Corrinne May (born Corrinne Foo May Ying; ) is a Singaporean singer-songwriter based in Los Angeles. Born on January 19, 1973, she was named after her mother's favourite song, "Corinna, Corinna".
Corrinne studied in Raffles Girls' Primary School, Raffles Girls' School (Secondary) and Raffles Junior College. She later majored in mass communications and English literature at the National University of Singapore. Corrinne left Singapore to further her music education at the Berklee College of Music, where she majored in songwriting and film scoring. In order to pursue her dreams in music, she moved to Los Angeles in 1999.
Corrinne co-wrote the song "If You Didn’t Love Me" with the legendary songwriters Carole King and Carole Bayer Sager as part of her winning entry in a songwriting competition on the music industry website blank">Tonos.com. Carole King & Carole Bayer Sager wrote the lyric for the song and entertained submissions for the best musical accompaniment and melody. Corrinne's version was the winner. The song is featured on Corrinne's debut album. Corrinne has met Carole Bayer Sager but not Carole King.
Her song "Journey" was featured on the Taiwanese drama Dolphin Bay Lovers and was covered by popular Asian singers _Angela Zhang and Gigi Leung.
Corrinne’s cover version of the Burt Bacharach classic “Close to You” was featured prominently in the movie “So Close” released by Columbia-Tristar films (2002).
In September 2004, Corrinne May became the first (and only) artist singing exclusively in English, to be signed by the record label Forward Music in Taiwan, which distributes her music to Taiwan, Japan, Hong Kong and China.
Two songs from Corrinne's second album, "Save Me" and "Everything in its Time", were featured in Channel 5's hit television series, Chase, which ran from March to May 2005. Chase arguably propelled Corrinne May from relative obscurity to an unprecedented level of recognition in Singapore.
Corrinne has been playing the piano since the age of 5, and is also proficient with the guitar. On February 11, 2005, The Straits Times interviewed May, who related that being a devout Catholic, "much of her music has been inspired by her relationship with God".
On Sunday 12 February 2006, Corrinne held a concert "Strings & Serenades: Corrinne May in Concert" in Singapore at UCC Hall. Singapore's answer to Sarah McLachlan returned to kick off the Arts Festival with this one-night-only acoustic concert, backed by an eight-piece string ensemble. Due to popular demand, an extra show was added on Monday February 13, 2006. This second show was more intimate and featured Corrinne on her piano accompanied by just a string quartet.
On Saturday 16 December 2006, Corrinne also held a Christmas Concert in Esplanade following the release of her Christmas album, The gift.
Corrinne's latest concert, "Beautiful Seed: Corrinne May in Concert", was held at the UCC Hall on Friday 3 August 2007. The singer performed tracks from her latest CD, Beautiful Seed, which was to be released the following Monday. A pre-release sale of the CD was held after the concert, followed by an autograph session, which lasted almost four hours.
