Photo of Alysson Light - Courtesy Luck Media & Marketing, Inc

Music's New Bright Spot: Folk-Rock Singer-Songwriter- Musician (And College Student) ALYSSON LIGHT To Release Looking Glass Conversations, May 1, 2004 on Own WWM Record Label.

The Sarah Lawrence freshman sits pretty on Top 25 AAA radio with emphasis track "Silk Sunflowers" Light launches a national summer tour with full band.

Brains. Beauty. Talent. Alysson Light, has them all. The folk-rock singer-songwriter and pianist is music’s new bright spot, and her Looking Glass Conversations says it all. The rather brilliant Sarah Lawrence freshman’s sophomore album, poised for release on May 1, is the follow-up to Water, the debut she recorded when she was 15 years old. Both are available on her own WWM Records, via North Carolina-based Red Eye Distributing.

The first emphasis track from Looking Glass Conversations, "Silk Sunflowers," is already blooming in Top 25 AAA radio charts across the country. The edgy pop song is also a growing favorite at college radio. An actual college student whose music is played on college radio. Now that’s an unusual concept.And just as interesting and wonderfully ironic, while most college kids are waiting tables or working retail, the twinkling-eyed Light is taking a serious road trip on a national summer tour with the band she recently put together.

"My mom and dad [manager Alan Light] looked at the costs of going to the Berklee College of Music for the summer," explains Light, who has been awarded two scholarships there as the result of her audition when she was with the World Scholarship Tour, "and figured out that it would be less expensive for me to go on tour than to go to Berklee," Light laughs. "We also wanted to see how I felt about touring, because that would affect the kind of classes that I take there."

But for Light, who loves performing and traveling (and even hotel rooms!), a tour it seems, is just more of what she already enjoys so much.Where Water was a guitar-based album, Looking Glass Conversations is ensconced in Light’s piano, with pop leanings, imaginative experimentation, and folk-rock fusion, all pointing to her diversity and graceful range. "Silken Wind," for example, is old school folk through and through, while "Maybe" is all Midi electronic, perfect for AAA-Alternative radio.

The Chapel Hill, North Carolina native and popular performer in the hip East Village of New York City, is a two-time Berklee College of Music scholarship winner, was No. 1 Artist Overall at ArtistLaunch.com (July-Sept. 2002), held simultaneous No. 1 slots on this same site (it’s an OMD (online music delivery web site) in the folk, jazz, and easy listening categories (April 2002), ranked No. 2 at MP3.com in pop vocals, and jazz vocals, and No. 41 overall, and was a finalist in the 2003 North Carolina Battle of the Bands competition as a solo artist, plus a finalist in the state’s 2002 Songwriting Contest. She was a member of the elite State Honors Chorus as a student at James Taylor and Ben Folds’ alma mater, Chapel Hill High School, as well as a member of the summer Berklee School of music version of the renowned funk outfit, Tower of Power, while a junior in high school.

Her new band members ain’t no slouches, either. Guitarist and backing vocalist Luke Kalloch and bassist Julie Gibbs are both Berklee College of Music students. The three debuted in early March at The Lion’s Den in NYC, where their performance was pure chemistry -- exciting sounds of things to come for Light, whose Looking Glass Conversations will reflect the strength and depth of the production and musicians who recorded with her."I feel so good having a band with me.

I’ve never played with a band before. I see why everyone else starts out that way; it’s such a comfortable thing. It’s easier to talk when you have other people on stage with you," points out Light, who now won’t be carrying Looking Glass Conversations alone. "It just makes it that much more fun to have not just the sounds that I make, but the sounds that someone else makes. We blend for something even better."An astonishing pianist as well as an interesting vocalist, she plans to remain on the piano bench for the tour. "Some of the songs feature just guitar, but I play the piano on those just to double it," she explains. "The band is doing a great job picking up what’s already been put down by the studio musicians. I’ve now been writing songs based more on full band sounds since I’ve known that I’ve been going to work this way. I wrote the last album just for piano then and was thinking entirely about piano, but these days, I can think about more. It opens up all kinds of possibilities."And many more song conversations to be had.

Alysson Light’s Looking Glass Conversations can be purchased on CD Baby, Amazon.com, Tower.com, and downloaded through Music.com, Lindows, Napster, DiscLogic, MusicMatch, NetMusic, Rhapsody, BuyMusic, Apple iTunes, MusicNet, and AudioLunchbox.