Sara Bareilles

Early life

Sara Beth Bareilles was born on December 7, 1979, in Eureka, California. Her father, Paul Bareilles, is an insurance adjuster, and her mother, Bonnie Jean (née Capellas), is a funeral home worker. Bareilles is the youngest of three daughters; she also has a younger half-sister. Bonnie has Portuguese ancestry through her father and maternal grandmother. Her maternal grandfather had German ancestry through his maternal grandfather. Paul has Swiss-Italian ancestry through his mother, Italian ancestry through his paternal grandmother, and French ancestry through his paternal grandfather. Bareilles speaks some Italian and lived in Bologna for a year during college. Bareilles's parents divorced when she was 12 years old, and Bonnie later married...

2002–2006: Career beginnings and Careful Confessions

After graduating from UCLA in 2002, Bareilles immediately wanted to pursue a career in the music industry, and started to perform at local bars and venues. She released two demos in 2003: The First One in April, and The Summer Sessions in October.

Musical style and influences

In Sounds Like Me, Bareilles tells of the conflicting feedback she received on her way to winning a recording contract. Some prospective labels gave her the feedback that her voice was great, but she needed better songs; others told her that the songs were great, but her singing wasn't up to par. This experience was portrayed in the series Little Voice.

Gonna Get Over You

"Gonna Get Over You" is a song written and recorded by American singer Sara Bareilles. It was released as the third and final single from her second studio album Kaleidoscope Heart (2010).

On September 20, a new version featuring Ryan Tedder was released exclusively on iTunes. Lyrically, the song speaks about getting over an ex-lover and is a "doo-wop pop song." It received a positive reception from most music critics, who noted it as one of the album's highlights and a "harmony post-breakup track." A music video, directed by actor Jonah Hill, was released on September 20, 2010.

Background and reception

"Gonna Get Over You" was written by Bareilles and Sam Farrar, who is the bass guitar player for rock band Phantom Planet. Bareilles recorded a new version featuring additional vocals from OneRepublic's Ryan Tedder. The new version was released as a single on September 20, 2011 exclusively on iTunes. Jon Pareles wrote for The New York Times that "the "post-breakup ballad" is a "finger-snapping, modernized doo-wop concoction" and has "swooping harmonized lines, nonsense-syllable backups, antiphonal choirs and a chorus that revolves around a nugget of self-reliance: 'I’ll be all right, just not tonight/But someday'." Jim Farber of New York Daily News perceived that the track "strikes a marching beat, making a heartbreak song sound like a...

Music video

A music video for the song was released on September 20, 2011 and was directed by comedian Jonah Hill. Driving up to a Latino supermarket, Sara sports a pompadour and a rad jacket, bent upon converting daily shoppers into a gang of leather-clad dancers.

Background

Bareilles told AOL Music that the clip is, "a mash-up of Grease meets West Side Story meets a little market in East LA." She added: "Jonah and I both wanted it to be a combination of fantasy and reality. Silly, over the top moments that are anchored with authenticity."

Reception

MTV Buzzworthly Blog's Jenna Hally Rubenstein praised the video, writing that "Sara is rocking out HARD on the dance front and unsurprisingly, girlfriend can move." Hally also said that "her dance moves are amazing."

Kaleidoscope Heart

Kaleidoscope Heart is the third studio album by American singer-songwriter Sara Bareilles, which was released on September 7, 2010, through Epic Records. The lead single from the album, "King of Anything", was released digitally on May 10, 2010.

Background

Bareilles stated on her website the reason behind the album's title, "I picked out the name of the record months before I even finished writing the songs. I love the imagery of those words, and they’re really representative of how I envision my heart. It's a colorful but fragmented, ever-changing sum of all the bits and pieces that make it up. A kaleidoscope is the tool that helps make sense of the mess. Or at least makes it nice to look at."

Critical reception

Kaleidoscope Heart received a 68% on Metacritic, resulting from generally favorable reviews. Stephen Thomas Erlewine from AllMusic rated the album with 4 stars out of 5 and has claimed positively that "Despite lushly detailed arrangements, Bareilles never pushes this distinctly commercial gift too hard, letting the songs flow easily and this gentleness is almost as appealing as those classically constructed melodies, tunes so softly insistent they could conceivably appear on adult contemporary charts anytime from 1971 to 2010". Jon Pareles from The New York Times was also positive regarding the album, saying that "When Ms. Bareilles goes for more straightforward tugs on the heartstrings, she often sounds like Sarah McLachlan's gifted...

King of Anything

"King of Anything" is a song written and recorded by American singer Sara Bareilles. The song was produced by Neal Avron, and served as the first single from her third studio album, Kaleidoscope Heart (2010).

The song was nominated at the 53rd Grammy Awards for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance, though it ultimately lost to Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance". The song was her second time being nominated for the category and her third nomination overall.

Background

"'King of Anything' is sort of a 'f[uck] you' song," Bareilles said. "I've had more unsolicited advice on my life than I care to mention, and this was how I dealt with it. It felt empowering to turn that frustration into music, especially a song that doesn't even sound angry. That's sort of what 'Love Song' was as well. Apparently, I don't get over things very quickly."

Release

"King of Anything" was released to radio in the US on May 10, 2010. It was released for sale on June 22, 2010.

Music video

The music video was released on June 29, 2010. It was filmed in Vancouver, Canada by director Laurent Briet and features Sara singing in a number of different places accompanied by a brass band; in a restaurant, on a bus, in a music store, standing in front of a mural and finally in a garden of flowers. The scenes of the video are all fragmented throughout. A behind-the-scenes of the video was released on Bareilles' official Facebook page. Bareilles states in the behind-the-scenes video that she had input in the making of the music video, writing a treatment for it as soon as she had written the song.

Uncharted

"Uncharted" is a song written and recorded by the American singer Sara Bareilles. The song was produced by Neal Avron.

It was the second single of her album Kaleidoscope Heart.

Background and history

Bareilles told Billboard magazine that she "...was really worried about stepping into the unknown and I didn't know what to expect the second time around... and that afternoon, I sat down and wrote 'Uncharted'." The album title, 'Kaleidoscope Heart', comes from the lyric of 'Uncharted', "Jump start my kaleidoscope heart, love to watch the colors fade... They may not make sense but they sure as hell made me". Bareilles stated the song to be the starting point of the new record, and this particular lyric saw the end to her writer's block.

Critical reception

Jim Farber of New York Daily News wrote that: "Uncharted, matches jaunty piano figures to a spritz of strings." Megan Vick wrote for Billboard that: "With "Uncharted," Bareilles puts a syncopated two-step beat to a heartbreak anthem as she belts out about being unable to deal with a failed relationship."

Music video

On 9 November 2010, official behind-the-scenes photographs were posted to Sara's official site, showing director Laurent Brie, director of previous single 'King of Anything', filming the video. The pictures showed Sara in various outfits, including a Geisha girl costume. However, nothing more was stated about the concept of this video, and it was believed to be scrapped for a new version.

Love Song

"Love Song" is a song by American singer-songwriter Sara Bareilles, released as her debut single in June 2007. Issued through Epic Records, it served as the lead single from her second album, Little Voice (2007).

It was nominated for 2009 Grammy Awards in the categories Song of the Year and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.

Background

Speaking of the song's origin in an interview with MTV, Bareilles said of her label, "They had encouraged me to keep writing, and I just wasn't having any luck. [...] I went to a rehearsal space one day. I sat down and wrote something for me. And 'Love Song' basically wrote itself. It's totally honest, and I'm very lucky the label liked it as well."

Music video

Directed by Josh Forbes, the music video features a miniature Bareilles playing the piano inside a coin-operated jukebox that plays love songs. A steady stream of men and women enter the booth and insert coins to observe her through a pinhole as she plays the same song day after day. The lyrics express her growing frustration as she declares that she is "not gonna write you a love song today," whereupon Bareilles grabs the next coin that rolls inside, and uses it to jam the gears. The next morning, the owner of the booth (who was seen at the beginning of the video) enters; he notices that the jukebox has gone dark, and appears amazed when he discovers Bareilles inside the jukebox. He retrieves the jammed coin from the gears and hands it to...