Erica Mah

City Serenade is an album that wrote itself. After 2 months travelling by bike around rural Northern BC, tracing Highway 16 and all the places I grew up in, I packed a van full of instruments, clothes, and favourite books and headed east. The first thing I unpacked in Toronto was my piano, and I started writing songs built up from the road before I even managed to locate the box where I had placed my winter coat. It was January 2006. A year and a half later, all of my rural longings, city discoveries, and hazy memories came out in a full-length album that people can't seem to get enough of.

After shows people always make comparisons: Norah Jones, Joni Mitchell, Cat Power, Sarah McLaughlan, and once someone even asked if I listen to Chopin. I was flattered. I grew up playing classical piano, listening to pop music, and saving up my allowance for the annual local folk fest. The music I write now is playful and magical, haunting and potent. It is a lyrical documentation of the things we ache for, long for, and can't let go of. It is the soundtrack to our dreams, and a catalyst for our imaginations.