We’re thrilled to present our Nashville Spotlight artist for the month of September, in partnership with H.O.M.E!
Joanna Borne started her venture into the world of music at the young age of 15 years old, making her first steps even before that. Her deeply caring nature, which she channeled into her work as a nurse in numerous different psychiatric hospitals, as well as her unfiltered insight into the mental health system and her own experience with Anxiety and OCD, strongly influence her songwriting today.
We had the pleasure of chatting with Joanna about her art and what inspires her. Keep reading for a closer look at her music journey and her latest projects.
Originally born in Canada, we asked Joanna what she likes about Nashville:
I grew up outside of a small city in Northern Saskatchewan. I love that Nashville is a big city with so much opportunity but still has a small town feel in a way.
A place with a small town feel like this can be a retreat for an artist to get into the mindset to create. Furthermore, music itself turned out to be an escape for Joanna.
“It was my escape, then it was my dream. I wanted to change the world and reach people with my music, just as other music out there reached me as a listener/consumer.”
At first, she started out playing various instruments such as the piano, flute abd guitar, before fully giving herself to the world of music and becoming serious about singing and songwriting at age 15.
For some reason, as a listener, I was always drawn to alt pop, hip-hop, and sync music/film soundtracks. For a time, I was creating music that I grew up surrounded by in my environment (country and folk), until one day I thought “I need to make what I enjoy hearing the most” and once I made the decision to do that, the music came out of me so much easier.
A snippet of Joanna’s song “Hey I See You”
Joanna’s latest single “Wolves” is an incredibly personal and special project. During the song’s creation process, she took every precaution she could to ensure it would be HER project down to the core.
I vividly remember the day I started writing “Wolves.” I wanted to create something that was straight form my soul, so I took some time off work, shut off my phone and locked myself out of the world for 3 days, just brainstorming and creating music. I didn’t let myself listen to any other music at the time, because I wanted to see what would come out of me with no outside influence.
True to the song’s title, Joanna spent lots of time in nature to let it inspire her, which she then used in her bedroom studio to experiment with different sounds and lyrics until “Wolves” came to be.
I started with some synth sounds, then wrote some lyrics, got stuck, went on a few walks outside, came back in and kept writing until I had a solid demo that I ended up bringing to my producer. That was only the beginning though. The production for that song took so many turns with many adjustments over years until it became what it is today. For whatever reason, this song took longer than any other song, this song was my Everest.
“Wolves” dives deep into how nature, as well as human nature, are both beautiful, yet corrupt. It calls for us to stand above this primal instinct to turn on one another and urges us to unite instead. Joanna expands:
Favorite Lyric from “Wolves” – “My home’s beautiful, but it’s sad,” this lyric explains everything that inspired the song. In the wild, wolves do best in a a pack, and a lot of the common themes in my song “Wolves” relates to this unity that survives nature. It’s a call for community. People are beautiful, just as nature is beautiful, but division and conflict among people is sad, just as the cruel corners of nature is sad.
This song is without a doubt a major milestone in Joanna’s songwriting evolution. Having been years in the making, it undoubtedly shapes her future projects in many ways.
This release has certainly inspired my future projects both in content of lyrics, production elements and the process. This song came from me slowing down, and I never forgot that. I make sure I don’t rush my creative process so that what’s in my soul can really come out to express something.
This cinematic anthem of hers, which will see the light of day in November, will come alongside a music video featuring Joanna Joanna interacting with a white Arctic wolf named “Halo” at “A Wolf Adventure,” a licensed wolf sanctuary located within Saskatchewan.
Take a look at some behind the scenes footage for the music video
Stay tuned for Joanna’s upcoming projects! This magical part of her music journey is only the beginning.
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