Tania Elizabeth - Storm Season (2024)

Tracklist

01. What You Need
02. New York City Sundance
03. Something Blue
04. Let Go
06. My Bride and I
07. Out of Time
08. Silver Wings
09. Hallie Crawford's Reel
10. Money in the Wind
11. Borderline
12. These Dreams
13. Who Will Take My Place

As fiddle player for the Avett Brothers, Grammy-winning founder of The Duhks, accompanist for Mary Gauthier and as a session player, Tania Elizabeth has spent two decades shaping the arc of modern-day roots music. She refocuses the spotlight on her own music with Storm Season, a solo album whose sonic textures are as dynamic and diverse as the songwriter who created them. “I’ve always backed other people,” she says. “I’m really good at supporting other musicians and holding down the fort so they can shine, but I’ve rarely had anybody else hold that space for me. With Storm Season, I’m investing in myself for the first time.”

A longtime road warrior, Tania began recording Storm Season during the global pandemic that brought her touring schedule to a standstill. It was a rare time of rest for someone who’d been performing since the age of 9. Raised in a single-parent household, Tania moved from Australia to Canada during her early childhood and began busking on the streets of Vancouver Island while still in grade school.

Storm Season is far more than a showcase for the multi-instrumentalist chops that Tania continues to display with the Avetts, though. It highlights the full spread of her musical abilities: the crystalline vocals that float through songs like “House of the Hurricane” and “Money in the Wind” like warm weather; the sharp songwriting that combines personal insight with universal sentiment; the warm, organic production that makes room for fingerpicked guitars, brushed percussion, Tania’s swooning string arrangements, and cameos from her long history of collaborators.

Scott and Seth Avett contribute to two songs — the instrumental track “Hallie Crawford’s Reel” and the elegiac, harmony-heavy “Money in the Wind” — while Sarah Dugas, Tania’s bandmate from The Duhks, appears on the folk-pop highlight “New York City Sundance” (of four songs written by Dan Frechette). Tania claims sole writing credit on the album’s six remaining tracks and doubles as the album’s co-producer, sharing that role with Dominic John Davis.

Tania began recording Storm Season with bassist Paul Defiglia and drummer Dom Billet, tracking a handful of songs at Nashville’s Blackbird Studios — where pedal steel legend Steve Fishell joined the group — before finishing the rest in Defiglia’s own Daylight Studios.

“We mainly worked together as a trio, and then I sent the recordings to other musicians because we were still in the midst of the pandemic,” she remembers. Overdubs soon arrived from friends in New York, Canada, and Los Angeles. Tania then brought in Dana Nielsen, Rick Rubin’s Grammy-nominated right-hand man, to mix the finished songs. The process was collaborative and cathartic, bringing people together — sometimes virtually, sometimes physically — during a time of separation.

On a record stacked with appearances by roots-music luminaries, though, it’s Tania Elizabeth’s star that shines the brightest. She writes honestly and poignantly about the bad weather in her life, ultimately finding comfort in her own resilience. Heartbreak, resolve, struggle, and vigilance are common themes, with tracks like “What You Need” unfolding like wake-up-calls for those who have yet to prepare for incoming storms.

Storm Season also soothes, though, balancing its own urgency with the comforting salve of Tania’s voice and the rootsy sweep of her multi-layered arrangements. This is music that targets the heart as well as the head. It’s the latest chapter in a life story that’s still being written. It’s the sound of a lifelong musician who’s making a return to centerstage, armed with the most compelling music of her career.

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