Alicia Toner: Songwriting with Emotion and Craft

PEI-based artist Alicia Toner has had an explosive year since the release of her sophomore album “Joan”. Alicia brought home a 2022 Canadian Folk Music Award, became the most nominated artist at the Music PEI Awards this year for the project, and received multiple nominations at the East Coast Music Awards as well. Her album spent eight weeks on the Canadian Campus Radio Charts, and received a two page feature in PEI Living Magazine. Described as an artist with “powerhouse vocals in a way that you just can’t capture on record” by Roots Music Canada, the celebrated vocalist and songwriter worked with well known Canadian producers Stuart Cameron (Crash Test Dummies, Matthew Good, Amanda Marshall) and Peter Fusco to bring the deeply personal project to life. Alicia is celebrating the one year anniversary of “Joan” with the release of her brand new single “Tonight”.

”Tonight” is the moment before you let yourself fall in love completely. It’s the fear of opening yourself up to heartbreak vs the fear of losing what could be. It’s the internal struggle of playing it safe or diving in head first.” – Alicia Toner

We talked about:

• starting a song with a guitar riff
• the influence of classical training on Alicia’s songwriting
• using time-based differences to progress the lyric through your song
• contrasting sections of your song with how wordy your lyric is
• the use of Melisma, or multiple notes on a single syllable

Download the lyrics to Tonight to follow along.