Eva Celia: And So Her Journey Begins

First time I heard Eva Celia's name, 

I thought she will only an ordinary girl who loves to sing. However, she proves that she could be the one who stamped herself as a great musician, not only a singer. With her bold statement, she finally begins her journey through her album, So It Begins.

The first step she took was acting in Adriana, a film by Fajar Nugros and produced by Sophia Latjuba which whom her mother, in 2013. For her first debut acting, she directly acted as the main character. Besides acting, she also sang the original soundtrack for this movie. From the first step she had already taken, Eva started to show to other people her sweet voice.

At that time, I thought Eva will only take the first trial and then she will go, but I was wrong. In 2014, she came back for her second film, Pendekar Tongkat Emas.

Pendekar Tongkat Emas was a film by Riza Riri. Eva played the main character together with well-known Indonesian actress, Tara Basro and other famous actors such as Nicholas Saputra and Reza Rahardian.

She finally ended up her story but started another journey to get off the ground.

I was (and I still am) excited when I knew that Eva already launched her album in December 2016. With its blue-ish cover of her album, I ordered it on demajors.com. Besides excited, I also feel nervous because I am afraid of putting too high expectations while on the other side I want to hear some more from Eva.

I played the whole album, and I felt strange. I need to repeat the whole album once again. Then I realized, this album is not-so-easy-listening tune so that I have to hear more detail and deeper. And I did so. In the second attempt, I still feel strange and I took a quick conclusion that maybe I won't be able to enjoy her music.

I felt so weird. Without thinking any longer, I repeat her album while I was worked. I looped my music player with her album only. As the time goes by, I started to fell in love with her music.

For only Rp50.000, you got the whole-8-song originally written and composed by Eva Celia. There are two single that had already been released before: "Reason" and "Against Time". Eva's first single, "Reason", released in 2015, not really makes me turning my head. It takes a quite long waiting for her second single. In 2016, Eva released "Against Time" as her second single. First time I heard this song, I directly touched by her words and its simple tune. She devotes her anxiety through simple words that I can't do.

every day is a battle / 'cause I need trying to find 

Same as the album's name, the first track on this album "So It Begins", was produced by Indra Lesmana which whom her lovely father. This track, I think, was the most difficult tune because of its rhythm. As the titled, Eva told us about her life that she is never could imagine. Also, jazzy tunes were surefire cling on the whole track.

the kind of life / I've never could imagine

Eva put on a short-length track in the middle of this album, it is titled "INTERLUDE: A Strange Kind of Longing". Like its titled, Interlude, the duration.for this track is only 1:38, the shortest duration compared to other songs in this album. However, this track succeeds brought me to another dimension.

Another interesting thing that is happening in this album is she was using only certain tone in her vocal range. Moreover, this album uses a middle-average tempo; not so upbeat but also not too slow. I am a little bit of deploring because this album came out too minimalist without any lyrics inside it. Other than that, I feel that Eva's vocalizing made me difficult to understands the words she's saying.

Nevertheless, So It Begins made it into a bold statement of Eva Celia.

And I'm glad that I had the chances to see her performance live at Java Jazz 2017. With her short hair and all-black outfits, Eva came out with her big smile holding her guitar. At that night, she sang all songs on her first album. That night proves how Eva put all her passion on music because she does not only sing but also owned the music.