Happy New Year everyone! I hope you all had a blessed, restful and peace filled holiday!

So although I originally intended to write a song diary entry every week, it’s turned out to be more like every month… or so (I love how all inclusive “or so” can be!). After another whirlwind couple of weeks – my husband and I bought a new house and business, moved into our new house, catered during the crazy Christmas season, and my sister had her twins 3 months premature on Boxing Day – here I am ready to write another entry about the fourth song on my new album, the title track infact called “Prairie Belle”…

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Since my last song diary entry, I have had quite the whirlwind life! My brother in law Brent and I went on tour with Via Rail across Alberta, BC, Saskatchewan and Manitoba! We played two shows a day on the train, and got off the train in Edmonton, Vancouver and Winnipeg to play additional shows. It was definitely the most I’ve ever sung in my life. I felt like a real musician. I got to play to some big crowds off the train, but on the train it was mostly smaller intimate crowds of 15 or so. All performances on the train were unplugged, so it was just Brent and I and his guitar. This was a great opportunity to really tell people about my songs. Why I wrote them, who I wrote them for.  So here I am to share with YOU readers (if there are any out there of course) the inspiration behind the 3rd song on my album, titled “Clearer Day.”

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As mentioned in a previous post, I have been trying to take some time lately to sit down and write in my song diary about each song on the new album “Prairie Belle”, in order of the tracks.

Track two is called “Heavy Heart”. Some songs I write a little fragment here, and then write a little fragment there and then although I can remember the initial inspiration, I can’t always remember where I was when I started the song, or where I was when I finished it. This song is an exception. I can remember the day I wrote this song very clearly. I can remember all the events of the day leading up to writing this song, and I can remember how I felt when I wrote this song… The majority of my songs are written for or about other people. This song was definitely written about, and for myself. As the title suggests, I had a very “Heavy Heart”. (more…)

Since I released my precious little Prairie Belle earlier this past month, I have been wanting to start a little song diary. So many of the songs on my record were written quite a while ago. I wanted to revisit them song by song and reflect on why I wrote them, where I was at the time and how I’ve grown and evolved as a singer/songwriter, friend, wife, sister… since. I decided I may as well just go in the order of the songs on the record. This week I want to reflect on “Too Easy” the very first track on the album.

I started writing “Too Easy” after I had met up with a friend with whom I had lost contact with for a number of years. (more…)

After two years of recording, months and months of mixing, mastering, designing, writing thank yous, planning my new website, planning my cd release… it’s here.

I’m in bed after midnight the night before I digitally release my first album and I am so bloody proud. I am proud of my amazing musicians. I’m proud of my engineer and my mixer, I’m proud of my masterer…. I’m ridiculously proud of my graphic designer (web & cd cover). I’m proud of myself.

This has been a very long journey, and although this is only one part of the process (and I still have my intimate cd launch in a few weeks, then my big cd release show in the new year) I’m close to finishing the creating process and beginning the promoting process. This is serious business for me. I have always dreamt of having a full length record. A catalogue of my music. A diary of my thoughts and inspirations. Here it finally is. Her name is Prairie Belle and she is pretty darn beautiful if I do say so myself! (more…)

BIG NEWS… so today I got the masters of my record in the mail. I had an amazing gentleman master my record, Joao Carvalho in Toronto. He has mastered the likes of Hannah Georgas, the Sheepdogs, Said the Whale, Sloan, Blue Rodeo, Sarah Harmer, City & Colour… the list goes on.

This means two things: 1 – that I will be able to have my digital release hopefully next week (to be available on itunes and cdbaby)! and 2 – that I can book & announce my intimate cd release show that will be taking place on October 29th. I plan on doing a bigger full band release in the new year, but for now I wanted to celebrate my first full length record in an intimate, acoustic and special setting. I will be chartering a street car that will take my lovely little crowd of 50 up onto the high level bridge and park while Jered, Brent, Ryan & I play some acoustic unplugged versions of the 10 songs on my record. There will be wine, there will be appies and there will be music! (more…)