Heather Renee was born February 22, 1978, in Nurenburg, Germany. An Army Brat, she moved around the US and abroad. Her taste in music is as diverse as her travels and she blends her love of all genres ranging from classical and country to rock and hip-hop in a unique music style she can proudly call her own.
As a child she was always drawn to the arts. She dabbled with songwriting in years as early as the age of 7, composing melodies on a 12 key Casio keyboard along with her younger sister Rebecca. Never classically trained, she first learned to play the piano by ear. Her parents, taking note of her continued interest in music, bought her a used upright piano. Heather fondly recalls listening outside of the window as one of her neighbors struggled to play "Fur Elise." She would sit in the grass on the way home from school and listen as her schoolmate practiced the song, stumbling over missed notes for hours. Heather would eagerly rush home to practice, sounding out the chords on her out of tune upright until she finally worked out the basic structure of the song herself. Using the same chords, she began to write instrumental pieces on the piano. Her budding fervor for music was short-lived when her beloved piano was trashed after her parents realized it was infested with termites. Never the less, she kept listening outside the window of her neighbor's weekly practice sessions. But, as the years slowly passed, her interest and songwriting endeavors faded with them. Moving from place to place she could never keep up with piano classes, forced to quit as soon as she got started and as a result, never really mastered the instrument. It wasn't until her Junior year of high school that music unexpectedly re-entered her life. She had befriended a foreign exchange student from Spain named Noah Martin. Noah was an accomplished guitarist and Heather enrolled in Noah's advanced guitar class just for fun. Using a child sized guitar her Father had purchased in a thrift store during his College years, she practiced open chords and rhythms just enough to pass the class. Intimidated by the skill of the other students she never really took her playing seriously and forgot the guitar soon after the class ended. But as luck would have it, music would not let her go. In her first year of college at the University of Central Florida she was studying marketing and met a boy who played guitar in one of her business classes. They began to date and he encouraged her to play again. Luckily she had kept the little Holiday guitar, using it as a wall decoration, in her off campus Apartment. With love on the line, she began to take her playing more seriously. Sadly, their fledgling relationship came to an end and in her angst she began to write songs about her heartbreak. She fondly remembers calling her sister and singing her new songs over the phone as she read from crumpled handwritten pages sprawled at her feet. Soon after her heartbreak she decided to drop out of school and move back home with her parents in Washington, DC to be near family again and re-evaluate her future.
Now 20 she was a little lost and not sure of what to do with herself. With encouragement from her family she began to sing around town at local open mics and artist showcases, writing almost a song a day. The music was in her blood again and this time there was no turning back. Her younger sister soon teamed up with her and the duet called "Ceylon" named after the country where their Mother is from. The two sang all around the Washington, DC metro area, winning awards and earning a comfortable living off of their art. Rebecca soon began writing music as well and they wowed audiences with their diverse and extensive song base. Heather was always a responsible child, a straight A student in school, she never really felt comfortable throwing caution to the wind, so she enrolled in College again. At the George Mason University she selected a major more befitting a musician and studied theater. In college she befriended another fellow entertainer, the founder of thinking hip-hop, Cristopolis, never knowing that she had met her future husband. Though their relationship would take another 6 years to blossom into marriage, Cristopolis became a very supportive friend and sounding board for Heather during her struggle to make it in the music industry. He attended a lot of her performances, bringing along several of his closest friends, one of whom would later marry her sister Rebecca.
Lured by the call of stardom, Heather decided to quit school again and moved to LA with her Sister in tow. The two stopped in Nashville along the way just to check out the scene and unexpectedly fell in love with the city. However, as fate would have it, Rebecca had been bitten by the love bug and decided to leave the duo to get married and start a family. This news was a hard hit to Heather who was not yet prepared to venture out as a solo artist. The Sisters moved back to DC 6 months later to plan for Rebecca's wedding.
Desperate to keep the dream alive, Heather continued to perform at local coffee shops and bars, starting up various bands in search of her new sound. The journey in the end led her right back to the beginning to those first moments on her Casio keyboard where she wrote songs from the heart and expressed her love and gift of song without bias. Now at 28 she has re-emerged as the songwriter she was born to be. Her music speaks of love and life and the incredible journey we all must make toward achieving our destiny.
