photo by Iris Ray / design by Beth Mathews
new album, WILDERNESS, out now
There’s not much attention given to a mother’s rite of passage. Expected to transition into their new role with ease and poise, a mother's reality is pretty messy. Alva Leigh became a mother in 2017 just three weeks after a career milestone performance at the Royal Albert Hall in London with her band, Lewis & Leigh. The Americana duo she formed with Welshman Al Lewis released their debut album Ghost to critical acclaim, after a run of shows at Glastonbury, Cambridge Folk Festival and a UK/Europe tour. Once thrust across the threshold of motherhood, however, the paradoxes began, and Alva processed the only way she knew how – songwriting.
Alva left London during the COVID pandemic with a newborn and toddler, returning to Tennessee to make a new home. Somewhere in between nap time and the nursing chair, she kept writing songs as a sort of reverse magic trick - how not to disappear into caretaking. But there was one threshold she wished she didn’t have to cross like the 20 week ultrasound appointment where she learned her third daughter would not survive birth. The paradoxes ensued; songs like “Find You In Other Places” became a hopeful lament.
Alva collaborated with Matt Ingram (Laura Marling, Florence & the Machine) for production of her new songs. The musical result is playful, explorative, dreamy, undeniably pure pop that stands in stark contrast with lyrics that are vulnerable, and piercing, yet hopeful in their observations. Love and fear. Loneliness and expectation. Loss and hope. Grief and magic. Turns out there is catharsis in the making, and Alva mines her experience into a poignant statement of not only a mother’s passage and perseverance, but the multifaceted beauty of the human condition itself.
kind words from writers i admire
With Wilderness, Alva Leigh gives us a heartbroken and joyful world, filled with tragedy, delight, and a kind of belligerent, burning hope. Her powerful, distinctive voice grants each melody a sense of gravitas and grace, and the songs linger in your heart and mind long after the music stops. This record will both crack your heart wide open and give you the courage to carry on.
- Jimmy Cajoleas
Life as a mother and an artist is messy, uncultivated and exhilarating. You can never escape the idea that everything you’re doing is just laying groundwork. You show up, sit there with your grain of sand, trusting that one day a pearl will emerge. In Alva Leigh’s Wilderness, the form interrogates the content: upbeat, ear worm melodies are layered with the lyrical tensions of an artist’s journey into motherhood. But you don’t have to be a mother to relate, anyone involved in a creative endeavor will find these songs complex and powerful.
- Jamie Quatro
kind words from real moms
I’m not sure I’ve ever heard or felt anything so close to the experience of motherhood as “Wilderness. ”It feels incredible surreal to be filled with so much joy and pain simultaneously. You capture this so deeply and poetically.
This album has been such a font of joy and togetherness and tenderness for our family! We are dancing especially hard to Late Bloomer, Pearl and Builder of the Bones, but man there is not a single track on this album that doesn’t project new pictures on the lil screen of my soul.
Pregnancy was hard. Labor and delivery was harder. Postpartum has been the hardest thing I’ve ever done. But your words and music have been a balm to my soul. A safe haven in the storm.
ME BEFORE THE YOU
director and dp @emilygraceharris
art director @sydsydhoang
gaffer @vaughnstegall
grip and edit @ethan_conroy_
FIND YOU IN OTHER PLACES
director @emilygraceharris
dp @tanehopper
dancer and choreo @jules.downum
edit + color @elizabetholms
Find you in other places
super 8 @sadiejeanspezzano
add’l footage @tanehopper
art direction @bethmathews
color @elizabetholms
jumpsuit @whatkaitmakes
hmu @trippychickmakeup
Past Releases
photo by Curious Rose
produced by Matt Ingram
released april 2020 | listen or purchase here | full credits here
photo by Rachell Smith
produced by Matt Ingram
released august 2016 | listen or purchase here
**** Q | **** The Guardian | **** Songwriting Magazine
photos by Bradley Spitzer | design by Amanda Odmark
produced by Mike Odmark
released 2012 | listen here
after taking apart all the pieces of my evangelical upbringing, i decided i didn’t want to walk away from christianity but to make a way. in 2023 i started a songwriting project called lady chapel that follows the major events of the christian calendar year. a reconstruction of faith one song at a time. listen and learn more on the lady chapel substack. all are welcome - no spiritual perquisites required.
i enjoyed doing the collages artwork as well - another form of “putting things back together”
pictured left to right: advent, christmas, epiphany, lent, good friday, easter, pentecost
