ELA (pronounced ‘Ella’) is an emerging new artist who writes from her core and sings from her soul. The Welsh London-based singer-songwriter is an experienced recording artist for TV drama and is now embarking on releasing her own material with a forthcoming E.P. 'Unfurl' which will be released later in the year and which is written by ELA and Ian Barter who has worked with big names such as Izzy Bizu, Paloma Faith and Amy Winehouse. Each of the five songs are based on her own personal experiences and are about the challenges of becoming a young woman. Fans may be surprised at the range of genres: from smoky jazzy chords to piano and voice ballad to a sassy number. The first single from the E.P. is the chilled and upbeat ‘Our Summer’, released on 26th June 2020.

ELA is originally from West Wales, a little village called Brongest near Cardigan but then she moved to Monmouth for 10 years (the reason, she thinks, that she mostly lost her strong Welsh accent!) She credits her musical father with helping her from a very young age to learn to play music and to sing, but above all, to work hard. This inspired and enabled her to win a coveted music scholarship where she decided to focus on the freedom of expression she found in singing. Of her father, she says “He's definitely one of my biggest musical inspirations because he taught me how to tell a story whilst singing which I think is super important.” ELA also is also inspired by the strong contemporary female artists that she loves– including Jorja Smith, Mahalia and Dua Lipa.

After college ELA’s big break came when she was invited to work with composer and performer Amy Wadge who wrote and sang the songs for the hit BBC One drama series, ‘Keeping Faith’. Here she had the pleasure of singing stunning songs in her native Welsh language: an exhilarating experience and it was certainly a huge honour to be involved in such a high-profile BBC show. Not only that, ELA was also invited on stage with Amy and composer Laurence Love Greed when they were awarded a Welsh BAFTA for the original score. Other TV recordings include singing two songs written by Amy Wadge for a BBC2 drama celebrating the NHS, To Provide All People, starring Martin Freeman, George McKay and others. More recently ELA was lucky enough to be asked to write and perform the songs for a new lockdown drama series (Cyswllt) which were written, recorded and produced ‘virtually’, and with only three weeks to write three songs! A challenge for any artist, particularly one who has just landed it as her very first writing commission, but the project worked out brilliantly and was a resounding success. Now, it is time for ELA to emerge as an artist and performer in her own right.

New single ‘Our Summer’ is a warm and vibrant feel-good song about young summer love and how we tend to associate a summer with that one special person.. ELA wrote it from the lows of experiencing such 'holiday blues' – a feeling we can all relate to. She says “I hope the hooky chorus will take the listeners back to ‘that happy moment’ in their lives: when they were in the company of their favourite person; the sun was beating down on them and for them to experience a wave of that iconic summery feeling.”