Baiyu releases her second full length CD Ayahuasca

AAP staff report

NEW YORK (Dec. 4, 2013) — The “eclectic pop and R&B” female vocalist, Baiyu, released her second full length CD on December 1, 2013.

“Ayahuasca” is an independently released project with the Shredded Records label. The production team included Baiyu, Grand Staff, Polo Crew, J.N.I.C.E., Kevin Odom and additional support from KQuick and Junious Sampson.

The Ayahuasca project taught her that people are capable of living out their wildest dreams if they dare to surrender to the experience. She said the result is an experience that she will carry with her always.

The creative process was a journey with many unforeseeable twists and turns, Baiyu said. Each song peels away the delicate layers to the core of who she really is.

“A choice is where the unbinding begins,” Baiyu stated in her production notes. “To make this choice is to unearth the truth—to willingly reverse my center of gravity and shred up every memory of my past. As I grasp on to what little I thought was reality, I am relieved yet frightened. Will I like what I find? Will that even matter? The deeper I go, the more I realize that nothing is as it seems.”

The songs place Baiyu at her most vulnerable and strongest. It is where she is most afraid also where she feels her most beautiful.

The songs are her deepest secrets, and her purest hopes and dreams. She wants her listeners to Love her as the artist who creates, rather than someone who is trying to invent something she thinks will please others.

“I couldn’t make an album about something and not actually experience it for myself, so off I went,” she said. “If trekking down to the jungles of Peru to work with this plant medicine sans companion wasn’t enough of a daredevil move, what frightened me even more was the prospect of having to face my true self as a result. Thankfully what I saw was what I had always felt deep down—that although it took a lot of soul searching and there’s infinite room for growth and learning—I, as I am today, am a proudly loving and passionate human being.”

Baiyu previous CD, “Fanfare”, was released in 2011, and just days prior to the devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan. She offered all the profits from song downloads and sales to support relief efforts.

She released her debut EP, “B-Side” in 2010,

  Born as Sara Baiyu Chen in Xiamen, southeastern China, she recall wonderful memories of a charming city with great food, great shopping and even better scenery. She was living in poverty but it was also a happy childhood with loving parents and a beautiful city.

At age eight her parents moved to Gaithersburg, Maryland, which was more about her future than their happiness and Baiyu said she is eternally grateful to them for their sacrifices.

Baiyu had a traditional upbringing but her music interests were drawn more toward Whitney Houston than to her Chinese folk songs. She said these completely different forms of vocal expression compelled her creativity on a more personal level.

She describes her sound as a fusion of introspective “eclectic pop and R&B” with a sense of international perspective.

She developed spiritual roots and sang with high school choirs in Maryland and at Princeton University. She studied sociology and described herself as a people-person who defines personal success as being able to channel her energy in a positive way. This pursuit was a gateway to human and societal insights, she said.

While in college Baiyu was a permanent video jockey host on MTV’s “The Freshman” which ran from 2002-2008. She held on to the job until she graduated while also pursuing modeling, acting, kickboxing, Chinese dance and ballet.

She enjoys using digital and social media to get her songs out in audio and video. From this exposure she is able to attract live concert performances, independent film work and endorsement contracts She sells her CDs on location and online. www.baiyuonline.com