For Cyrille Aimée, music is both a way of life and an art form. A singer, songwriter, lyricist and educator, she has built an award-winning international career while remaining connected to her roots.
She grew up in a multilingual, musical household, surrounded by the bachata and merengue of her mother’s native Dominican Republic. Her family home in Samois-sur-Seine brought her into contact with the Django Reinhardt Festival. As a teenager, she joined the musicians gathering there and discovered both jazz and the idea of a musical community without borders.
After time in Santo Domingo, she moved to New York, studied at SUNY Purchase and performed in Manhattan’s jazz clubs. She became known for her improvisation, collaborated with artists including Roy Hargrove, won the Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition and performed at Harlem’s Apollo Theater.
Her recordings for Mack Avenue Records attracted the attention of Stephen Sondheim, leading to a special concert alongside Bernadette Peters, Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. Her Sondheim tribute album Move On (2019) includes the Grammy-nominated performance Marry Me a Little.
Her online collaborations include performances with Emmet Cohen, notably La Vie en Rose. After settling in New Orleans in 2017, she also built a home in the Costa Rican forest in 2021 and began writing songs drawn from her own life.
À Fleur de Peau, released by Whirlwind Recordings and created with Jake Sherman, brings together jazz, songwriting and Caribbean rhythms in a personal new chapter of her work.