Ann Vriend is a singer-songwriter/pianist from Edmonton

Edmonton

Edmonton is the capital of the Canadian province of Alberta and is the province's second-largest city. Edmonton is located on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Capital Region, which is surrounded by the central region of the province.The city and its census...

, Alberta

Alberta

Alberta is a province of Canada. It had an estimated population of 3.7 million in 2010 making it the most populous of Canada's three prairie provinces...

, Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

. A popular performer, she has sold thousands of albums and played festivals and venues around the world.

Recording career

Ann Vriend released a popular demo in 2000, which garnered immediate radio play on stations across western Canada and earned her a spot at the prestigious Edmonton Folk Music Festival

Edmonton Folk Music Festival

The Edmonton Folk Music Festival is an annual four-day outdoor music event held the second weekend of August in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, established in 1980 by Don Whalen. The festival continues to draw many people from around the world as both spectators and performers. The current producer of...

. A year later she won a songwriting contest which took her to Nashville, and helped fund her debut album, Soul Unravelling (2003), which was well received by critics and sold well for an independent release. The album is now in its 5th pressing.

Vriend's second album, Modes of Transport, was released two years later. "Feelin' Fine", the album's first single, was put on heavy rotation

Heavy rotation

In broadcasting, rotation is the repeated airing of a limited playlist of songs on a radio station or satellite radio channel, or music videos on a TV network. They are usually in a different order each time, however they are not completely shuffled, so as to avoid playing the same song again too...

 by a local adult contemporary/jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 radio station. A third album, When We Were Spies, was released on March 11, 2008. Produced by Juno

Juno Award

The Juno Awards are presented annually to Canadian musical artists and bands to acknowledge their artistic and technical achievements in all aspects of music...

-nominated Douglas Romanow, it contains fuller production, drawing on modern pop sounds. A single, "St. Paul", received heavy rotation in her hometown of Edmonton, and hit the Top 30 on radio stations in Toronto and Cologne

Cologne

Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...

 (Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

). Vriend's first music video, for "(If We Are Not) Spies", was released in mid 2008.

Love & Other Messes, Vriend's first studio album in almost three years, is being released in early 2011. The album features a seven piece band, including vocalists Coco Love Alcorn

Coco Love Alcorn

Coco Love Alcorn is a Canadian pop and jazz singer. The daughter of jazz singer John Alcorn, she released her debut album in 1995. She subsequently toured as an opening act for Burton Cummings, Chantal Kreviazuk, Jesse Cook and Ani DiFranco, and performed on some Lilith Fair dates.She is also a...

 and Chloe Albert, and includes a duet with Matt Epp

Matt Epp

Matt Epp is an Canadian folk/rock/soul singer-songwriter from Winnipeg, Manitoba. He has released several albums and collaborated with Eliza Gilkyson, Ann Vriend and Matt Mays, among others.- Solo career :...

. The record, produced by Vriend herself, was influenced by Nashville

Nashville sound

The Nashville sound originated during the late 1950s as a sub-genre of American country music, replacing the chart dominance of honky tonk music which was most popular in the 1940s and 1950s...

, Muscle Shoals

Muscle Shoals Sound Studio

The Muscle Shoals Sound Studio was formed in Muscle Shoals, Alabama,in 1969 when musicians Barry Beckett , Roger Hawkins , Jimmy Johnson and David Hood left FAME Studios to create their own studio...

, classic R&B and Motown sounds. Vriend released a video for "Graffiti on my Heart". Love & Other Messes was number one on the CKUA album charts for two weeks, and received a 3 1/2 star review in the Toronto Star

Toronto Star

The Toronto Star is Canada's highest-circulation newspaper, based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Its print edition is distributed almost entirely within the province of Ontario...

.

Also in 2011, Vriend provided vocals for a topical single

Single (music)

In music, a single or record single is a type of release, typically a recording of fewer tracks than an LP or a CD. This can be released for sale to the public in a variety of different formats. In most cases, the single is a song that is released separately from an album, but it can still appear...

 called "William and Kate".

Live performances

Vriend has toured Canada, Australia and Europe extensively, both solo and backed by a band. Live recordings from 2008 and 2009 shows, along with new songs recorded live-off-the-floor, were released in late 2009 as Closer Encounters. She released videos for "A Dollar and a Suitcase" and "On Your Street", the two new songs on the album, in 2010.

Vriend is also the currator and host of Edmonton's Bluebird North performance series. She also performs with popular 1980s cover band Valiant Thieves.

Television

In August 2010, Vriend appeared on the hit Australian music and comedy show Spicks and Specks. She has also been featured on a regional news program in the Netherlands, and has performed on network television in Canada and Australia.

Musical style

Vriend's literary writing style reveals the influence of 1970s singer/songwriters such as Paul Simon

Paul Simon

Paul Frederic Simon is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist.Simon is best known for his success, beginning in 1965, as part of the duo Simon & Garfunkel, with musical partner Art Garfunkel. Simon wrote most of the pair's songs, including three that reached number one on the US singles...

, Leonard Cohen

Leonard Cohen

Leonard Norman Cohen, is a Canadian singer-songwriter, musician, poet and novelist. Cohen published his first book of poetry in Montreal in 1956 and his first novel in 1963. His work often explores religion, isolation, sexuality and interpersonal relationships...

, and Cat Stevens

Cat Stevens

Yusuf Islam , commonly known by his former stage name Cat Stevens, is an English singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, educator, philanthropist, and prominent convert to Islam....

. Her unique vocals have been compared to the clear, vulnerable Nashville

Nashville, Tennessee

Nashville is the capital of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in Davidson County, in the north-central part of the state. The city is a center for the health care, publishing, banking and transportation industries, and is home...

 sound of Dolly Parton

Dolly Parton

Dolly Rebecca Parton is an American singer-songwriter, author, multi-instrumentalist, actress and philanthropist, best known for her work in country music. Dolly Parton has appeared in movies like 9 to 5, The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Steel Magnolias and Straight Talk...

, the playfulness of Cyndi Lauper

Cyndi Lauper

Cynthia Ann Stephanie "Cyndi" Lauper is an American singer, songwriter, actress and LGBT rights activist. She achieved success in the mid-1980s with the release of the album She's So Unusual and became the first female singer to have four top-five singles released from one album...

, and the raw power of Aretha Franklin

Aretha Franklin

Aretha Louise Franklin is an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Although known for her soul recordings and referred to as The Queen of Soul, Franklin is also adept at jazz, blues, R&B, gospel music, and rock. Rolling Stone magazine ranked her atop its list of The Greatest Singers of All...

 and Etta James

Etta James

Etta James is an American blues, soul, rhythm and blues , rock and roll, gospel and jazz singer. In the 1950s and 1960s, she had her biggest success as a blues and R&B singer...

.

Discography

• 2003: Soul Unravelling
• 2005: Modes of Transport
• 2007: The Clandestine EP
• 2008: When We Were Spies
• 2009: Closer Encounters
• 2011: Love & Other Messes

External links

• http://annvriend.com - official webpage
• http://www.myspace.com/annvriend - myspace Profile
• http://www.facebook.com/AnnVriend - Facebook Profile