Tag: Autumn Nicholas

Out Now: Madeline Finn

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Madeline Finn is a thoughtful writer and dynamic artist. Madeline transcends the boundaries of genre, crafting pieces that pull elements from folk, rock, and indie. Their songs are honest, relatable, and catchy.

Madeline feels that her role as an LGBTQ+ musician is bigger than herself and she values uplifting her community. She hopes to embody the queer representation that she longed for as a kid. In our Out Now interview, Madeline shares their vision for the future, their upcoming projects, and their journey into self-producing music.

We are thrilled to be featuring Madeline Finn at our next Queerfest show in Nashville at Vinyl Tap on Wednesday, August 7. The show runs from 7-9 pm and features four local LGBTQ+ artists. There’s a ticket suggestion of $10 that goes directly to supporting the artists. Don’t miss out on the chance to hear Madeline Finn live!

Why do you create music? What’s more satisfying to you, the process or the outcome?

Madeline Finn: I used to be more amped up on the outcome, but these days I have really fallen in love with the process. Mostly since I have started self-producing. It’s so much fun and I could do it literally all day.

You create within a wide range of musical genres including folk, rock, and indie. How do you navigate your identity as an artist who works across several genres?

Honestly, I have no idea. I’ve been trying to just let go and make music that’s fun and meaningful to me. Whatever the genre might end up being doesn’t matter that much to me.

What does it mean to you to be an LGBTQ+ musician?

Being a queer musician is a special thing. Especially because it’s becoming less and less special, if you know what I mean. I am one of many LGBTQ+ artists who make up a whole force of nature. I see my role as a part of the whole, a part of something way bigger than me. The more we uplift our community with art that speaks directly to the queer experience, I think the more healing can be done. The more healing that can be done within each individual, the more we heal the human experience as a whole.

I’m so jazzed on the queer music community and wish I would have had more folks like that growing up to listen to. Honored to be what I needed when I was a kid, now.

For anyone reading this who might not be out of the closet, were there any specific people, musicians, or resources that helped you find yourself as a queer individual?

Specifically, I found a lot of help as a kiddo from The Trevor Project. I also was able to find a safe adult/family member to talk to about it before I came out to my immediate circle. For those who are in adulthood I would highly recommend THERAPY!

You’ve been on the team at Wild Heart Meditation Center for a few years. What has that experience been like for you? Do you find that your meditation practice influences your music?

Wild Heart Meditation Center has been the single most important part of my personal growth and healing over the past five to six years. I came to the center interested in meditation and since then have fallen deeply in love with the practice and the teachings of the Buddha. It’s been so rewarding to be offered an opportunity to share that with the community and others as a facilitator. My practice influences every single part of my life, music included. It’s helped me let go of the craving that often surrounds a career like this, I have gained a deep freedom from contentment within my musical career. I honestly think you can hear it in the music. The shows are more fun for me, I am not afraid of what others think, not sitting around waiting for someone to give me my golden ticket. Instead, I know that I can rest in the reality of this moment and have a deep, non-attached appreciation for all the beautiful parts I encounter.

What has it been like for you to work with other LGBTQ+ artists in the music industry?

The LGBTQ+ music scene here in Nashville has been amazing. It’s this collaborative, joyful machine that just runs all on its own. Getting to hear music direct from artists like Autumn Nicholas and to play for so many other queer folks just gets me so pumped.

It’s like “Y’ALL WE ARE DOING IT!!!” I’d like to believe it’s deeply healing for my inner child.

What’s your ideal vision for your future?

My ideal vision for my future is to have chickens, mainly. If I can have a little space in the world with chickens, my wife, and my dog I am all set. Beyond that, I try not to set too many expectations for the future. Instead, I am really practicing following my intuition towards the next most meaningful step. One day at a time.

What are your release and touring plans for the next year?

I have been hard at work on my own record based on the IFS (internal family systems) model of therapy, it’s my first venture into self-production and I’m hoping to have it ready to start sharing singles by the end of the year.

My pop-rock project ENVOI just released a brand new album in May, so there is a chance we may be doing some live shows to support that. In addition, I’m working on a project with Liv Lombardi here in Nashville that is going to totally slay.

As far as touring goes, I’ll be around playing bass, guitar, and singing for a TON of artists throughout the rest of the year and there have been talks about an East Coast run for my solo material in the fall.

Photo courtesy of the artist.

WATCH: Autumn Nicholas Performs “Baggage” for From One to Tenn

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Artist: Autumn Nicholas
Hometown: Born in Fayetteville, North Carolina, living in Nashville, Tennessee
Song: “Baggage”

In Their Words: “To be able to share our music in such an incredible, intimate way, in such a breathtaking setting was pure joy for us and we hope that comes through with the recordings. We are grateful to From One to Tenn. for including us in this series and are excited to share our music as part of the program.

“We’ve had the pleasure of working with Pilot Moon on a few other projects and it’s always an amazing experience, they are uniquely able to capture emotion in a raw, unfiltered, and honest way.

“Opportunities to help lift and amplify our music, such as the One to Tenn. series, are invaluable to us as artists and humans, as it allows us to connect more broadly with new people in a very compelling way.” – Autumn Nicholas

“John, Dave, and I have been coming to AmericanaFest for a few years to sit back, relax and enjoy the music.  Last year, we decided that, in 2023, we would set something up that’s fun, helps musicians, and benefits the AMA. It was important to us that we dream up something big that would inspire the musicians and offer them an opportunity that doesn’t come around very often. Once the Schermerhorn [Symphony Center] agreed to rent us the venue, we knew this series was going to be special.” – Joel Malizia, Pilot Moon Films

Video Credits: Filmed by David Allison, John DeMaio, and Joel Malizia, Pilot Moon Films / Islander Entertainment
Audio captured – Brett Blandon
Mixed/Mastered – John Kelly
Special thanks to Helene Cronin & Victoria O’Campo

Photo Credit: Video stills courtesy of Pilot Moon Films

One to Watch: Country Singer-Songwriter Julie Williams

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

With her warm, agile voice and potent lyricism, Julie Williams is taking the country music world by storm. On June 2 she released her self-titled EP containing 6 original, remarkable tracks. Through her narrative lyrics and captivating melodies, Williams’ songs discuss a wide palate of her lived experience — as a Black woman living in the South, as a navigator of harmful sexual encounters, as someone who has loved, and as someone who has lost. Her record will take listeners on an evocative journey through her emotional landscapes, with peaks and troughs and everything in between.

Currently based in Nashville, Williams’ robust and radiant presence is enlivening the Music City landscape and beyond. Earlier this year, she was selected as one of CMT’s Next Women of Country, where she joins other major talent alumni of the Next Women of Country such as Margo Price, Kacey Musgraves, Lainey Wilson, Brittney Spencer, Lauren Alaina, Madeline Edwards, Maren Morris, Morgan Wade, and many more.

Williams is also a seasoned member of the Black Opry Revue, a collective based in Nashville that features Black artists in country, Americana, blues, and folk music. Her current solo tour is in full-swing as she enchants summertime audiences across the country.

BGS: Can you tell me a little bit about your personal history with music? Do you come from a line of musicians? Or did you find this path on your own?

JW: Neither of my parents play music or sing. There was always this joke in my family that I would listen to what my parents did and do the opposite. … There’s definitely a history of musicians in my extended family, but it wasn’t necessarily something where I grew up with everybody playing an instrument around me.

My parents always joked that I told them, “I can sing.” Ever since I was little, it was my way to relieve stress when on an airplane or a car ride or something. I was singing songs, making up songs, singing Barney songs. And I think for them, it wasn’t until they went to an elementary school play of mine, and saw me compared to some of the other kids, that they realized I actually could sing a little bit better. When I was in middle school I started singing national anthems and then I would sing at beach bars and restaurants and weddings. That was kind of my early start into professional singing. Then, when I got to college, I started songwriting and turned into the artist that I am now, but I’ve always been making some sort of noise.

You knew from the very start! On your EP, you share a lot of really beautiful narrative songs, and I’m wondering about your creative process. When does it become clear to you which of your stories needs to become a song?

I do write a lot of narrative songs. That’s what I love. I always write lyrics first. Usually, it’s just a dump, like a poem, that comes out. Sometimes [it’s] not even a really good and properly formatted poem, but then I kind of piece that together and turn it into a song, or I bring it to somebody that I really trust to help me bring the story to life, and together we turn it into the song.

I started with my creative process after I took a songwriting class when I first moved to Nashville with this amazing professor at Vanderbilt, Deanna Walker. She made the point that good lyrics should be able to stand on their own. The best songs can make you feel something from just reading. It really stuck with me.

That question of knowing which stories ultimately make it into song — I ask myself that same question all the time. Because sometimes I think, “Oh, I’m gonna write a song about that.” Then I sit and I try to conjure up something and nothing comes, or nothing that I feel is worth putting out into the world. But I don’t like to push things in my songwriting. Sometimes, if I just have a word, or I just have a phrase, or maybe a few lines about a story, I will leave it and wait. Because, six months later, something else has happened. I begin to process whatever that moment was a little bit differently, and all of a sudden, it just begins to flow.

I really like to write songs that make somebody really feel something or see themselves in a certain way or something that has a kind of unique twist, even if it’s a love song or a breakup song. Sometimes I have to wait until I can find that perspective in an everyday moment before it turns into a song.

You do that so beautifully! I’d like to ask more about those collaborators you mentioned—can you tell me a bit about your work with the Black Opry and how you became involved?

I was in Pigeon Forge, actually, to play a show at the Listening Room there with a friend of mine named Bonner. I think there were only like five people there, so we were kind of down in the dumps a bit. But I posted, “We’re here in Pigeon Forge,” and Holly G of the Black Opry, who I’d never met in person, messaged me on Instagram. She said they were having a Black Opry show at Dollywood, and we should come by after our show. We went and caught the last song of the show. [Afterward] everyone was hanging at the hotel and I got to meet Holly G, Tanner D, Aaron Vance, Roberta Lea, Crys Matthews, Virginia Prater, who is my booking agent now — a lot of the people that became part of my family. We all hung out in this hotel room, passing around a guitar, singing songs.

I just immediately felt so comfortable and at home. These people felt like my cousins! I told Holly, “Look, I would love to be involved with Black Opry. I’m single, I have no responsibility right now, just put me on the road! I will play any show, any place, any time.” She put me on a few Black Opry runs; before those runs were happening I was thinking that I was done in Nashville. I wasn’t feeling like my career was moving forward. I really felt kind of lost, creatively. I hadn’t yet found those creative collaborators. And when I did that first Black Opry run, everything just clicked and I knew I needed to be a part of it because it just felt like magic.

Wow, it sounds like your whole world expanded. Is there any advice you would give to aspiring Black artists looking to break into the country music scene?

I think my advice would be that it’s hard to do this alone. It can feel like you’re on an island. But it’s so much easier to do this work when you have other people around you that really support and uplift you. Reach out to the Black Opry, or the NSAI chapter near you. Set aside some of that energy that you’re putting towards your own individual projects into building community — even if that’s an online community at first. That’s how I met a lot of people during COVID time and after the murder of George Floyd, that’s when so many Black artists were coming out.

It just makes it so much easier to be in spaces where there are people around you who just get it, and who really believe in you and care for you and support you. Why build a car that only one person can get into and make it just a few miles down the road? Why don’t we instead all build a bus together that has space for everyone and we can all get there together? It’s just so much more fulfilling and honestly so much more fun.

What a beautiful metaphor, thank you for sharing that. Speaking of communal support and inspiration, you’re being featured as “One to Watch,” but do you have any ones you’re watching? Who is inspiring you these days?

I have this Spotify playlist called “Big Blue House and Her Sisters” of songs that feel like musical sisters of “Big Blue House.” There are a lot of artists on there that really inspire me. I would also say Denitia, a Black Opry artist who was named CMT Equal Access Artist — an incredible singer, songwriter, producer — just a powerhouse. We met at a Black Opry show in September and have become best friends. Also, you can’t be following what’s happening in Black music and queer music right now and not know the force that is Autumn Nicholas. Their performance at Love Rising had everyone in that room, thousands of people including myself, in tears. Lastly, Raye Zaragoza is an amazing Asian, Indigenous, and Latinx artist. I had the honor of meeting her on the Cayamo Cruise. She has been such an inspiration to me as a songwriter in the ways that she incorporates all of her identity into everything she makes, and her songs have such resonance and power that really make you feel. There’s no way you can listen to her songs and not feel moved and inspired by them, which is everything I’m trying to do in my songwriting, and I think she does it flawlessly.

Photo Credit: Mackenzie Ryan