BARBARA has studied piano since she was a child. At the precocious age of ten she won a scholarship to the prestigious Juilliard School of Music where she graduated from the college division as a composer and pianist. She has worked with some of the top names in the industry, ranging from Quincy Jones, Martin Scorcese, & Michael Jackson (in the production of the "Bad" video) to Eric Clapton, Carly Simon and George Duke, and doing musical arrangements for the Saturday Night Live Band. She has performed with Bruce Willis, singing back up with his blues band, The Accelerators. In 1996 she was honored by being chosen as the music director for the annual Christmas play in Puttaparthi, India for Spiritual leader, Sathya Sai Baba. In the 80's she had a hit record "It's Allrite" put out by WEA International in Holland which became #17 on the Billboard europe pop charts. Next year had another hit in France called "I Don't Wanna be a Zombie" put out by Musidisc label, France. It became #2 on dan

Barbara Markay Bio

BARBARA MARKAY

SHAMBHALA DANCE went to #3 on the national NEW AGE REPORTER charts. The seven songs – ranging in length from seven to nine-and-a-half-minutes – were written, arranged and produced by Markay, who also plays keyboards and sings on the three vocal tracks. She is joined by Alberto de Almar (Alicia Keys, Keiko Matsui, Doug Cameron) on flamenco and electric guitars, Eric Gorfain (Grant Lee Phillips, Lisa Lynne, Lowen & Navarro) on violin, Tim May (Stan Getz, Les McCann, Michael Feinstein, Lionel Ritchie, Sarah Brightman) on electric guitar, Joseph Lecuona (Jon Anderson, Judy Collins) on vocals, among others.

Markay graduated from prestigious Juilliard College, had salsa dance hits in Europe, wrote and performed a musical comedy revue in Miami Beach and New York City, sang backup with Bruce Willis and his blues band, wrote arrangements for the Saturday Night Live Band, did synthesizer programming on a Carly Simon album and the Michael Jackson “Bad” video, and composed music for India’s revered spiritual teacher Sathya Sai Baba.

Markay’s albums are available at the leading online retail stores such as www.amazon.com and www.cdbaby.com.

Barbara was born and raised on Long Island, New York, in Rockville Center. She began taking piano lessons when she was four. When she was ten, she auditioned and was awarded a scholarship to attend the Juilliard School of Music’s Preparatory Division. The following year she also began attending the Manhattan School of Music to study violin. For three summers as a teenager she won scholarships to the Chatauqua Institute for the Arts in upstate New York.
At 17, Barbara spent the summer touring southern Italy as a violinist with the American Festival Orchestra and playing piano with their chamber music group.

Markay went on to attend the College Division of Juilliard where she graduated with a Bachelor of Music degree in composition.

Markay began recording original pop music with salsa-dance influences. WEA International in europe released the single “It’s Alright” which went to #17 on Billboard magazine’s European pop charts (the song also was released in Asia and South America). The next year she had another hit in France on the Musicdisc label with “I Don’t Want To Be A Zombie” which went to #2 on the French dance charts .

Barbara worked as an assistant to Leon Pendarvis (a well-known arranger for acts such as Eric Clapton, Whitney Houston and George Duke) which included programming synthesizers and other studio productio work. Markay did synth programming on the Michael Jackson "Bad" video produced by Martin Scorcese, as well as on Carly Simon’s COMING AROUND AGAIN album.

She performed with Bruce Willis, singing backup with his blues group The Accelerators. She also wrote, recorded and released her second album, the world-pop-Latin-jazz HEART LIKE A SONG. The album continued to explore spiritual themes with songs such as “All Is One.” In
addition, Barbara co-wrote, co-produced and performed on the recording CANCIONES ROMANTICAS by Joseph Lecuona, part of a legendary Cuban musical family (his mother Margarita Lecuona, whom Joseph performed with, was a famous singer-songwriter who wrote the Desi Arnaz tune “Babalu;” and his great uncle Ernesto Lecuona composed the classic “Malaguena”). For two years Markay was invited to sing “The Great Invocation” at a gathering at Mount Shasta celebrating the Tibetan Wesak Festival after she put this new age prayer to music and recorded it as a single.

In the past few years Barbara has been influenced more and more by world music artists including Jai Uttal, Sheila Chandra, Chebi Sabbah, Buena Vista Social Club, Coyote Oldman, Caetano Veloso, Natacha Atlas, Angelique Kidjo, and Irakere.

My Thing Music: 310-575-9829
www.mythingmusic.com
barbaramarkay@hotmail.com