own music! Mastering is a true art form and should only be left to the professionals!
How did you become a seasoned performer in jazz and concert bands by the time you were in high school?
Music called to me from a very early age. Some of my earliest memories are of standing on tables and singing at family gatherings! I started playing piano at age 6, took up saxophone at the age of 11, and guitar at 13.
As a very bullied teenager in high school, music, and the arts literally saved my life. Music for me, especially in high school, was sort of an escape from all that bullying. It was my safe place, my haven, a place where I could express my authentic self, knowing that I wouldn’t be judged or made fun of.
Were it not for encouragement from my extraordinary high school music teacher Jeremy Hepner, I might not be here. He opened my eyes to what a career in music could actually be, that it was even possible. And frankly if Jeremy hadn’t caught me at that time, I probably would have gone into some other career altogether, and been a very very unhappy person. In my last year of high school he said to me, “you don’t pursue music, music pursues you.” He went on to say that you can either do it now while you’re young, or find out that you have to do it later on, when it’s a lot harder!
You’re a multi-instrumentalist, playing piano, saxophone, and guitar but you have a Bachelor of Music in Jazz Studies on Saxophone. Tell us more about why you chose this particular study.
Jazz and soul music has always spoken to me on a deep level, so it just felt right to go to a university that offered a degree in jazz studies. I had the option of going to another university that had a classical music program, but that path didn’t feel right. Although I learned classical music theory, harmony and history in the university I went to, I knew that a degree in jazz was much more suited to me and my instrument.
Take us through your songwriting process.
Songwriting is such a beautiful craft, and my writing partner Alan and I are constantly inspired by the incredible songwriting duos of the Brill Building’s glory days, like Cynthia Weil & Barry Mann, Neil Sedaka and Howard Greenfield, Burt Bacherach and Hal David, Carol King & Gerry Goffin.
Alan and I have been writing for years together, and he’s mostly the lyric side, while I’m more on the music side; however, we both influence each other’s work. Generally I’ll come to Alan with an “emotion dump,” or an idea for a song, and he’ll take notes (kind of like a therapist haha) and then he’ll make sense of it all and create lyrics with those notes.
Alan does a lot of automatic writing too, and sometimes a poem will fall out. Both of us feel that a poem in its original form doesn’t necessarily make good song lyrics. So we’ll edit the poem and transform them into lyrics. Other times a great stray line will just fall out randomly, either from him or myself, and that becomes the basis of a new song. We have tons of stray lines written on post-it notes scattered all over our flat – we’ve got a lot more songs to write!
After we’ve finished finalizing the shape of the lyrics, I’ll then sit at the piano (or guitar) and let the lyrics guide where the melody/harmonies/arrangement/groove wants to go. The song will tell you what it wants to do; all you have to do is get out of its way!
What does it mean to you personally to be an indie music woman artist?
Women make up half the population, and we have a different perspective on the world, and writing and performing music through that female lens is not only powerful but essential.
I feel proud to have a voice and to be able to share my art with the world. Good music has the power to evolve consciousness on a universal level. Good music that is created using songwriting craft, honesty and integrity can help someone feel emotions that they’re afraid to feel, or want to celebrate in feeling. Catharsis through art is deeply powerful, and I hope that people who listen to my music will experience a level of it in the same way I did when writing and recording it.
That being said, never before has it been so challenging to be an indie artist, male or female.
It takes me three “day jobs” in order to pursue music, which makes it almost impossible to find the time to do what I’m meant to do – which is to write, record and perform great music. Without art (cinema, music, visual art, acting, writing, etc) the world would not be worth living in.
How do you think women artists can be better supported in the indie music industry?
Throughout history, women have been horribly exploited, taken advantage of, used and abused in the music industry. Unfortunately, it is still happening to this day. Did you know that only 1% of the top 200 airplay tracks across 2020-21 in the UK were female? And only 13% of UK headliners in 2022 were female? These are appalling statistics.
Women desperately need more support from the industry, including support for more airplay, headlining opportunities, and pay gap equality. This means that festival bookers, radio stations, pluggers, etc, all need to make a conscious effort to include more women into their bookings/playlists/interviews and more.
And if someone who isn’t in the music industry wants to support or make a difference to an independent female artist, the best thing you can do is actually BUY their music. Not stream (we don’t really get paid for that), but actually go to that artist’s website or iTunes or BandCamp and BUY their single/album/merch. Also if an artist has a Patreon page, you can support them by signing up to pay a small amount every month so that the artist can continue to create and release music.
You are a voice actor who has appeared in video games, radio ads, and audio dramas like Neil Gaiman’s “Sandman” that went to #1 on the New York Times Best Seller’s List and Audible’s Aliens – “Sea of Sorrows” in multiple roles. What were the experiences like? What were the challenges of having multiple roles?
Those experiences were incredible, and I felt so lucky to be a part of those incredible productions! To be in the same studio recording with such a huge amount of talent was totally thrilling, and humbling. And Dirk Maggs is an absolute rockstar of a director (literally)!
I think the biggest challenge of being multiple characters is just trying to keep all those different voices in your head. Sometimes you have to do a scene where you’re two different characters, so you’ll have to shift gears really quickly. Sometimes you’ll record the characters separately, but sometimes it’s done all in the same take!
Why did you also become a voice actor? What do you enjoy most about the work?
When I look back at my life, becoming a voice actor was kind of inevitable.
As a kid, my favourite toy was this “My First Sony” recorder, and I would spend hours recording different voices, singing, and tinkering with it. I also did the school announcements in elementary school and high school, so I guess there’s no surprise that I ended up going into voice acting! Anytime I’m behind a microphone, I’m in my happy place.
What I enjoy most about the work is the thrill of looking at a script for the first time, and getting an intuitive feel for how the text “wants” to be spoken, letting the text read you. It’s also really fun to do multiple approaches of the same text and see what comes out!
What is your favorite microphone for performing and/or recording and why?
The best microphone I ever had the pleasure of recording on was a gorgeous vintage Neumann U47. There’s a magic, a sparkle to it that’s just incomparable to anything else I’ve sung on.
Don’t take my word for it, it was Frank Sinatra’s favourite mic at Capitol! I look forward to owning my own soon.
Explain why you describe 70s Soul and Disco music as your true love.
I mean, what’s not to love? I don’t trust anyone who doesn’t love a bit of classic disco! There’s something so, well, soulful about 1970s soul music. There’s an honesty, integrity, and that connection to the divine that runs through it all, especially since a lot of those singers came out of gospel. And personally, I think that to this day, music production never bettered after 1979.
Tell us more about the many feathered masks you have.
Ha! Before releasing the album, I had this dream where I was wearing a Venetian feathered mask, sparkly jumpsuit and holding a disco ball and a large parrot. Well, I made that dream a reality and used it as the basis of the artwork concept for my album! I ended up just collecting a bunch of different Venetian masks to see which would work/look best. And in the photoshoot I actually did have a live parrot named Mikey! The artwork really is something to behold, my friend Fiona MacVicar is an incredible artist, and it looks amazing on vinyl.
What projects do you have planned for this year?
I’ve written and demo-ed a lot of new music with my writing partner, so a few more singles and another album release is definitely on the horizon! These new singles that I’m working on are more on the pop side of things, which is really exciting! It’s a genre I’ve always loved, so it’s great to finally write, record and produce more in this realm. If you’d like to hear my music, check out the merch (including delicious audiophile vinyl!), or just reach out and say hello, feel free to click here: https://linktr.ee/sandramaelux
