Real Name: Maya Hussam Asmar
Place of Birth: Akkar - Miniara
Date of Birth: 14th of August.
Horoscope: Leo
Family Members: Mother "May", Father "Husam", Elder Brother "Marwan" and younger sister "Rana".
Pets: Maya loves animals and has a little cute dog named "Chips"
Maya lived in Tripoli till she finished high school, she went to Ste. Famille school, and was always on top of her class.
When she finished high school, Maya moved to Beirut, and joined the "Lebanese University, the fine arts institute" to study "Stage, TV and Cinema Acting and Directing".
She is still trying her best to finish her university degree, Maya explains: "I learned from my parents that, education is important and indispensable, no matter how successful and well off a person is."
During these years, Maya worked to support herself, and pay for her education; she did modeling, TV Commercials, and acted in TV series, cinema, and theater. Maya describes these different experiences saying: "acting helped me a lot later on when I became a singer; I learned how to deal with camera, and face the audience in live performances."
She add: "I have great passion for acting that is equal to my passion for singing if not more, I dream of performing in a musical that will make use of my acting and singing talents."
Unlike many female singers in the Arab world, Maya was encouraged by her family to enter the domain of singing, and never had to struggle to convince them to let her peruse singing as a career.
They sensed her talent develops through out the years, and encouraged her to participate in "Kas Al-Nojom" competition in 1998.
This talent TV show was the starting point for Maya's singing career. In this program Maya won 3 trophies; the "Layla Murad" category trophy, the audience trophy, and eventually she surpassed all other contestants and won the "trophy of trophies" which was the ultimate prize of this competition.
Maya recalls: "the competition was very tough, and there were many participants who are older and more experienced and has actually studied music. Winning in this competition meant a lot to me."
With the support of the great director and star maker "Simon Asmar", Maya was introduced to the Arabic musical scene, and her first release "Akhbarak Eih", received great success, and Maya became a prominent star overnight.
Stardom did not change Maya she is still modest and simple in her relationships with others, Maya say's: "till date I go about town as a normal person, forgetting that I am famous, and it still surprises me sometimes, that people recognize me and start talking to me, for a moment I try to remember if I know this person?!!. Then I realize that this person is a fan that recognizes me from TV. It feels great to be loved by people, yet sometimes it takes away your privacy."
Maya is always accompanied by a family member when she is touring, her father usually accompanying her if she was touring inside Lebanon, and her Mother would be with her if she was touring Outside Lebanon.
Maya expresses her thoughts about this love and support from her family saying: "I was always the center of attention in the family, due to my multiple talents; I liked to sing, dance and loved posing for my father's camera.
My father cherishes our family and he always tends to capture our special moments with his camera, we have tons of pictures.
Even now, the entire family documents everything I do; all my TV appearances, concerts, radio interviews, etc. are taped and preserved in my family archive."
Maya adds "I guess I inherited this sense of documentation from my father, when it comes to my fans, I keep every message I get from them on stage in special albums. I also, have a fans e-mail address to stay in contact with my fans, I get a lot of e-mails, from fans around the world, I have them all; printed out, categorized and preserved in special binders."
Maya continues: "I love my fans and appreciate their love and devotion, and the time they spend; writing to me, and following my news. I try my best to stay in constant contact with them, and reply on their questions, whenever I find the time to do so".
"I know for a fact that my fans are my true mirror. Through them I know what they want and expect from me".
Maya describes her feelings when she is performing live on stage saying: "after all this time performing live, in hundreds of concerts around Lebanon and other Arabic countries, it still feels the same, when I get on stage; I can't see the audience faces, it is all black, I'm nervous and scared, after the first song, I relax a little bit, and start seeing the faces of the audiences in the first rows, sometimes they get copied into my memory and I still recall some of these faces till date."
Describing a unique and unforgettable moment in her singing career Maya says: "it was one of my concerts in north Lebanon during 2001 summer concerts in a town called "Karm Saddeh", when I sang "khalini bil jaw" I could not hear my voice from the crowds voices, it was an unforgettable moment."
