By Ashley McKinley
Photo by Lea Morales
SONiA is a singer, songwriter, and visual artist from Baltimore, MD who founded the band Disappear Fear with her sister Cindy Frank. Sonia fell in love with music at the tender age of five after seeing a picture of a band in her family home.
SONiA’s style of music is totally different from other singers in the music industry. After growing up listening to The Beatles and Bruce Springsteen, she decided to mix her music with theirs. Her music also has blend of folk, pop, rock, blues and global sounds. Unlike her fellow artists who often write about money, sex, and women or men, SONiA focuses on humanitarian issues such as love, life, the city of Baltimore, LGBTQ and progressive rights.
If you have ever heard SONia sing, you would have noticed her very unique voice. “I would say I think my voice is somewhere between Patty Smith and Perry Como; and my guitar style has a Gipsy Kings and Richie Havens flavor,” says SONia. “The songs are mine, but you can hear some Beatles and Springsteen. It’s really all about the energy—like a bird jumping off a window ledge. It’s in that spilt second of trust and light and talent and God.”
SONiA is very passionate about her music and her fans. When SONia decided to be a singer, she defined her inner self and focused on honing in on her craft. She usually performs over 100 shows a year across United States, Europe, Australia, the Middle East, and Canada. Although SONia rarely performs in the Washington, D.C. area, she is bringing her talents to the Owen Brown Interfaith Center in Columbia, MD on Saturday, September 20.
Over the course of her 25-year career, she has received many awards from across the world. She recently has received the Coin of Honor from the United States Army for Humanitarian efforts and the GLAAD award for best album.
With retirement nowhere in sight, SONiA wants her legacy to be “someone who inspired people to be who found love and be open to it.” Sonia wants fear to disappear in people and to love out loud.
