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Date: 10/28/2020
ENFIELD, CT – Enfield-raised singer/songwriter Cassandra Kubinski recently released a new single titled “Stardust.”
The song was produced by Chris Sclafani, who has produced and engineered hit tracks for Ed Sheeran, Benny Blanco, Selena Gomez and Gwen Stefani. Since its release, Stardust has had over 10,000 plays on Spotify and been added to well over 100 playlists. It was also remixed by noted yoga DJ Taz Rashid.
“The story of Stardust is about digging into our personal power,” Kubinski said. “Reclaiming our power especially as we relate to nature and to each other, so we can allow our own personal life to shine.”
She continued, “I'm a storyteller. The music that I most relate to are the songs where you hear about somebody’s personal experience and then you hear yourself in that story. It’s something that I really look to do. Even if I'm producing a song that’s more poppy or dance–y, the core of it is just one person sitting down to play the piano and sing a song. That’s the heart of what I do.”
Kubinski has toured through the U.S, Europe, Asia and Australia. She's recorded with Chris Botti, the Goo Goo Dolls, Mary Ramsey of 10,000 Maniacs, Dickie Betts, Jill Sobule and many others. She was also the bandleader for two seasons of Emmy-winning new media talk show, “The Never Settle Show with Mario Armstrong.” Her music has been licensed on broadcast network TV shows, including 13 placements on the hit show “Dance Moms,” which led to millions of views on user-uploaded videos of her songs on YouTube.
“I've been singing since I was two,” said Kubinski. “I always loved to sing and I was really lucky that my parents raised me in household with music around.”
She continued, “We had a piano growing up and my parents listened to a lot of singer/songwriters like Billy Joel and Jackson Brown. Lots of musicals, jazz and polka so it was really a diverse representation of different kinds of music that I remember in my house growing up.”
Kubinski was a part of many theater and music groups at Edgar Parkman Elementary School, John F. Kennedy Middle School and also at Enfield High as a member of Voices Incorporated, a combined Enrico Fermi and Enfield High School chorus under the leadership of John S. Gionfriddo, which Kubinski said is one of her most favorite and treasured musical experiences to date.
She is both classically trained and self-taught, taking piano lessons as a little girl with Jane LaRocca in Enfield. Yet it was at Florida State University where Kubinski became fascinated with songwriting and wanted to be a songwriter. She wrote her own songs on the practice piano at the music building. Kubinski read books, watched interviews and listened to some of the music to see what she could come up with.
“I learned a lot about the technical songwriting process as well as the artistic creative songwriting process,” Kubinski responded.
Along with music, Kubinski is a registered yoga instructor as well certified by Sonic Yoga in New York. While living in the city, she felt she needed something to supplement her musical income. Kubinski was a student of yoga and had been a Yogi practitioner. She saw yoga as a useful philosophy and methodology for living life. Kubinski taught and led kirtans at Harlem Yoga for three years until the pandemic.
“The practice of yoga can enhance your singing and performing,” replied Kubinski. “Music and yoga are extremely related because they’re both interested in vibration. When you’re practicing yoga, you may be able to move yourself from one state to another with as little as 30 seconds of yoga breathing or five minutes of physical practice and you can feel really differently than you did at the beginning.”
She went on to say, “I think the same is true with a song or a piece of music where you listen to it and expose yourself to those vibrations and you feel very differently at the end. I think both of them are really transformational tools in art.”
After she was certified, Kubinski’s music career began to pick up. Now, she’s a full-time singer/songwriter, voice over artist and other entertainment ventures where she uses her voice.
Kubinski currently resides in Saratoga Springs, NY. She has more songs in the works, with one called “Burn It Down” that is close to completing production. She is collaborating with Hannah Grace Colin (from season eight of the Lifetime show “Dance Moms”) on some songs and projects that will come out in early 2021. She also is collaborating with another yoga DJ name Sol Rising next year.
Kubinski's goal is for her music to be widely found and be a number one hit songwriter. She expressed that she is grateful to be a working singer/songwriter, and the next win for her, she said, is to say she has a number one charting hit – which Kubinski jokingly said she's working on.
“As a songwriter, I really hope that I'm becoming a part of people’s moments in life,” Kubinski added. “Important moments they’ll look back on and say Cassandra’s song was there.”
For more information on Cassandra Kubinski, go to cassandrakubinski.com.