Newtown’s Daria Musk Breaking The Big Time At Last!

By John Voket

Watch out John Mayer – there’s an up-county girl ready to replace you as Connecticut’s next big singer-songwriter sensation. In fact, by the time you read this, thousands of radio listeners will have already sampled Newtowner Daria Musk thanks to a live performance on 99.1 WPLR’s Chaz & AJ’s Buried at the Beach broadcast Thursday, July 24.

Anyone who wants to say “I saw her when” can do just that during several upcoming sets she is playing at Borders in Southbury this Sunday, July 27, and again on Sunday, August 24, both at 2 pm. Visitors to the SoNo Arts Festival in South Norwalk can also catch Daria performing on August 3 at 11 am.

And she just announced an opening set for Patty Larkin, an internationally acclaimed folk and indie artist whose life strangely mirrors Daria’s. That free all ages show is set for Friday, August 15, at 6 pm, on McLevy Green in downtown Bridgeport, part of Black Rock Art Center’s Summer Sounds of the World Concert Series.

These performances are just the latest blocks on the game board for this self-starter who grew up with the influence of two parents who play and compose music.

“We always had a lot of instruments and music around the house,” Daria told The Newtown Bee during a chat prior to her Chaz & AJ debut. Her mom, Wendy Musk, enjoyed a storied career as a concert flautist who trained at Juilliard, and was honored three times with the prestigious Artist International Award.

Today, Wendy has switched gears, working as a teacher at Frasier-Woods where she is head of the middle school Humanities Dept. Daria’s dad Richard has been a composer and film scorer for many years, contributing to a lot of commercials and industrial films which have garnered him more than a dozen industry awards for his work.

While she was born in Santa Barbara, Calif., Daria grew up in Fairfield County, attending elementary school in Stamford. She later came to Newtown where she completed middle school and went on to truly discover her potential as both a musician and philanthropist at Newtown High School.

“I remember my freshman year I tried out to be in this big talent show,” she recalled. “This was the first time performing in front of audience. It was a defining moment.”

Since then, besides too many coffee house sessions, Daria has produced an AIDS benefit, and a Tsunami relief concert at NHS which “raised a lot of money for the cause.”

But she clearly remembers that first tentative moment on stage.

“There were about 300 or 400 people, and ‘Dove’ was the song,” she said. “We still perform it. It’s an important song  for me as a musician. Really it was my first fully formed song.”

Paying Her Dues

From those first few shows as a high school freshman, Daria went on to hone her singing skills in several NHS performing ensembles, doing a cameo solo in West Side Story, and getting an opportunity to solo before the Pope during a chorus tour of Italy.

“We did ‘Ride the Chariot,’ an African-American slave spiritual,” she said. In addition, the local musician was accepted into a competitive summer training program at Berklee College of Music the summer between her sophomore and junior year.

Daria also followed in the footsteps of her parents, albeit at a much more tender age, having been recognized for her music at age 16 with the first-ever Connecticut Association of Schools’ Bruce Eagleson Memorial Award.

“After I applied for the award with an essay and my first self-produced CD, my teacher said it would be a great experience to go to the awards ceremony. But they played a trick on me,” she recalled. All through the ceremony Daria said she saw student after student getting up to accept various CAS awards.

“Then when it was time for the biggest award of the night, my CD starts playing. It was a surreal moment,” she said.

Today Daria is courting fame at the next level, and being courted by producers from New York and Philly. One of those industry professionals, Bob Power, a Grammy-winning producer/mixer who has worked with India.Arie, Angie Stone and Erykah Badu, contributed album notes to her latest release.

“Daria’s one of the most effortless singers I’ve ever heard,” Mr Power wrote. “You can hear her smile when she sings. Killer guitar-player, too. Beautiful musicianship in the band. They’re great. Was I ever pleasantly bowled over!”

Besides playing an April 2008 sold out headline set at The Mercury Lounge in New York City, and opening for Warner Bros. Recording artist Eric Hutchinson at The Knitting Factory, Daria is also traveling to showcase her material.

“We’ve already got some label interest from performing at the South By Southwest Festival [SWSX] in Austin [Texas],” Daria said. “We showcased with OurStage.com, and have had some tremendous success on that site.”

OurStage.com promotes its contributing artists, pushing chart positions higher by fans and listeners themselves who vote for their favorites.

DM3’s Commercial Debut

As a result of all her work, Daria and her backing musicians, both Newtowners, are counting on their first independent label release this fall.

She primarily performs with DM3, which includes Rich Allan — known only as “Rich” on her CDs — who contributes bass, vocals  and keyboard. Her rhythm section is rounded out by “J”  — née Jason Hiruo — on drums and percussion.

The songwriter credits artists including Dave Matthews for her inspiration to stick it out and make the best of her talents.

“I’ve always admired careers like Dave Matthews, being on a label, building a huge following without being splashed around the tabloids,” she said. In the end, if a major label does come knocking, it is Daria’s ultimate hope to retain creative control.

“I just want to be able to do what I do - see how far I can take it,” she said, adding she is working with a PR firm who is attempting to get reviews placed in major publications like Rolling Stone.

Having paid her dues learning to front the trio guitar, Daria said she recently started playing keyboards and synth.

“I’ve got a song, ‘On Your Shoulders,’ which is the first time I’m performing on keyboard,” she said. “With guitar I worked and worked, but the keyboard came really easy. It’s really cool to add into the mix.”

Her latest accomplishment, which will put her music in front of hundreds of radio industry programming execs, came courtesy of the Musician’s Atlas, which Daria calls “…an indie bible for musicians.”

“We were picked as their buzz band for 2008 with my song ‘Maybe,’” she said. It’s going to be promoted to 750 radio stations nationwide.

In preparation for selecting a commercial producer, Daria said she is rounding up “a lot of material, plus songs we’re just finishing this summer” to select as the “first statement for the world to hear.”

Check out Daria Musk at myspace.com/DariaMusk, and book her through SonicBuds.com/DariaMusk. Her own website is in the final stage of production, and will be linked from the myspace site upon launching.