Imogen Heap

Imogen Jennifer Heap (born 9 December 1977) is a British musician, singer, songwriter and record producer. Her work has been considered pioneering in pop and electropop music.

Heap classically trained in piano, cello and clarinet starting at a young age. She began writing songs at the age of 13 and, while attending boarding school, taught herself music production. After being discovered by manager Mickey Modern while attending the BRIT School, Heap signed to independent record label Almo Sounds at the age of 18 and later began working with experimental pop band Acacia. She released her debut album, an alternative rock record, '' I Megaphone'', in 1998. In early 2002, Heap and English record producer Guy Sigsworth formed the electronic duo Frou Frou and released their only album to date, '' Details'' (2002).

Her second studio album, '' Speak for Yourself'', was released in 2005 on her own label, Megaphonic Records, and was certified gold in the United States and Canada. The album spawned three singles: " Headlock", "Goodnight and Go", which became her highest-charting single as a lead artist on the UK Singles Chart, and " Hide and Seek", which was certified gold in the United States and gained popularity after being used in the Fox teen drama television series ''The O.C.''. Heap's third studio album, '' Ellipse'' (2009), peaked in the top five of the ''Billboard'' 200 chart and received mostly positive reviews. This was followed by her fourth studio album, ''Sparks'' (2014). In 2017, she reunited with Sigsworth as part of Frou Frou.

Heap developed the Mi.Mu Gloves, a line of musical gloves, as well as a blockchain-based music-sharing program, Mycelia. She also composed the music for the West End/ Broadway play ''Harry Potter and the Cursed Child''. Over the course of her career, she has received two Grammy Awards, one Ivor Novello Award, and one Drama Desk Award. In July 2019, Heap was awarded an honorary doctorate from Berklee College of Music.

Early life

Imogen Jennifer Heap was born on 9 December 1977 in Havering, Greater London. Her name was inspired by that of British composer Imogen Holst, as her mother wanted Heap to become a cellist like Holst. She played music from an early age, first learning the piano due to "wanting attention" as a middle child and realizing, according to her, that "it was something hecould make a lot of noise with". She did not enjoy playing the music of classical composers such as Bach and Beethoven, and would instead attempt to play in their style to convince her parents she was practicing their music. As a child, she began recording music by recording herself playing piano on cassette, then recording herself again singing over it. She soon began taking lessons and became classically trained in several instruments including piano, cello and clarinet while attending Friends School, a private, Quaker-run boarding school in Saffron Walden. At around age 10, she began composing Christmas carols for her school's choir.

Due to being placed a year above children her age, Heap claims she did not get along with many people from the school and spent most of her time in the music room practising piano. She stated, "In boarding school...I was mocked about the clothes I wore, the way I looked, whatever. People there really did regard me as some kind of freak from the middle of nowhere. And these things do matter a lot when you are sixteen, seventeen." Heap's mother, an art therapist, and father, a construction rock retailer, separated when she was twelve years old. Also at age twelve, she taught herself how to use Cubase on an Atari computer at Friends School. By the age of thirteen, she had begun writing songs. At age fifteen, she began using reel-to-reel recording to record her music, using a home computer to program the music.

Career

1995–1996: Almo Sounds & Acacia

After boarding school, she went on to study at the BRIT School for Performing Arts & Technology in Croydon, South London, where she first began regularly singing and writing songs due to loneliness. It was there that she recorded her first song to feature her vocals, "Missing You", which was released on the BRIT School's ''Class of 1994'' album and earned her attention from manager Mickey Modern after he saw her performance at a talent showcase. After being introduced to Nik Kershaw by Modern, Heap recorded demos which were taken to Rondor Music. A few months later, Heap signed her first record contract, aged 18, with independent record label Almo Sounds.

In 1996, Heap began working with British experimental pop band Acacia, which featured her future collaborator Guy Sigsworth. While never a full member of the band, Heap was a guest vocalist and contributed to various Acacia singles and album tracks. Heap's first major live solo performance was as part of the line-up for the 1996 Prince's Trust Concert in Hyde Park.

1998–2001: ''I Megaphone''

Heap's debut commercial single, "Getting Scared", was released in 1997. The song became the lead single from her debut album, '' I Megaphone'', and was included in the soundtrack for the 1998 horror film '' I Still Know What You Did Last Summer''. She released her debut album, the alternative rock record ''I Megaphone'', on 16 June 1998 through Almo. The record was made with several producers, including English musician Dave Stewart and Sigsworth, and received some critical praise but was a commercial failure, as Almo did little to promote the album. Soon after Heap released the record, Almo Sounds was acquired by Universal, forcing its artists to either move to other labels or be released. Heap was one of the artists who was dropped from the label, leaving her without a record contract. ''I Megaphone'' had, however, been licensed from Almo Sounds to Aozora Records in Japan, who eventually re-released and re-promoted the album in January 2002, and included the bonus tracks "Blanket" and "Aeroplane".

During her time as an unsigned artist, Heap appeared on two singles: "Meantime", a track written by her former Acacia colleagues Guy Sigsworth and Alexander Nilere for the soundtrack to the independent British film '' G:MT – Greenwich Mean Time'', and "Blanket", a 1998 collaboration with British hip hop band Urban Species. "Blanket" was Heap's first charting single, reaching number 56 on the UK Singles Chart. The song would later appear in a 2005 sex tape of Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst. Heap appeared as a featured vocalist on two songs"Dirty Mind" and "Rollin' and Tumblin'"on the 2001 album ''You Had It Coming'' by English guitarist Jeff Beck.

2002–2003: Frou Frou

Heap had kept in contact with Guy Sigsworth (who had co-written and produced "Getting Scared" from ''I Megaphone''), and this led to the pair of them establishing the collaborative project Frou Frou.

The initial concept for Frou Frou was Sigsworth's, and the project was to have been an album written and produced by her with each track featuring a different singer, songwriter, poet or rapper. Heap explains that Sigsworth invited her over to his studio to write lyrics to a four-bar motif he had, with one condition – that she include the word "love" somewhere. The first line she came up with was "lung of love, leaves me breathless", and the '' Details'' album track "Flicks" was written. A week later, Sigsworth called Heap again, and together they wrote and recorded the future single "Breathe In".

On 4 June 2002, they released ''Details'', their first and only album to date. The album spawned the singles "Breathe In", "It's Good to Be in Love" and "Must Be Dreaming". The song "Let Go" was featured on the soundtrack for the 2004 film ''Garden State''.

In late 2003, after an extensive promotional tour of the UK, Europe and the US, the duo was told that their record label Island Records would not be picking up the option for a second album.

Heap and Sigsworth remain firm friends and have worked together since the project, including their temporary re-formation in late 2003, when they covered the Bonnie Tyler classic " Holding Out for a Hero" which was featured during the credits of the movie ''Shrek 2'' after Jennifer Saunders' version in the film. Frou Frou saw a resurgence in popularity in 2004, when their album track "Let Go" was featured in the film '' Garden State'', the soundtrack of which won a Grammy award.

In a 2005 interview, Heap said of Frou Frou, " twas really like a kind of little holiday from my own work. Guy and I, we have always worked together, and then over the years, it became clear that we wanted to do a whole album together. It was very organic and spontaneous – just one of those wonderful things that happens. But there was never a mention of a second record from either of us, and not uncomfortably. We're just both kind of free spirits. I love to work with a lot of different people, but I was also just gagging to see what I could do on my own. But I'm sure in the future, Guy and I will get back together to do another record, or to record a few songs together."

2004–2007: ''Speak for Yourself''

In December 2003, Heap announced on her website that she was going to write and produce her second solo album, using her site as a blog to publicise progress.

Heap recorded a rendition of the song "I'm a Lonely Little Petunia (In an Onion Patch)" for the seventh episode of the fourth season of the HBO drama series ''Six Feet Under'', which premiered in August 2004. Her rendition later appeared as the album closer for the 2005 soundtrack album '' Six Feet Under, Vol. 2: Everything Ends''.

Heap set herself a deadline of one year to make the album, booking a session to master the album one year ahead in December 2004. She re-mortgaged her flat to fund production costs, including renting a studio at Atomic Studios, London (previously inhabited by UK grime artist, Dizzee Rascal), and purchasing instruments.

At the end of 2004, with the album completed, Heap premiered two album tracks online, selling them prior to the album's release – " Just for Now" and "Goodnight and Go".

In May 2005, Heap released the lead single from her forthcoming album, " Hide and Seek". The song earned immense popularity after being used to score the season two finale of the Fox television series ''The O.C.'' on the same day as its release. It peaked in the top-40 of the ''Billboard'' Digital Songs chart, eventually receiving a gold certification from the RIAA and going on to be sampled in the song " Whatcha Say" by American singer Jason Derulo, which topped the ''Billboard'' Hot 100.

Heap released the album on her own label, Megaphonic Records. The album was titled '' Speak for Yourself''. ''Speak for Yourself'' was released in the UK on 18 July 2005 on CD and iTunes UK, where it entered the top 10 chart. The initial 10,000 physical copies pressed sold out, distributed through large and independent record stores and Heap's own online shop. In August 2005, Heap announced that she had licensed ''Speak for Yourself'' to RCA Records for the album's release in the United States, Canada and Mexico. The album was released in November 2005 and débuted at number 144 in the Billboard Top 200 album chart. In concert, Heap performed solo, controlling the sound through her laptop, as well as singing and playing the piano and array mbira. Also that month, Heap appeared on the soundtrack for the 2005 romantic comedy film ''Just Like Heaven'', performing a cover of the song " Spooky" by American band Classics IV. Heap announced, upon her return to the UK, that she had signed a deal for the album to be released internationally, as well as re-promoted in the UK, with a new imprint of Sony BMG, White Rabbit, run by former Sony BMG UK A&R vice president Nick Raphael.

In November 2005, Heap wrote and recorded the song "Can't Take It In" for the soundtrack of the fantasy film '' The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe'', which was released one month later.

''Speak for Yourself'' was re-released on the label on 24 April 2006, ahead of a full promotional push on 15 May, a week after the second single, "Goodnight and Go", was commercially released in the UK. Heap recorded an a cappella cover of the Leonard Cohen song " Hallelujah" for the season three finale of ''The O.C.'', which premiered in May 2006.

In August 2006, Heap performed a set at the V Festival, where it was announced that "Headlock" was to be the third single lifted from the album and released on 16 October 2006 in the UK. Heap wrote and performed the song "Glittering Cloud", which was based on the plague of locusts, as part of an event called the Margate Exodus sponsored by Artangel in November 2006, where ten artists each performed one song based on one of the Plagues of Egypt in Margate. The songs were compiled in the 2006 album '' Plague Songs''.

In late September and early October, Heap embarked on a tour of the UK, holding a competition on MySpace for different support acts for each venue before touring throughout Canada and the US in November and December. This was her first tour of North America that included a band, incorporating upright bass, percussion, and support acts Kid Beyond and Levi Weaver on beatbox and guitar, respectively. In December 2006, Heap was featured on the front page of ''The Green Room'' magazine.

On 7 December 2006, Heap received two Grammy nominations for the 49th Annual Grammy Awards, one for Best New Artist and the other for Best Song Written For Motion Picture, Television Or Other Visual Media for "Can't Take It In".

2008–2010: ''Ellipse''

Throughout the creation of her album '' Ellipse'', Heap posted vlogs or VBlogs as she called them, on YouTube.
She used these to comment on the album as well as update on its release.
The album's release was pushed back multiple times.
These included Heap being asked to perform at the annual event PopTech in October 2008. During the event, she premiered one of her album's songs, "Wait it Out".

In October 2008, Heap gave a musical performance in the anti-human trafficking documentary and rockumentary film ''Call + Response'', directed by Justin Dillon. She was also featured on two songs on Jeff Beck's live album '' Live at Ronnie Scott's'' and appeared in the accompanying DVD in April 2009.

Heap announced on her Twitter page that ''Ellipse''s first single would be "First Train Home".

On 17 August 2009, Heap made the entire album ''Ellipse'' available for live streaming via her webpage.

'' Ellipse'' was released in the United Kingdom on 24 August 2009 and in the United States on 25 August 2009.

Heap received two nominations for the 49th Annual Grammy Awards, where she won the Grammy Award for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical for her engineering work on ''Ellipse'', making her the first female artist to win the award.

2011–2014: ''Sparks''

In March 2011, Heap began working on her then-unnamed fourth studio album, ''Sparks'', and revealed that she would be writing and releasing a new single for the album once every three months, beginning with the recording and release of the album's lead single, then released under the working title "Heapsong1" and eventually released commercially as "Lifeline", via Ustream. "Propeller Seeds", the second single, followed in July 2011.

The third single from the album, "Neglected Space", was created as part of Heap's project with charity organization Clear Village to restore a walled garden in Bedfords Park in October 2011. She starred in the debut episode of the MTV India musical reality television series '' The Dewarists'', where she recorded "Minds Without Fear", her fourth single from ''Sparks'', with Indian production duo Vishal–Shekhar. Both "Neglected Space" and "Minds Without Fear" were released in October 2011.

Heap released "Xizi She Knows", the fifth single from the album, in February 2012.

On 6 May 2011, Heap tweeted that she and deadmau5 were working on a collaboration. The song was titled "Telemiscommunications" and included in deadmau5's sixth studio album, ''Album Title Goes Here