2025 Competition Entry:
Still The Girl by Tracey
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Genre
Pop
Artist
Website
Co-writer(s)
no
Performer(s)
Tracey Yarad voice/piano, Jon Cowherd, hammond organ, Luca Benedetti, guitar, Tony Scherr, bass, Josh Dion, drums
Description
In my disbelief that my husband decided to leave our marriage after 23 years I couldn’t get it because I was still the girl he married….little did I know what he was REALLY up to :)
Bio
Australia-born, New York-based Tracey Yarad is a pianist and singer-songwriter with jazz sensibilities. Her career has taken her from touring Australia with her original music and having a Top 40 single in the ’90s, to a seven-year residency singing in 5-star hotels in Japan, to running her own music school for 18 years in the Blue Mountains of Australia, to New York.
Blessed with a soulful, incredibly beautiful instrument and a talent for composing heartfelt and evocative songs, Tracey has produced multiple projects since relocating to New York City, performing at the 55 Bar, Soapbox Gallery, the Bitter End, Birdland, among others. She has collaborated with Grammy-nominated Chilean vocal star Claudia Acuna, Grammy-winning Jon Cowherd and avant garde saxophonist Dave Binney. Her duo performance with pianist Jim Ridl, ‘Lost in Translation’ (featuring stories and songs from her seven years as a hotel singer in Japan) was flagged by the New Yorker’s award-winning journalist Steve Futterman, who wrote, “If demanding experience leads to hard-won wisdom, Yarad and Ridl will have much to impart.”
In 2024 she took her her one-woman-show All These Pretty Things to the Edinburgh Fringe, a musical memoir based on her own experience of her 23 year marriage and it’s shocking demise. The show has received rave reviews and is touring extensivley in Australia and the UK in 2025. “Breathtakingly honest and gorgeously sung songs on the themes of loss and abandonment, and the restorative power of music and love.” – Broadway World
As part of her re-invention in her new life in NYC she has added jazz photographer to her list of professional accomplishments, and is photographer of choice for many of New York’s leading jazz musicians. Her work has appeared in Downbeat, Guitar Player, and Drum Scene magazines.
Blessed with a soulful, incredibly beautiful instrument and a talent for composing heartfelt and evocative songs, Tracey has produced multiple projects since relocating to New York City, performing at the 55 Bar, Soapbox Gallery, the Bitter End, Birdland, among others. She has collaborated with Grammy-nominated Chilean vocal star Claudia Acuna, Grammy-winning Jon Cowherd and avant garde saxophonist Dave Binney. Her duo performance with pianist Jim Ridl, ‘Lost in Translation’ (featuring stories and songs from her seven years as a hotel singer in Japan) was flagged by the New Yorker’s award-winning journalist Steve Futterman, who wrote, “If demanding experience leads to hard-won wisdom, Yarad and Ridl will have much to impart.”
In 2024 she took her her one-woman-show All These Pretty Things to the Edinburgh Fringe, a musical memoir based on her own experience of her 23 year marriage and it’s shocking demise. The show has received rave reviews and is touring extensivley in Australia and the UK in 2025. “Breathtakingly honest and gorgeously sung songs on the themes of loss and abandonment, and the restorative power of music and love.” – Broadway World
As part of her re-invention in her new life in NYC she has added jazz photographer to her list of professional accomplishments, and is photographer of choice for many of New York’s leading jazz musicians. Her work has appeared in Downbeat, Guitar Player, and Drum Scene magazines.
Lyrics
Deep water drowning
Nothing stays the same
The wheels keep turning
People looking at us
Wishing that they had a love like ours
Tell me
Where are you going
I’m still the girl
That you used to know
Trying to pull myself up
Out of misery
And it’s weighing me down, down, down
Holding onto hope
Hanging by a thread
A ray of light
That’s nearly broke
Tell me
Where are you going
I’m still the girl
That you used to love
We made it half way to forever
Side by side
Now you’re leaving
You made a choice
I didn’t get to decide
Hey take a deeper look
Damned things pulling strings
In your subconscious mind
Living with my doubts
Took a bite right out of your integrity
Hey tell me
Where are you going
I’m still the girl
Where are you going
That you used to love
Nothing stays the same
The wheels keep turning
People looking at us
Wishing that they had a love like ours
Tell me
Where are you going
I’m still the girl
That you used to know
Trying to pull myself up
Out of misery
And it’s weighing me down, down, down
Holding onto hope
Hanging by a thread
A ray of light
That’s nearly broke
Tell me
Where are you going
I’m still the girl
That you used to love
We made it half way to forever
Side by side
Now you’re leaving
You made a choice
I didn’t get to decide
Hey take a deeper look
Damned things pulling strings
In your subconscious mind
Living with my doubts
Took a bite right out of your integrity
Hey tell me
Where are you going
I’m still the girl
Where are you going
That you used to love
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