HOPE'S HEART AND SOUL SHINE THROUGH - "One does not see many female pianists and she's refreshing. Her appeal is how she's able to make the keys take on her personality which is somewhat temperamental, strong and self-assured. What you see when you look at her is rock n roll, but what you hear when she plays is heart and soul. She calls her genre art pop because it is lyrically driven, making it more arty than pop. She plays classical to pop and complements that with her powerful voice. Hope is a Durban girl and has been playing the piano since she was six years old. Growing up she was influenced by music that paints a beautiful picture of the world, she says. But her approach to music is where the romantic and the real collide…She is heart and soul and she is onto something."

 

LIVE IN GRAHAMSTOWN - "Shannon Hope manages to command the audience’s attention from the moment she sits behind her piano. The Durban singer-songwriter has been touring the country extensively over the past year, and is putting on no fewer than 12 shows at the National Arts Festival. The touring experience has clearly paid off: she’s a confident and appealing performer. Hope sports an emo black-and-red hairstyle, and sips intermittently from a hip flask during the show – but don’t let her edgy image fool you. She’s a self-confessed romantic, and her songs are tender and sensitive. She sings about falling in love, loneliness, depression and dreaming, in lyrics that are almost achingly honest. Her powerful voice conveys unabashed emotion through skilful dynamics and changes in tone: she roars out a line and then pulls back into a gentle whisper. Shannon Hope definitely won me, and the rest of the audience, over. I felt inspired and moved for having heard Shannon Hope sing; and that’s the highest endorsement of any artist, in my mind."

 

"With a sound charged with emotional intensity, Shannon Hope’s performance brought goose bumps to my skin. The powerful combination of her singing and song-writing is sure to leave any audience captured."

 

"Shannon Hope is awesome! Her voice is amazing, and the way she puts her all into every melody is admirable. I especially loved how her voice is so powerful yet intimate at the same time. Her music really touches you and when you walk out of the performance some things just make sense. If you have no idea what I mean you must go and experience her for yourself. I guarantee you won’t be disappointed!"

 

(read the article online)
IMPRESSIONS OF THE NATIONAL ARTS FESTIVAL - "...Guitarist extraordinaire Louis Mhlanga and Standard Bank Young Artist for Jazz, singer Melanie Scholtz, both impress with their musical prowess, although the proverbial show is stolen by piano-playing singer Shannon Hope, who moves me to tears with her honest and powerful performance..."

 

THE MAGICAL GEM HIDDEN UP AT PJs - "As auditoriums of the more established artists fill up with audiences keen to experience their work, sometimes one happens upon a true gem in the relative unknowns of the Fringe. Shannon Hope has been hard at work promoting her shows this week, the power of her phenomenal voice drawing crowds at various venues around town. I caught one of her shows at the Cuervo Music Room, but as she started to sing, I instantly pictured her on a dark stage, lit by a single spotlight in an auditorium filled with thousands. PJs Basement may not have space for thousands, but this intimate venue certainly promises to provide a mood more suitable to her stores of the dreams, pursuit and pain of love that this up-and-coming piano-based vocal artist tells in her honest set. Touring furiously since she quit her day job a little over a year ago, Hope is slowly establishing a fan base across the country, and it’s easy to understand why."

 

SHANNON HOPE BLOWS ONE AWAY - "…She dresses as you could expect a rock star to dress. A little bit grungy… But cool... But when she opens her mouth, it's not what I expect at all. I sit, breathless, forcing myself to break my reverie with half-hearted applause at the end of each song. She has me entranced. I'm a words chick. And blow me down if she doesn't make me think with the words of every song. Every one. Her online blurbs say her music will ‘make you think and feel'. And in spite of that created expectation - it really was true! And that speaks nothing of her performance... I think part of the reason I am not such a fan of live music, is that musicians are often really not great performers, and so I spend a lot of the time trying to stop myself from being irritated with the way their spare hand floats aimlessly in space, or the apologetic babble between songs. But none of that here. This woman knows her craft. Her voice is strong and gorgeous, and she manages it with expertise. As she does her body, which controls her keyboard with the same... And I am blown away. Shannon Hope calls what she plays ‘Art Pop'. She launched her fulltime musical career merely a year ago, and is ‘fast gaining a reputation as one of the hardest-touring self-managed artists on the national circuit'."

 

HOPE IS WHERE THE HEART IS - "Music has the ability to take you to places that you can't always access in everyday life. This is why we need artists like Durban-based Shannon Hope. Her music is emotive, evocative, and delivered with such honesty that you can’t help believing every single word.

Hope is an exceptionally honest performer. She gets into those emotional places we often block out, with such ease and sincerity that you wonder if she doesn’t perhaps live there permanently. Watching her performance at the Corner Cafe in Durban the other night, her honesty was so obvious that it seemed at times as if she had stopped performing. There were moments where she forgot the audience, and became lost in the music itself; the effect was simply mesmerising.

In June this year she started her solo career with the debut album STILL, a collection of truthful and moving songs. Defining Hope's genre is slippery; sometimes folk, sometimes pop, sometimes jazz it seems to crossover to something new. Hope calls it 'art pop', since her music is strongly lyric-based, a genre chosen to fit each song's style rather than the other way around. Hope trained as a classical pianist so the music is technically tight. And while her lyrics are undoubtedly profound, Hope's true strength is the emotional states she creates especially through her voice control. Her interpretation of Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean" is clever, moving and simply the best I've ever heard.

Hope is no stranger to the music world, having been a member of the successful alternative rock band Ketamine when they were still around. But with her solo career, the sturm-und-drang rock persona has fallen away to show a more vulnerable side. She is not afraid to reveal herself and often just uses vocals and keyboards to do so. Her music is raw, uncompromising and penetrating. From the melancholic "Blue Skies" to the playful and lovesick "Oh boy", her album covers a wide range of human experiences honestly and intelligently. Hope is brave and real, and her outstanding performance took me places I hadn't been in years. Don't miss it."

A PASSION FOR MUSIC - "With two opening performances for Prime Circle, an intimate tête-a-tête at the Market restaurant and a performance at Snap Wine Bar to name but some, the past few months have been busy for local muso Shannon Hope. Whether it’s seated at a little table next to a fountain surrounded by fairy lights or at a wine bar sipping a glass or two – a cosy atmosphere is idyllic for Shannon’s acoustic and melodic sound. This Umhlanga girl who has recently released her début album ‘S T I L L’, has an intense enthusiasm for her music. So much so that she has devoted herself to promoting her career as a solo artist. Shannon’s voice is powerful and melodic, bringing an Alternative pop rock sound to her audience. Accompanied only by a keyboard, her passion for her music comes to the fore..."

GIMME HOPE - "Umhlanga has been hiding a funky and talented musician who could just be on the verge of stardom. Shannon Hope's no stranger to the stage. The singer with the powerful voice and superb piano skills oozes the confidence of someone completely comfortable in the limelight and with her instruments (voice & piano). We believe it's just a matter of time before she will take her message to a much wider audience."

"Hope is a powerful singer and when she opens you get the feeling you're in for something special... talented and brave, her music makes you feel. Her set was powerful, strong, and she sings with such conviction that you know she's not going anywhere for a while."

SHANNON HOPE GOES SOLO - "Brooding and magnetic, it's hard not to be intrigued by singer-songwriter Shannon Hope. The established artist has had her share of success in the South African music industry and abroad, playing keyboards and singing in the rock band Ketamine, but nowadays she shows an altogether more vulnerable side as she launches her solo career."