Past Releases
SELF/LESS (released April 2020)
Birthday Girl
production - Alva Leigh & Matt Ingram
song - Alva Leigh & Mary Erskine
Take My Time
production - Matt Ingram
song - Alva Leigh & Matt Ingram
Soft Focus
production - Matt Ingram
song - Alva Leigh & Matt Ingram
Wilderness
production - Matt Ingram
song - Alva Leigh
LEWIS & LEIGH, GHOST (2016)
**** Q
**** The Guardian
**** Songwriting Magazine
MODERN LOVE SONGS (2014)
IN NASHVILLE (2012)
Covers EP feat. Natalie Prass, Matthew Perryman Jones, Daniel Ellsworth & Alva’s brother Bill
ALVA LEIGH (2010)
About
Alva Leigh teamed up with writer and producer Matt Ingram to make her new EP, Self/less in London at Urchin Studios. In December 2017, Alva gave birth to her first child and spent the next two years piecing together songs about the emotional tumble dryer of new motherhood. The joyous, relentless, tumultuous job of being a new mom inspired Alva's dark and dreamy pop sound with her crystal-clear voice at the center.
Alva Leigh has always worked to craft the kind of songs that transport listeners with emotional honesty and lush storytelling, and Self/less is no different. Filled with smart lyrics and wistful pop hooks, this EP showcases Alva’s skills as a songwriter and her knack for distilling her observations and melodies into smoky, synth-driven pop.
Alva’s sound has developed with her changing surroundings; growing up on Mississippi’s Gulf Coast, her eponymous debut album drew from the jazz and blues that the region is steeped in, and dealt with young love, growing up, and the experience of life on the road. With the recognition of a young talent, songs from the album were picked to feature in an episode of Grey’s Anatomy, and an ad campaign for Pandora Jewelry, bringing Alva’s music to new ears. A move to London in 2012 inspired Modern Love Songs, a sparkling and emotionally honest collection of odes to long-lasting love and the realities of two lives entwining through all of life’s messy, practical and beautiful moments.
In 2014, a co-writing session with Welsh singer-songwriter Al Lewis led to the duo Lewis and Leigh, where Alva delved back into her southern roots to co-write Ghost, an album of rootsy Americana, released to huge critical acclaim in 2016. The album reached number 1 on the Amazon Folk chart, and won best UK Americana Album & Song ('The 4:19') in 2017. The duo appeared on Germany's largest music TV show, Ina's Nacht, opened for Deacon Blue & Jools Holland and performed at the Royal Albert Hall, Glastonbury & Cambridge Folk Festival.
Self/less takes Alva’s songwriting in a new direction, musing on her changing perspective and the experiences that motherhood has brought into her life. Alva’s voice crosses over seamlessly from her previous work into this collection of dark and dusky, insightful pop, with a lightness of touch that allows the singer-songwriter to shine.
The Self/less EP is out on all platforms. (2020)
Alva playing the last show of the Lewis & Leigh, Ghost tour at the Royal Albert Hall, 37 weeks pregnant. No she didn’t go into labour!
