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From Opera to Folk

Joanna Drummond is a folk singer-songwriter from Calgary with a clear, compelling soprano voice, and beautifully written, thoughtful lyrics. Her songs can feel like old folk songs written in a different world, and yet also speak vividly about the times that we are living in.

 

Though Joanna began in classical music, with a B.A. In Music from the University of Calgary and a background in operatic training, she has chosen to leave opera entirely behind and turn her instrument towards folk music. She is drawn towards folk music because of its intimacy and simplicity, the way that often just one instrument and one voice can be enough, the power of words working together with melody. She counts Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, Ani DiFranco and Amelia Curran among her main influences.

 

Her first album Workshop was released 2014, and it has been said that “her debut album...will doubtless shape a reputation in folk music...A pure-as-crystal voice delivering softly engaging lyrics over quietly seductive melodies, if Workshop is the beginning then there's much to follow.” (www.FolkWords.com) Fittingly, Workshop was written about the process of becoming, the idea that we are all unfinished projects.

 

Her second album was released in 2015 at the National Music Centre. Songs for Mother's Day is written to be a gift for mothers. The songs on this album are inspired by the intimacies and struggles that women sometimes share with each other, and sometimes face alone. They are drawn from the playground chat, the daily pressures, the quiet desires and the purest of joys. And even though each woman's story is different, there are ways that motherhood can bring women together. So with that in mind Songs for Mother's Day brings together a group of featured artists who are all mothers themselves to sing about the lived experience of what it's really like to be a mom.