The group Iowa (IOWA) is a project headed by Ekaterina Ivanchikova. Having started her solo career, she conquered Belarus and then the whole of Russia with lightning speed. Her emotionality, sensuality, and expression, with which her songs are imbued, are very close to people. She lets every word pass through her heart.
Their music inspires and relaxes, makes you think or forget about everything. It is filled with drive and expression. Today - it is one of the brightest and most popular bands in its genre.
Main persona
The founder and vocalist of the group "Iowa" is Ekaterina Ivanchikova. She was born in the Belarusian town of Chausy on August 18, 1987. Since childhood she loved to sing and dreamed of becoming an artist. Her parents were far from creativity: her father worked as a mechanic, her mother - a kindergarten teacher. The girl spent a lot of time in the circle of friends. Her broad and kind soul was pronounced in childhood: she often brought sick and stray animals, begging her family to keep them and cure them.
From an early age, she attended a music school, mastered the piano, received dancing skills. At the same time, Catherine practiced drawing. Despite this workload, the girl studied well. But the most favorite occupation was vocal. She raved about the big stage. And being a high school student, began to go to the dream: performed songs in the genre of hard rock, applying it growling. It was because of this passion that she failed to get the desired education, because the Mogilev College of Culture took only students with academic vocals.
Then Ivanchikova went into pedagogy. In Minsk, she successfully studied for 4 years, receiving two specialties "philology" and "journalism". But neither one nor the other was of any use to the girl, because when she received her diploma Ekaterina already knew that she would not be a teacher or a correspondent.
The beginning of the creative path and a rapid rise
As a student, the girl took part in the TV program "Star Stagecoach" (analog of "Star Factory" in Russia). Her talent was highly appreciated by experts, and it was simply unthinkable to "bury" it. She got the idea to organize a band, which, in fact, the singer did.
Leonid Tereshchenko (guitarist), Vasily Bulanov (drummer) and Ekaterina Ivanchikova (vocalist and songwriter) became the first and main composition of the band IOWA. It happened in 2009. The name of the band was given by the guys, referring to Katya's nickname - Iowa (so she was called at one rocker party in honor of the concert of her favorite band Slipknot. This name "stuck", and everyone began to call her that. As it turned out later, the idiom IOWA stands for Idiots Out Wandering Around. It sounds very unconventional, attractive and memorable).
At first Ivanchikova played three roles in the band: songwriter, vocalist and bass guitarist. But a little later she decided to concentrate on vocals, reserving the right to write lyrics for the band. She started to compose beautiful and sensual poems back in school, when she first fell in love. The peculiarity of her creativity lies in the fact that in each word you can feel her feelings, excitement, passion or tenderness. And in combination with the manner of singing the songs they become incredibly expressive, energetic and at the same time soulful.
The group "Iowa" became a fresh breath for the Belarusian audience. They conquered the youth audience and quite quickly decided to go on tour. It was very successful: thousands came to the concerts, actively sang along, knowing all the words by heart, asked for autographs and were recognized on the streets.
Having climbed to the top of the Belarusian show business, the young artists went to conquer Russia. And they did it quickly and efficiently. The first to open the door for them was St. Petersburg - the city where creativity is in the air. Coming at first only for a couple of days for a concert, the band finally moved there. They were welcomed very warmly, and soon the guests coming from Belarus began to be taken for their own.
Performing at the peak of popularity
The fame of the group IOWA spread very quickly. They began to be invited to the largest concert venues: Red Square, SC "Olympic", "Ice Palace". However, they did not have a single album or music video yet. This had to be urgently corrected, and active preparation began.
The first video clip of their creative biography was filmed for the composition "Simple Song". For a few weeks he collected about 100 thousand views. This is an incredible success for beginners in this field. The second video for the song "Mom" brought them the first million views.
The group has several iconic soundtracks in its repertoire: "Looking for a husband" for the show "Let's get married", "Same thing" for the TV series "Kitchen", "Simple song" for t/s "Fizruk", "Smile" for two works at once - "Fizruk" and "Sweet Life".
At the end of 2014, they finally released their first album - Export. And not surprisingly, the next year became the peak of popularity of the musical collective.
2015 was very successful. Nationwide love, crowds of fans, recognizability on the streets, dozens of concerts, tours, shootings - a real star life! The musical group received the award "Lyra", "Golden Gramophone", as well as a number of nominations: "Best Group", "Breakthrough of the Year", "Best Song", "Best Russian Performer", "Best Group", "Song of the Year", "Best Pop Group". They were noted by all music publications, TV channels and radio stations. In the same year they performed in Moscow Crocus City Hall, and were also honored to open the festival "New Wave".
The following years of their creative activity were not less successful. Almost every song of theirs automatically becomes a hit. They are always welcome guests at any concert. The soundtracks of the group sound in the most popular movies and TV series.
Over the last few years the band has undergone changes in its composition - three more people joined them: Alexander Gavrilov (bass guitarist), Andrey Artemiev (keyboardist), Ruslan Gadzhimuradov (drummer). The producer of the band is Oleg Baranov.
Cohesive work, friendly atmosphere, professional arrangements, strong vocals, original stage image and boundless talent of each band member allow IOWA to be one of the most popular representatives of pop-rock genre on the Russian stage. About further events in the life of the collective read in the catalog of artists on the website kontramarka.de.
Discography:
2014 - Export
2016 - Import
