Our very own songwriting and voice teacher, Lindsey Walker, has been nominated for an Edmonton Music Award! Lindsey is currently in the running for the Artist to Watch award and you can vote for her by clicking here.

Who is Lindsey Walker, the artist?

What would happen if Janis Joplin, Eva Cassidy, Joan Osborne, Adele and Bonnie Raitt found themselves at the same wine bar and ended up jamming together?

You would get Lindsey Walker.

Born and raised in Winnipeg, Lindsey didn’t grow up in a particularly musical household, but her parents were always huge supporters of following her heart. Lindsey started out heavily involved in theatre and film in Winnipeg, but it wasn’t until she was in her early twenties when she realized her love for singing. Lindsey’s first experience singing with a band actually happened unintentionally when she was dared by her friends to sign up for a spot at an open mic at a small bar in Winnipeg. Once she started singing, all eyes and ears were on her as she blew everyone away with her powerful voice. She landed a weekly gig with the house band there, exposing her to the music of Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, and what would become one of her biggest idols, Janis Joplin.

Lindsey continued acting throughout this time, and landed a gig with a touring company singing rock songs in a dinner theatre production. She was on the road for 9 months, and during her stay in Edmonton Alberta she looked into the Music diploma at Grant MacEwan University (then college). Lindsey auditioned and was accepted into the program, and moved to Edmonton in the fall of 2005.

With Lindsey’s powerful voice and outgoing personality, she was already starting to work with her instructors on outside projects within months of her starting school. It was while she was finishing her final year at school Lindsey was offered a grant to record an album through RAWLCO Radio. Lindsey decided to record with Mike Lent, a renowned bassist with a great ear for producing. She recorded 8 cover songs with some of Canada’s best studio musicians. The tracks, all mastered, have yet to be released to this day. As Lindsey puts it, “I found that after living with these songs for a while they didn’t really represent me as an artist, or as a person. I wanted to have my debut CD songs that I wrote that have my entire heart in it.” So Lindsey set out to do just that.

Lindsey, who has always been a very independent person, decided she would teach herself guitar to be more self-sufficient as a writer and a touring performer. She started writing and performing as much as possible. Lindsey started making contacts in the Edmonton music scene and within the first year of her solo attempt she was playing and average of 2 shows a month in Alberta as well as 4 festivals as a “tweener”. In early 2012, Lindsey made a bold move to ask audience and friends for financial contributions to help fund her debut album. Within the 55 days she had allotted for the campaign, she was stunned see that her audience had helped raise more money than what she was asking for. In return they received completed copies of Our Glory, free tickets to shows and even homemade jam by Lindsey herself.

As of February 2013, Lindsey has fully planned two Western Canadian tours for Spring in support of Our Glory, along with being nominated for Edmonton Music Award’s “Artist To Watch”. Our Glory is set to be released May 2013.

Links

Songwriting & Voice Lessons With Lindsey

As of now, Lindsey only has four remaining 30 minute time slots available for songwriting and/or voice lessons. Available days include Wednesday and Thursday. Click here to view Lindsey’s full schedule.