Long Beach-based musician Hannah Calimpusan, known by her stage name Calinnah, is making her mark in the local music scene with her self-described “sad girl vibes.” Drawing on influences from her childhood, life experiences, relationships and heartbreaks, Calinnah’s songs contain lyrics filled with genuine emotion, sung with a soulful and ethereal voice.
Calinnah stepped out of the studio on March 31 for an interview with the Signal Tribune. The singer had spent the day creating another one of her “alternative dreamy R&B” bops.
“I feel great. I mean, we worked on a song,” Calinnah said. “I actually came up with all the lyrics while I was in the car on the way to the studio. But it’s been a beat that I really wanted to work on for a while.”
Calinnah began creating music while attending college, but has had a love of music since early childhood. She grew up in Bellflower listening to her family’s collection of Motown, oldies and soft rock, and singing at church and with her cousins. She later became interested in pop, hip-hop and R&B during her time as a dancer in highschool. Her father is also a singer, and the two would often harmonize or have singing duels in the car.
“That’s when I really started enjoying music more and having fun with it,” Calinnah said.
The Long Beach-based artist combines her lived experiences and imagination to create songs centering relationships and the problems that arise from them.
“I write a lot of sad songs,” Calinnah said. “I think it comes from the relationships that I have with people, and […] the words that I want to say that I can’t say in person I say through my writing.”
In her latest music video for her song “Mistake,” released on March 24, Calinnah dances in an empty room with several TVs in the background showing only static on their screens. She sings of spending 24 hours in a room with someone, but wanting to be alone.
“I don’t wanna wait no more, and I don’t wanna talk no more, and I don’t wanna fight no more, but I just want to be alone, but I’m here with you,” Calinnah croons in “Mistake.”
Calinnah told the Signal Tribune “Mistake” was inspired by a past relationship she had, and describes the tensions between two people in an enclosed space.
“It was influenced during COVID actually, because we were quarantining during that time. The song is based on being in a room with someone 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and all you want to do is kind of be alone,” Calinnah said. “It’s talking about how there’s so much sound coming out of the room. You’re always fighting with this person. And the tension between you and this person is leading you to a place where you just want to be left alone, but you can’t really leave because you’re stuck.”
“Mistake” is the first new song Calinnah has released in two years, but she said it’s the start of a “domino effect.” She has more new songs that will soon be released, and an upcoming performance in July organized by Be Here Now, a Long beach-based event planning business.
“There’s definitely a huge music culture in Long Beach that is often overlooked,” Calinnah said. “But Long Beach has so much amazing talent and I feel like everybody that I know is involved in music somehow. And I feel like Long Beach needs more recognition for its culture because there’s definitely a really cool chill vibe here in Long Beach that I feel is different than LA.”
To keep up with Calinnah, follow her on Instagram, @calinnah. Her music is available on YouTube, Apple Music, Spotify, SoundCloud, Deezer and more.
[A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that Calinnah attended Cal State Long Beach. The Signal Tribune regrets this error.]