Tara Priya (born Tara Priya Chandra)[1] is a London-based[2] American singer-songwriter and vocalist. Tara Priya was born in San Francisco to a Persian mother, the niece of poet Sohrab Sepehri, and an Indian father.[3]
Tara Priya attended The Harker School in San Jose prior to Columbia University in New York City.[4] Priya majored in economics while studying jazz and classical voice.[5] After graduating from Columbia two years early, Priya moved to Los Angeles to focus on her career as a singer-songwriter.[6] She started off by singing hooks on rap demos in underground hip-hop studios in exchange for recording time for her own R&B/soul music.[7]
Immediately after releasing a six-track Motown-inspired EP,[8] Priya was nominated as one of the Best Emerging Artists by The Deli Magazine.[9] Shortly after, Priya was selected as one of three "Pop" genre finalists of the John Lennon Songwriting Contest[10] and named a category winner in the Billboard Song Contest.[11][12]
In January 2012, Priya signed to Japanese indie P-Vine Records[13] after her EP was discovered in a record shop in Kobe, Japan.[7][14] There, her first radio single "Run Like Hell" peaked at number 25[15] on the BillboardJapan Hot 100 and number six[16] on the Billboard Japan Digital and Airplay chart. This led to two subsequent tours of Japan, through Tower Records and Billboard Live, respectively.[17]
In autumn 2014, British popular music and fashion magazine and website Clash premiered new music from Priya, noting that the track was "somewhere between classic soul, trip hop and the slumped productions of J Dilla".[22] The track, titled "One Foot Out", was co-produced by Priya and represented a significant departure from her earlier music.[22] Subsequent releases throughout 2015 gained her UK press and radio support, including by Time Out London,[23]BBC Radio 2's Jamie Cullum,[24]Tom RobinsonofBBC Radio 6 Music,[25] and UK record label and club Ministry of Sound.[26]
In November 2016, The Independent premiered new music from Tara Priya, noting the singer "has been tipped for big things" and comparing her "sensual trip hop and soul" sound to fellow Londoner Sinéad Harnett.[27]
