Proud Homewood resident, Pittsburgh native, and self-proclaimed FireShorty™️, INEZ is a multi-faceted artistic Renaissance woman. The nurtured product of two musical parents, INEZ developed an intense love of music and audio. INEZ, a Cum Laude Berklee College of Music alumna, is a musical polymath for singing, music production, arranging, songwriting, drumming, audio mixing, mastering, and engineering.
INEZ began her public musical ascent as the featured vocalist and songwriter on Spillage Village (SinceThe80s) artist Benji.’s song “Family Ties”; a collaborator whom she shared production credits with on her 2018 single, “Love x INEZ”. Following the release of her debut album "Voicemails and Conversations," INEZ’s work was featured on NPR Weekend Edition, Bandcamp Daily Essentials, and earned her the cover story of the Pittsburgh City Paper.
Despite the confines of COVID-19, INEZ performed on the digital mainstage of The Dollar Bank Three Rivers Arts Festival, headlined City Theatre's Drive-In Arts Festival at Hazelwood Green, performed on local PBS station WQED and composed and performed work for Jon Rubin and Sohrab Kashani’s joint exhibition The Other Apartment at Pittsburgh’s Mattress Factory Museum and Museum of Sohrab in Tehran, Iran. In late 2020, INEZ was selected as an Artist-in-Residence at the Frank-Ratchye Studio for Creative Inquiry at Carnegie Mellon University. INEZ received the “Reviewer’s Award” for the University of Pittsburgh’s Office of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion “The Art of Diversity” Showcase and Competition, winning the award for her song “Queen.”
In January 2021, INEZ was named "Pittsburgh Music Artist of the Year" for 2020 by Pittsburgh AAA-format radio station WYEP 91.3 FM. INEZ completed audio production work with Kelly StrayhornTheater for Duolingo’s 5th Anniversary and performed at Kelly Strayhorn Theater’s SUNSTAR: Women in Music Festival. She helped open the 2021 NFL season, singing the “Star Spangled Banner” for the Pro Football Hall of Fame Enshrinement Game in Canton, OH. In December, INEZ received $20,000 after being awarded the Carol R. Brown Creative Achievement Award as the Emerging Artist recipient by The Heinz Endowments, The Pittsburgh Foundation, and Opportunity Fund.
2022 saw INEZ perform the mainstage of the Deutschtown Music Festival, Chamber Music Pittsburgh's Just Summer series, and later rang in 2023 for the City of Pittsburgh as the headlining performer of Highmark's First Night New Year’s Eve celebration.
In 2023, INEZ returned to her compositional and production roots. She completed work with Healthline.com (Nina’s Metastatic Breast Cancer series), composed ten original works for Pittsburgh NPR station WESA 90.5 FM and WYEP 91.3 FM's joint Artist-in-Residence programming, and composed two works for Looking Glass Augmented Reality Archive. INEZ earned her first film composition credit with Pittsburgh Sound + Image’s restoration of Spang’s First Century film; scoring and sound designing the seventh and final reel. INEZ received acceptance into UniSound’s (Three Rivers Young Peoples Orchestra) Black-Teaching-Artist-In-Residence (BTAR) program; a program supporting the artistic practice and professional development of Black music teaching artists in the Pittsburgh region. In June, she became a new voting member of The Recording Academy/GRAMMY’s and was awarded $50,000 (over two years) by The Heinz Endowments and The Pittsburgh Foundation as a 2023 Advancing Black Arts in Pittsburgh grantee.
In February 2024, INEZ was honored by Senator Lindsey Williams and the Pennsylvania State Senate Democrats for her contributions to Black music and art in Pennsylvania.
INEZ is an Audio Arts Instructor at YMCA Lighthouse Project and has been an active Pittsburgh teaching artist since 2015. She is passionate about advocating for and mentoring the next generation of musicians, songwriters and creatives. INEZ hopes to continue using the fullness of her gifts to create space for and uplift the voices and talents of Black girls, femmes, and women.