SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, April 18, 2024 (Gephardt Daily) — Canadian country singer and songwriter Tenille Townes remembers the exact moment she knew for sure she wanted to be a musical artist.
“I had a crazy moment happen actually when I was 9 years old,” Townes told Gephardt Daily in a phone interview from Nashville Wednesday. “I was like a diehard Shania Twain fan, and just knew every word by heart. My family and I drove to a concert five hours away and I had a little sign that said ‘Shania, can I please sing for you?’ and I had a costume that my mom had glue gunned to look like the cover of her concert DVD. It was a complete fluke but she happened to see my sign in the crowd and came around like three-quarters of the way through the show and pulled me up on stage with her, in this big arena with 18,000 people in it. I stood on stage next to my hero and it just lit this fire in me; I was like: ‘This is it. This is what I want to do.'”
That was way back in 2003; Townes is now 30 years old and moved to Nashville alone when she was 19.
Born Tenille Nicole Nadkrynechny, she was raised in Grande Prairie, Alberta. She was introduced to country music by her parents and grandparents during trips in the family car. In 2009, she released the single “Home Now,” a song she wrote from the perspective of a daughter whose father is posted in the war in Afghanistan, a topic she learned about in school.
In 2011, at the age of 17, she was nominated for a Canadian Country Music Award for Female Artist of the Year. Townes released her first album, “Real,” in June of that year. She released her second album, “Light,” in March 2013. That same year, she relocated to Nashville.
In April 2018, Townes announced she had signed a record deal with Columbia Nashville and released her first single with the label, “Somebody’s Daughter,” in September 2018. That same year, Townes served as the opening act for all dates for Miranda Lambert and Little Big Town on their co-headlining the Bandwagon Tour. Townes won four awards at the 2019 Canadian Country Music Association Awards, which included one for Female Artist of the year, and three for “Somebody’s Daughter,” which won Single, Song, and Video of the Year. She released her third album, “The Lemonade Stand,” in 2020, and has also issued four EPs.
As part of her spring tour, Townes is playing the State Room at 638 S. State St. on May 1 at 8 p.m., supported by Emily Hicks, a Utah based folk-pop singer and songwriter. For tickets and more information click here.
Townes told us more about that memorable moment with Shania Twain, who is also from Canada.
“So she brought me up for ‘What a Way to Wanna Be!’ which was a deep cut on the ‘Up!’ record, that she was touring at the time, but then when the song finished … the stage had kind of like three tiers,” Townes said. “There was a center stage and we ended on the top tier, and the song finished and she goes: ‘I know your sign says you want to sing with me, but I want to hear you sing.’ She’s like: ‘Sing something for me.’ So she’s like: ‘It can be any song of mine you want,’ so I sang a piece of ‘Honey, I’m Home’ and that was the moment, for me. I already had the bug, she just poured gasoline right on it.”
We also asked Townes about what moving to Nashville was like.
“My dad helped me make the road trip, and we drove the 47 hours from Grand Prairie all the way to Nashville,” she explained. “And he dropped me off at this little rental apartment, took me grocery shopping, set me up and then was like, ‘all right kid’ and flew back home. It was terrifying and amazing. It was like, Nashville was the city I’d always had my heart set on, getting to be in that community of songwriters at some point in my life. And so I was so excited. I could hardly sleep for months leading up to that trip, but then you know I was also very far away from home and just finished a tour after high school, and was like: ‘OK, how does one do this? How do I make this work?’ because I really don’t want to have to drive 47 hours all the way back home, so I’m very glad to still be here.”
She said that her strategy at the beginning of her career was to write with as many songwriters as she could.
“It was a lot of just writing with anyone and everyone that I could, really being a sponge and just going out and watching live music and listening to so many of my songwriting heroes and then coming back home writing songs all through the night, digging into what I wanted to say as an artist and really just kind of following that hunger and love of music,” she said. “I think that empowered me to figure out what to do next one step at a time. So I would go meet for coffee with people and ask for advice. And I called my ASCAP [American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers] rep, and was like: ‘Hey, can you help introduce me to other writers and publishers?’ And one person really just kind of kept opening the door to the next, and I just kept relentlessly bugging everybody.”
In December 2022, the singer and her band hopped on the Canadian Pacific Holiday Train for a 15-day trek. The train raises money, food and awareness for the important work that food banks do in their communities. It has raised more than $24.3 million and collected approximately 5.3 million pounds of food for community food banks in Canada and the United States since its inaugural journey back in 1999. Professional musicians play free concerts from the brightly decorated train’s stage. Along the journey from Montreal to Calgary, Townes and her band played a whopping 65 shows. The experience resulted in a five-song EP recorded on the train, titled “Train Track Worktapes.” She told us more about that journey.
“It was a very unique touring experience,” she said. “I’ve always loved being on the road. And you know, when I first moved to Nashville, I was making trips back and forth to go play house shows and do whatever I could to make money to keep being able to make it work. And then we were opening up for people, and all these different cool experiences on the road happened, and then all of a sudden we got this opportunity to be part of this train ride and we were so excited, because I’ve always loved trains.
“So one of the boxcars of the train was actually the stage. And so we pulled into the town and the door would fold down off of the boxcar and we’d go out and play our show. And then the door would fold back up and we’d roll down the road to the next town. So some days we were doing six or seven shows a day. It was amazing. It was like I had a front row seat to witnessing the best part of the human spirit. It was just so much generosity; people were bringing local food bank donations at every stop, and they were bundling up in the cold and showing up for their neighbors and friends and people who needed support, and it was so cool to watch.
“I felt so inspired that I started writing songs in between the shows, and we borrowed gear from the stage car and brought it to the caboose and set up a little recording makeshift studio with our laptops and the gear that we had, and just recorded us jamming on this train. And so you can hear the rumble of the engine and the rattle of the tracks in the recording. We just couldn’t avoid it, and I’m so glad that is in there. I hope it feels like people are riding the train with us when they listen to it.”
Townes also talked about what the rest of this year is looking like for her.
“We’re about to head out to play some shows throughout the West Coast, Salt Lake City being one of those,” she explained. “I really love getting to do these shows. We’ve been on tour opening up for some of our heroes and friends and then getting to meet some of the people that have seen us and other shows, that have started to gather and build a community around the songs that I’m writing is such a beautiful thing to me. So I’m really enjoying those kinds of shows, and then we’ve got a few different dates throughout the summer. And then we’re headed on a cross-Canadian headline tour during this fall, which I’m really looking forward to as well.”
We asked Townes about her extensive work for charity; she has helped raise over $2 million for Sunrise House, a shelter for homeless youths in Alberta, through her annual fundraiser, Big Hearts For Big Kids.
“I think it’s the most important part of what music can do: its ability to bring people together in a room,” she said. “And connect each other through a common emotion or a common cause, and to me that’s so important and always has been. I learned about the shelter in my hometown; I was 15 years old and, you know, read this pamphlet on our kitchen counter that my mom brought home, learning that there were kids my age in my own hometown who were staying in and out of this unit. And I just was working to help, and so mom drove me around after school to the different local businesses with sponsor letters and asking people for a silent auction items, and it was amazing to find out how many people said yes when you asked them. To me I was like: ‘Wow, this is what’s possible if you just put it out there, you never know what can happen.’
“People showed up, and the night of our first event [in 2010] the local shelter actually had to close down due to lack of funding. So the timing was essential, and everyone in the room kind of looked at each other and we’re like, we’re gonna get this place back up and running. So that night we raised $30,000 and helped them start their renovations to be able to to reopen their doors a year later, and we’ve kept the event going. It’s blown my mind watching the generosity of people coming together every year, and we’ve raised over $2 million. It’s pretty crazy. I mean, you know at one point or another in our lives, whatever that the shape of that looks like, we all need help from time to time, and just to be able to know that music and a small group of people who believe in something coming together can lend a helping hand. Especially for me, it’s like thinking about kids in that sweet spot of their life where if they get the right guidance and love and nurturing and acceptance then, the steps forward for the rest of their story can be put in a completely different direction. And I think that’s such an important time.”
We also asked Townes what else, other than music, brings her joy.
“Oh goodness, I love to … mostly just music,” she laughed. “I really love to travel and I’m glad and grateful for the ways that music packs my suitcase. I love to meet people. I love to come home and hang with my dog, that brings me a lot of joy, too. I have a little terrier mix, not exactly sure. But he’s real cute, he’s looking at me right now. Very friendly little guy, and I’ve had him for the last four years. I didn’t realize what all the dog people were talking about until I got him, and now I get it.”
Townes added she doesn’t take her dog on the road when she’s flying and traveling in vans, but “one day when when we’re rocking the bus,” he will come along, she said.
Finally, we asked Townes if there are any dream collaborations she’d like to do in the future.
“I always love getting to, like, sing songs with heroes and friends,” she said. “I’m a huge fan of what Noah Kahan is doing right now. I just absolutely love that record so much. And Paramore, I think it’d be so cool to sing something with them someday. Yeah, I just look forward again to meet a bunch of new friends in the music community and make music wherever that takes us next.”
And maybe one day, Shania Twain will join Townes on her stage.
For more information about Townes and tickets to her Salt Lake City show, click here.
