Cookie Baker
Genre:Folk, Pop/rock
** Upcoming shows:
PLEASE CLICK THE GIGS TAB ABOVE
'Clever, sophisticated, laid-back, personal and inspiring.' - Rip It Up
'A prodigious talent...' - The Advertiser
'A piquant, poignant and evocative release' - ABC Radio
Cookie Baker grew up on a farm by the seaside. She can be spotted gallivanting around the fair city of Adelaide, South Australia, and consistently throughout the countryside. She also has a talent for hiding and is a sucker for adventure. The warm melodies, cool wordsmithery and a sugar-velvet voice that Cookie pulls from thin air and wraps in her whimsical guitar ‘n’ piano licks create a potent faux-folk pop-cabaret sensation that these experiences and environments only serve to benefit. An effervescent yet relaxed and personable performer and an introspective songwriter, Cookie Baker has shared stages with Augie March, Little Birdy, Ben Lee, Kate Miller-Heidke, Old Man River and The Audreys. A penchant for creating innovative new concepts in live performance and being a huge supporter of our local live scene saw Miss Cookie sell out her 2008 Adelaide Fringe show ‘Dark Horse in an Ivory Veil’ (which received a Fringe Award nomination for Best Music), its subsequent encore performances of the same name and her 2009 Adelaide Fringe theatre showcases, celebrating the release of her debut album. Cookie featured on the Coopers Lager Sessions Compilation CD and was also handpicked to appear in the inaugural Coopers Alive Live Music Showcase event, which sold out beyond capacity and resulted in Cookie being approached with a proposal to produce and present her own theatrical music production as part of the Adelaide Festival Centre’s inSPACE program in 2009, featuring her extended and ever-evolving live ensemble, her Special Secret Spells. Cookie Baker’s debut album Gala Day was released nationally through Mixmasters Records and MGM in November 2008 – successful touring throughout New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia and consistent national radio airplay continues to engage Australian audiences. 2010 brings with it Cookie Baker's maiden voyage to New Zealand to perform in the New Zealand Fringe Festival in Wellington. Cookie will also join award-winning songwriters Matt Gresham (WA), Nicole Brophy (NSW) and Chris Pickering (QLD) on the much-anticipated United Tour 2010 presented by Big Tree Artists and Mucho Bravado. [See Gigs page for more info...] About Gala Day: Uplifting, wry, observant and downright honest in her approach to life’s little tricks, flips and whimsies, Cookie Baker’s debut album Gala Day is at once gently arresting, mature yet playful – story time for grownups – an aural novella laden with haunting strings, barnyard percussives and a rich, raw and melancholic vocal quality aimed square at the heart. From the opening sparse acoustic heartbreak of ‘Espery’, to the childlike circus/schoolyard bop of ‘Walls Made Of String’, to the gut-wrenching majestic beauty of ‘Bad Weather’, Gala Day is no walk in the park, but a trip down memory lane, a shout-out to home truths and a face-off with lost love, found habits and laying your bones bare.
