Serpentine Arborvitae: Press

“ One of the most fascinating vocal stylists to emerge in many years. “

"From deep within New York’s downtown jazz enclaves, singer/ songwriter Serpentine Arborvitae first electrified listener’s with her dynamic gift of improvisational voice. After studying and performing with jazz legend Ornette Coleman, Serpentine turned from the avant-garde to cultivate her own musical forms. Endlessly suggestive and inventive, sensual and energetic, Serpentine breathes with a musical verve that evokes a fiery lust for freedom we may have forgotten we have."

Serpentine Arborvitae ~ “ Heaven’s Secret Garden “ "Luminous! Serpentine's soul blows musical kisses to her enraptured audience.Her Goddess-like voice, sacred dance movements and mesmerizing stage presence combine with her spiritually empowering lyrics to uplift her listeners into Heaven's Secret Garden. Her musical style is an enchanting bridge between East & West, Ancient & Modern - spanning Mediterranean, Vedic, and Celtic sacred traditions. Do your Self a big favor: go hear this lady sing."

"I want to tell you just how very much I love this music. You make beauitiful paintings with sound and your brilliant voice. It is food for my mind, body & soul. I feel deeply connected to Spirit while experiencing your music... it nourishes my most inner soul Source while positively inspiring my outer 'Goddess girl.' " 

SERPENTINE “ ROCK THE GODDESS “ ‘ Serpentine does it again! This second album reveals a refinement of style and sound that her first raw and powerful album opened up, with more world beat, middle eastern flair. AS always, she does not concern herself with merely sounding pleasing to the ear. Her music is designed to stir up, to confront, to empower, to awaken, to invoke, to be dark and powerful. Some of her pieces such as “ Heru-Ra-Ha” are pure invocations, complete with her trademark hisses, groans and wild high howls. The sounds she makes are evocative and compelling and move one into an altered state. Other instrumentation includes her simple and effective synthesizer backgrounds. ”Rock the Goddess” takes the classic chant “ We all come from the Goddess “ and takes off into a deep trance rock groove. It must be said that the drumming, funky bass, dark tasteful, polyrhythmic synth and lead guitar work are all outstanding, pulsing and flowing to frame her moving invocations.. With her ethereal voice and powerful music, I can’t help but thinking of her as Enya on a broomstick! This magnificent album may disturb some, be forewarned, but listen if you dare...This is another treasure from the new rock high priestess.”

SERPENTINE ~ “The First Coil“ Once every great while, even the primary colors like “ folk, rock, blues, jazz,“ can only fade when trying to categorize a vividly personal vision. Using her voice and a synthesizer, with guitar and percussion added, Serpentine Arborvitae could compose a soundtrack to David Lynch’s next film, only I think the movie should be about her. More than any hard macho-rock you can think of “The First Coil” shatters convention and routine, but in its place raises dark pagan frameworks that allow the primal spirits to enter our world. Its no surprise the ten tracks are eccentric, daring and erotic. Any good musician reaches for some common truth, but Serpentine is after the ultimate passion that channels spiritual totality through the mortal individual. Though this motif dominates her music, Serpentine has many moods and styles at her disposal; for example, the polychordal vocal patterns familiar to Bulgaria and Asia Minor. One recurring vocalization is a long keening howl that could be the pain of childbirth, and of being born simultaneously. These are ancient amoral voices that guide our world - and Serpentine can hear them. This time categories can wait. ~ Mark Keating

Focus Magazine/ EATMAG.COM SERPENTINE ARBORVITAE " Temple of the Heart " Recorded in Tel Aviv, Israel This is one of those albums that supercedes the usual banal chatter. With a sound that binds traditional instrumentation with digital orchestrations and religious persuasion with futurist manifest. Serpentine's " Temple Of The Heart " is a genuine union of historical and cutting edge elements. In a cosmic swirl of profound new age Enya like arrangements and conventional Middle-Eastern motifs, Serpentine's vocal passages are a passionate declaration of love and devotion to the secular and sometimes sacrilegious.With the silken tones similiar to Ofra Haza, Serpentine constructs a multi-blossomed bouquet of synthesizers and traditional hand percussion, that evokes a tribal, mystical ambience.From there her lyrics explore the sensual and surreal : " Mother nature makes no mistake, no separation between spirit and flesh, let it guide your soul to soul...sex is holy ! " Ahh, yes. !! A little daring " White Witch " , a bit glamourous " Goddess Girl " , with some very arousing proposals" My Body Is My Cauldron " Serpentine will appeal to broad-minded listeners, that enjoy both Paula Cole and Dead Can Dance with this poppish global feast. Exceptional production and visionary sound.

Well,... where do I begin?... What an amazing performance last night!... whatever energies have allowed its magic to work within you has truly arrived inside your skin & at a time when we need your music, your passion & your truth. Rarely do I feel performers climb inside the song & become the song. You have done that & in a genuine & authentic way. From the first song to the last, I felt transported & lifted to a higher place within myself. And watching you, John & River blend with one another so easily & with such passion was inspirational for all of us. Thank you so much for this astounding performance.Thank you for your vision & your willingness to be of service for the greater good. And thank you for doing this performance first at the Light Center, where higher, transforming frequencies are released into other dimensions, knowingly & unknowingly by many. I can still feel the vibrations.

" TEMPLE OF THE HEART" CD Fan's Review " I have listened to "TEMPLE OF THE HEART " several times. I am blown away. I love your other work, but till now, I guess I had heard your songs as solitary creations. Sure, each of the songs on TOTH can easily stand on their own as wonderful works of art, but when listened to from the beginning to the end, particularlty in the midst of a horrific thunderstorm on I-10 in Louisana, it makes the hairs stand on end. In short, this album is like a mind-altering drug. You might consider putting an advisory sticker on it: " Warning--highly addictive! " You're probably sick of everyone heaping praise on you, but I've got to be honest. The only problem with your music is that I don't have 20 or 30 CDs to listen to. Simply incredible. On this end, I'm going to keep on spreading the message till your name and music are household words."

" MANTRA AMERICA Is a must as it conveys a successful fusion of cultures, blending into this continent the spirit of eastern mysticism with the already profound spirits of that which is native to this land. If one enjoys any such variation of Hindu sounds as well as Native American then you have stumbled upon a treasure that in my experience has not been explored before. Once again Serpentine has offered her musical gifts to the world and we are all enriched by them."

"ROCK THE GODDESS  Haunting, exhilarating, moving and mystical; the beautifully intoxicating and exalting sounds of Rock The Goddess will conjure a reverence shared by Goddess-centered peoples toward the Great Mother of us all. Serpentine's musical recipes are powerful incantations, that touch a very primitive point within the inner self, often confronting the discomfort of our more hidden aspects of persona. This brings the listener to new heights as a result, approaching the altar of the Goddess Herself, and embracing the holy being of both animal and spirit that we all are woven out of. Breath work and more organic-sounds emerge as if we are in a darkened forest of predator versus prey, where our senses are heightened to their maximum fight and flight capacity. With her savage melodies, Serpentine lures you into the holiness of wild nature, the tooth and claw that evolved us into the creatures who have survived millions of years upon this planet of life. Shedding the many layers of our present society's sense of separation and enforced domestications as she tempts us to explore our more primitive recesses of self. Every Earth-Centered individual will fall in love with the completion of the world famous Pagan hymn "We All Come from the Goddess." This musical exploration is delivered with powerfully rounded new verses and set to joyful sweet sounds of veneration toward the many faces of the Goddess as She has been worshipped throughout various world cultures. Little Witch House is perhaps one of Serpentine's most noted works, a delicious collage of disturbing and ominous melodies and shrieks, a Hansel and Gretel-like Grim's fairy tale set to music. A song for the solitary life of a witch and the burgeoning powers of her potential, rooted in ancient ways and living in modern times. There is certainly a part to Little Witch House that may make one uncomfortable if they do not understand the positive intentions behind Serpentine's endeavors.The unabashed release of dark rage is permitted in full within the heart of this magnificent piece, as the base human scream is a vital expression of the natural self, where in the power of Earth Magick — is rooted. In many parts of the anthology, Rock the Goddess tends to the nature of human physicality, dismissing the judgment that traditional society lends to our healthy, sensual selves.The philosophy of original sin is replaced by the positive, the original goodness of being human. Rock the Goddess is raw and succulent, drawing down a Pagan temple of deep celebration into your own setting. The imminent divinity of being, encompassed by a profound understanding of The Goddess, is intricately woven through djembe rolls, synth and pan pipes.These are magnified only by the sheer genius of Serpentine's free style, experimental tongues. Her wildly eloquent trills and deep-throated vocalizations come through like untamed - yet highly mastered - chants that surge from profound reaches of the psyche so that the listener may be acquainted with the pure animal-spirit state of human experience.

Sublime beauty, grace and wisdom saturate this singer's visionary self produced art. Serpentine casts a spell with ambient pop exotic atmospheres both intimate and uplifting. Intoxicated by the teaching and writings of Ernest Holmes Serpentine's voice effortlessly modulates the full spectrum of human emotions through her songs." DREAM WITH ME " awakens us to our human magnificence. Affirming the powers we possess to heal, as well as exposing the deep, sometimes turbulent emotions that arise as part of that awakening.

SERPENTINE " ROCK THE GODDESS "

In this, her second commerically released album, Serpentine once again takes us on a macabre tour of her magical world. "Pretty" is not an adjective one would ever use to describe her music; this is the stuff from the deepest and darkest nooks and crannies of the human psyche—a powerful blend of New York urban gothic squalor, fascinating electronics and of course, the voice of this extremely talented individual who uses it not as a lyric device, but as a precise instrument of pleasure and torture. Moving from playful lullabies to primal screams within the same piece, Serpentine's voice has the dynamic range and flexibility of Bobby McFerrin with the intensity of Kali. Rock the Goddess brings in a new sound to the music of alternative spirituality, a sound which exposes the great depth of emotion and energy on the magical plane. 

“Serpentine has to be the most versatile female vocalist in existence. Throughout “ ROCK THE GODDESS “ her angelic vocals range from soft lullaby, to deep and errie to very high pitched.A highly original style, full of depth, commercially accessible and indescribably pleasantly bizarre. On top of that, the word is out that she puts on a great, strange and unique show on a frequent basis in the Manhattan area. “

SERPENTINE" THE FIRST COIL " New York City neo-pagan singer/performance artist delivers this vital, INTENSE, evocative, dark, witchy, hard to review but excellent album of gothic, ritual, tribal, synthesizer, GODDESS rock ambience .Her incredible soaring voice is also capable of the most animalistic gutteral sounds and bone chilling wails. The outstanding lyrics are striking and powerful, exploring radical feminist themes in ways both compelling and unsettling. The Burning Times sings to those dark times of the holocaust of the witches of Europe and to modern women’s internalized oppression and subjection. To Die Is Ecstasy is a trance dance sung in tongues a la her work on Gabrielle Roth’s label. Lilith is a truly disturbing song invoking the hissing cackling, screeching, otherworldly calls of the succubus that I never the less enjoyed. To quote one reviewer in N.Y. “ her lyrics reveal the scars of womanhood “. A song that stands out lyrically is the autobiographical Belonging To No One that explores her evolutional reclaiming of her sexual being, evoking the true meaning of virgin as a un possessed person. An outstanding work, but not easy to listen to, beware!

Serpentine ~ ROCK THE GODDESS Serpentine has captured some serious Crone energy on this recording - or so it seems to me, at least. Maybe it’s a gut reaction to her combination of minor keys and Middle Eastern-inflected melodies, which she sprinkles liberally over sampled percussion, synth pads, and some live guitar and bass. Or maybe it’s her keening voice, encompassing both whispered invocation (“invocation to the moon goddess (at the sea)”) and exultant chanting (“rock the goddess”, a funky adaptation of some ‘traditional’ chants). The resulting blend is akin to Dead Can Dance, but with a harsher edge - less croon, more crone? Her lyrics are stream-of-consciousness entities, weaving their way from a child’s refuge (“little witch house”) to a woman’s reclamation of power (“ride my broom”). About half of the album is lyricless, which doesn’t mean voiceless, as Serpentine applies chants and wails over the hypnotic grooves. “Hypnotic” is a key word here - so if you’re looking for music to guide a new moon meditation, or just to trance out to, then look no further. Scott’s picks: “heru-ra-ha”, “little witch house”

SERPENTINE “ ROCK THE GODDESS “ ‘A voice in song for those of us who love our Goddess! So exotic ,so beautiful, so in touch with the stirring of music into the senses. I’m hooked. With titles like “ Little Witch House “ and ” Ride My Broom” how can you resist! An earthy yet polished piece of art. Be prepared for a wonderful spiritual ride. I give it five broomsticks!”

" With the grace of a cobra, Serpentine's lush liquid tones begin whispering secrets, soft and sensous climaxing in an ecstasy of explosive passion. The vocal charms of this graceful serpent are mesmerizing, weaving a trail of chills and thrills through my body. " Enchanted!

" Serpentine, that was just a completely utterly wonderful and stunning evening last night. The three of us just loved and adored it. It fed me still when I woke up this morning. Say "yes" to all the opportunities to share more of what happened last night with the wide wider widest world(s)...."

A beautiful goddess sister from that wonderful cosmic consciousness place beyond duality! Singing and toning - bringing forth the flow of light & dark energies of dualty's dance on earth today! An important job! Welcome to Asheville. May your journey continue to deepen & flourish here. Blessings, new friend! Your performance last night was unusual, mesmerizing, enthralling.

SERPENTINE PERFORMANCE AT UNITY CHURCH FLETCHER NC " Serpentine's performance this past weekend was mesmerizing and unlike any other vocal presentation I have experienced in the past. She is capable of communicating with her whole audience in a way that touches people at a deeply spiritual level. I felt refreshed and reminded of my own interests in mysticism, wondering why I have not pursued them more deeply--like Serpentine is."

SERPENTINE ARBORVITAE PERFORMANCE AT THE CENTER OF UNLIMITED POSSIBILITIES " I so wish to see Asheville acknowledge Serpentine for her incredible voice. My impression of her is that she is a very humble and unassuming person. I was carried away by her amazing voice and her ability to express from every chakra of her being. Serpentine's expanded and deep sense of Spirit shine through every note."