Who is Sonja?

A red haired-girl with lot of passion for music.
Believes in love.
Sometimes wrapped in madness. (various sorts)

When did you discover you could sing and are you a trained singer?

When I saw Andrew Lloyd Webbers “Cats”, I was so fascinated by this musical, by the dancers, actors and singers that I knew that I would love to this as well. I started with ballet lessons and was more into dancing when I was a kid. Later I became singing lessons and finally this passion leaded to the professional education at the university of performing arts and drama in Vienna. I always really wanted it and dreamed of being on stage as a performer. I never sense singing as work. I enjoy what I`m doing!

To what music did you listen as a kid and do you still listen to it?

Well, I listened to title songs of cartoon series, as all children do I guess. -)) And I have to say that I still like them. In Austria we had really cool and intelligent, most of the time also quite sad and dramatic cartoons for kids. They were great! Later I listened to Elton John, Madonna, Björk, David Bowie, artists I still like. Especially David Bowie and Björk.

What did you wanted to become as a kid (profession)?

I wanted to become a ghost in a haunted castle. Seriously. Well, I`m still working on it.
But aside from this, I always wanted to do something with art and/or music.

We were on tour with Christian Death in 1999 and I got to know their guitarist Wim Leydes. Furthermore he wrote his own songs and asked me to sing to his “Forest Song”. I did and found a new challenge for me… I enjoyed singing to this great and atmospheric song, where voice and lyrics were mainly important. It was a very creative work and suddenly I had to use my voice differently and found new ways to express myself.
An other inspiration was Tobias Hahn, who produced the album “Dann habe ich umsonst gelebt” for L´âme immortelle. For the first time we recorded real instruments, like cello or the violin and I was so fascinated by the sound that I wanted to increase the work with real instruments. I often talked to Toby, who shared this passion and finally we got the idea to bring a common project into being


Why did you choose the name Persephone and do you feel connected to Greek mythology?

I was searching for the name of a woman who`s between the living and the dead, a woman who strolls between these two worlds. Finally a common friend got the idea for the name Persephone. When we heard it we were not that enthusiastic for the first moment, but decided to keep it as a working title, but when all songs were finished and we saw Joachim Luetkes pictures and artwork, the name Persephone seemed to become one with the whole idea of this project.

How were the responses on the previous albums?

Very good. Of course for us the latest album is always more or less the best, but we also heard from friends and fans that they think that “Letters to a stranger” is the best Persephone CD so far. That`s nice to hear, but of course all releases have their charm…

The previous albums were conceptual, the new one (letters to a stranger) isn’t, why break with this tradition?

Why not. -)) By the way the first CD “Home” doesn`t belong to the conceptual CDs “Atma Gyan” and “Mera Sangeet kho gaya”, it`s just the two of them.

Can we see Persephone as a band or is it your project with live members?

Martin and me are responsible for all music and lyrics, but still I would say it is a band… We are working together with Holger, Johannes and John for quite a long time now in the studio and live… so they are very important for the whole thing and the live performance.

Each production differs from the other. You always learn a lot and at the end you already know what you can do better for the next recordings. It`s always like this.

I think the biggest change was the work with the philharmonic chamber orchestra of Wernigerode. Especially for Martin, who wrote and prepared all arrangements. Working with an orchestra means that everything has to be well defined and even more precise.

We recorded more drums and I think that`s also one of the reasons, why “Letters to a stranger” sounds completely different from the other albums.

We worked together with many musicians who already accompany the project for various productions now. And it was a pleasure to see, hear and feel how easily they played their parts and could empathize with our ideas and the songs.

All track names are single words, did you do this on purpose and why?

As the title of the album already says all lyrics are letters, so you wouldn`t title a letter, wouldn`t you? So I concentrated on the feeling of the single letters, that`s why I used adjectives.

This time you worked with a philharmonic chamber orchestra, why did you do this and was it different for you to work with them?

We played a concert together with the philharmonic chamber orchestra in Autumn 2006 and really liked the sound of it. Martin made new arrangements for some of our songs, which were presented in Wernigerode and it went pretty well. So we wanted more and we got the idea to work with the orchestra for the new CD.

When the demo of the song “Mean” was finished Martin and I knew that we would need the orchestra for sure to create the passionate feeling of the tango.

The days we spent for the recordings were very exciting. I mean even our demos sounded quite well, Martin prepared them careful and each note was already played by samples. But when we heard our songs played by the orchestra it was a very moving moment for us. First of all because it sounded wonderful, but it was also quite difficult to organise and we were glad that all worked out fine in the end.

You will only perform accoustically, why this decission and what can people expect from it?

I`m interested in the sound of the acoustic instruments that`s why I like to perform completely unplugged. We love to play in special locations like castle, museums, churches, or anything with flair… and atmosphere… so our concerts are always quite intimate. In nowadays I think it`s something special, when you have musicians on stage playing real instruments. Live.

Besides music, what are driving forces for you in life?

Love. Well and again music. -)

My boyfriend making jokes, or our cat playing around just looking like the cutest thing
you `ve ever seen (he`s very good in that), a bath, a glass of wine or chocolate, or I just watch comedy series, like Father Ted or Stromberg.

Everybody has an addiction like smoking/ sudoku and so on, what is yours?

Well mine is chocolate, or anything with milk, sometimes wine… And I love plants and flowers.

If you could live in another era of time, in what period would you want to live?

In the past… Maybe in the 18th century meeting Mozart, or at the end of the 19th century having a chat with Elisabeth of Austria…

We think of the Persephone pictures as romantic, are you romantic yourself? How does it show?

Yes, I would me as describe a romantic person… I believe in eternal love…

Any last words for the readers?

We are very glad to come to Holland for the first time to play at this years Summer Darkness festival and we hope to see you all there!!!

For more information about us, our music or upcoming shows, please visit our website: www.persephone-home.de

www.myspace.com/persephonehome