Carlitta Durand: This Time Around
Carlitta
Durand had no idea that her singing career would take off so quickly
this year —after all, she’d been working with the critically acclaimed
Little Brother since 2006. But as soon as she graduated from North
Carolina Central University in May with a degree in theater, the
opportunities started rolling in. Over the past three months, Durand
has garnered accolades for her impressive mixtape, Carlitta’s Way,
will go on tour with Foreign Exchange (the jazz-soul duo featuring
Phonte of LB fame and producer, Nicolay), and will start work on her
anticipated debut album. Ro talked with Carlitta about her mixtape and the freedom that comes with being an independent artist.
–nadine graham
How does signing with Foreign Exchange, an independent, free you from industry standards?
I don’t really have to worry about my image. I can wear what I want to,
sing what I want to, write what I want to, put whatever music out that
I want to. With a major, you’re owned by them. If you’re not a Beyoncé
or [a] major performer, you don’t have a say in what goes down. Most
artists [that are] signed to a record label, their stuff doesn’t come
out for years.
Your
dad was on the basketball team with Prince back when they were in
school, and you remade a Prince song with ?uestlove recently …
That’s a family story [laughs]. That’s so funny that you know that!
?uest threw a Prince dedication party where he played Prince songs all
night and Phonte asked me about doing music with The Roots because he
was recording with them. He called me up and as we were writing to the
beat, he said, ‘Why don’t you sing the original song?’ So we just
changed the melody up a little bit and that was it.
What can fans expect from your upcoming album?
It’ll be more mature, the music will be really good because I’m working
with Nicolay. There are things that I can do with my voice now that I
couldn’t do years ago. I hope it’ll be a classic album from front to
back.
