Unbelievably, it has been over a year since I last put out a solo artist release, so I'm thrilled to share this project with you. Sojourn is a short EP written and recorded entirely during 2020, most of it while locked down at home. COVID threw a bit of a wrench in my recording plans for that year—studio shut downs being the most frustrating. After a lot of time spent reevaluating what I wanted to make as an artist, my hands were tied, my album postponed, and home recording became the only outlet (along with noisy neighbors that never leave).

In a way my less-than-acoustically-ideal apartment with all of its weird shapes, glass doors, and abundance of fridges (groan) became the perfect environment for this little EP—considering the season, I wanted to write something raw… almost uncomfortably so; I wanted to write in a way that made you feel like you were in the same room with me when you put your ear buds in… every creak, every noise, a sound that was intentionally “unpolished” in the right way.

Later, the title “Sojourn” became clear: “a temporary stay”. This rang true on so many levels—globally, of course, but also where I was at as an artist. I consider it the “in-between” chapter between my previous work and what’s to come. It’s not quite my old stuff, but it’s the stepping stone to the new. It is miles away from where I’ve been, but nowhere near the end decision of where this music took me; it became the bridge that connects the two without being fully either. It is also likely what will be my last solo piano release for a while as I begin taking my music in a new direction with a few new projects. Finally, it just seemed so perfectly fitting that this project is about staying, when the album I put on hold is about the opposite—traveling; the music I wrote while on a physical journey. Initially I was so frustrated putting this on hold, but in hindsight the timing was perfect—I needed to journey a bit as an artist before writing about the journey.

I hope it’s a strangely comforting EP—it’s possibly the most intimate thing I’ve written, and in my mind it holds that balance between stillness and the tension of wanting to move again.

Photography by Rachel Wooley Davis.