It's hello, not goodbye, for Lara

MANILA, Philippines - She was a pro in China. For six years, Lara Cuevas, a native of Batangas, had been entertaining and impressing different nationalities in bars and hotels in Shanghai and its nearby city, Ningbo. She would sing anything from jazz, blues to pop, and she would even rap in Chinese. She loved her job and was utterly contented. But fate had something wonderful in store for her.

In December 2009, while on vacation in Manila, Lara passed by a small recording studio and was reminded of a friend’s advice to record songs for a demo. So in she went and sang songs like Get Here and Through the Fire on videoke. After completing eight songs, she got her demo CD which she gave to her friend. This ended up in the right hands and ears. To Lara’s surprise, producer Christian de Walden of Viva Records got interested in her talent. A meeting with Boss Vic clinched it. Only three months after making that demo CD, she was ready to make her debut album under Viva Records.

In June 2010, Lara flew to Los Angeles to record her 12-track self-titled album. It boasts four original tracks namely, Wala Nang Mahihiling Pa, Bakit Pinaglaruan, Running Into Love and the carrier single This Moment, with lyrics by Pamela Phillips-Oland and music by Jimmy Borja.

The rest of the tracks are covers like You Make Me Feel Brand New, Can’t Fight the Moonlight, Genie in a Bottle, Un-break My Heart and The Trouble with Hello is Goodbye, to name a few. Lara is as excited about her remakes as with her originals because they are all given a twist to sound like new. Some of the arrangements are Latin style.

Lara shares that doing the album was very challenging. With the headphones, you become aware of all the sound elements unlike in live singing which she was used to. That is why she is ever grateful to De Walden and four-time Grammy Award-winner Kenny O’Brien (owner of the studio where she recorded in L.A.) for their guidance. She is please to say that The Trouble with Hello is Goodbye was recorded within 30 minutes.