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UPDATE!!
Anne was recently chosen as one of two opening acts for Jewel's spring tour. Thanks for everyone's support in getting the vote out!
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Anne Heaton has been lauded by The Boston Globe as “easily [one] of the area’s most notable female singer-songwriters.” Chris Smith, former editor of Performing Songwriter Magazine, wrote “Heaton is one of the finest writers and performers I’ve come across in years.” Heaton sings and plays keyboards, collaborating with longtime musical partner Frank Marotta Jr. on vocals, acoustic and electric guitars. Heaton and Marotta just recently finished up their new album with producer Mike Deneen (Aimee Mann, Guster, Fountains of Wayne, Merrie Amsterberg). The new album, Give In, will be officially released in september 2004.
With Marotta’s new role as songwriting collaborator, their sound has evolved. Heaton says, “working with Frank has allowed me to develop new ways of constructing a song, such as building a song around a bass line or electric guitar part, rather than always writing music based on a piano part.” The songs “Your Heart,” “Wanna Make You Sad,” and “The Line,” all co-written with Marotta, are significantly more upbeat and “more like the rock songs we would want to listen to.”
The two put on an energetic, full-sounding show combining Heaton’s rhythmic and moving keyboard style with Marotta’s aggressive acoustic guitar and lush, clean electric guitar sounds and backing vocals.
Heaton's debut studio album Black Notebook, which charted on CMJ at #139 and has sold over 6,000 copies to date, is a luminous collection, full of the sorts of people who frequent all of our personal circles. "Sweetly nostalgic without being overly sentimental and powerful without being melodramatic” (decontrol.com), Heaton's songs are catchy, with soaring melodies boasting great emotional pull and smart lyrics.
Performing Songwriter Magazine, which chose “Black Notebook” as one of its Top 12 Independent Releases, describes Heaton’s music as “alternately lush, sweet, funny and sorrowful. At times, Heaton almost sounds like Macy Gray. She switches from Midwestern high school girl for “Megan & Kevin” to Tori Amos intensity for “I Want to Fly.”
Her musical influences are varied: Peter Gabriel, Indigo Girls, Sinead O'Connor, 10,000 Maniacs, and the Rolling Stones to name only a few. Through her touring, Heaton has shared the stage with singer-songwriters Melissa Ferrick and Jonatha Brooke, as well as jazz drummer Max Roach. Heaton was recently chosen in a national competition as a finalist to open for Jewel on her Fall 2003 Tour.
Heaton “plays her piano and sings her open-hearted platitudes like a stream in spring thaw, crisp and overflowing” (The Chicago Reader). With her richly textured voice, Heaton has been described as having "an uncanny ability to succinctly and unpretentiously say what she has to say" (Cincinnati CityBeat).
