What qualities make you different and unique from everyone else in the industry?
Thank you so much for having me!
I think my versatility and ability to perform and create in all genres of music is a way that I have always stood out. I used to sometimes feel like it was a hindrance but now it has worked in my favor because it seems that artists are beginning to break the “genre mold’ that the industry has kind of forced us to stay in for so long. People are collaborating and I think it’s really cool and super fun!
Describe THAT moment when you realized you’re doing what you were born to do.
I started writing songs around 10 years old and when I was 12 years old one of my fathers work friends came to town. My father wanted me to play him one of my songs and I played one of the first songs I’d ever written, “In The Middle of A Teardrop”. He broke down crying. He said he’d just gone through a divorce and the song really resonated with him.
I guess in that moment it became clear that if the songs I was writing as a 12 year old made a grown man cry, then I knew I could get even better. It became clear to me that people were reacting and resonating with my music.Â
At a later time in my life when I was singing with Melissa Etheridge on her cruise, she told me she was a fan. She came and sang my song “Jack Is Back” with me and we sang one of her songs “Back Door” I mean I have been a Melissa Etheridge fan since I heard her for the first time. That moment was something I dreamed about when I was 14 years old learning how to play her songs on the guitar.
What’s been the biggest challenge you’ve had to go through and how did you grow through it?Â
I think the biggest challenge for me was when I was on my first major national tour with Zac Brown Band and my mother was going through terminal cancer. I didn’t know how to manage it.
I was living my dreams of playing to thousands of people, I had my own tour bus, and my band was with me, it was the dream and everything I’d worked so hard for had finally arrived. Yet, I had this other thing going on. I didn’t know how to handle both, it was hard to compartmentalize my emotions. That was very difficult for me emotionally, I think more so than I was aware of looking back on it now.
I was under an immense amount of pressure and in a lot of internal pain. I think smiling for interviews, greeting fans, and the grind of the road were the hardest challenges I’d ever had to juggle. When my mom passed my whole life changed. I learned alot about what success means to me during those times. The definition of success changed for me after that.Â
Who are the TOP 3 people you’d want to meet that could elevate your career or business? Why these specific individuals?Â
Rick Rubin- I am dying to work with him. I feel like he’d understand me as an artist and my crazy need to make all styles of music. I think we’d make a powerful, magical record together.
Sia- I think it would be incredible to write with Sia, I have so much respect for her story and her writing, I have always wanted to work with her. She has such a brilliant and unique voice and is an empowering and versatile artist/songwriter.
Lorne Michaels- I am a goofy person and I LOVE comedy. I have always dreamed to be on Saturday Night Live one day. I think I am pretty funny and it would be a blast to present some of my ideas to him for skits ha ha and to perform of course but mostly I wanna be in the skits lol.
Drop your social media link.
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sonialeigh/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/sonialeigh
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sonialeighmusic/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/sonialeighofficial
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/6xezzx8L2FAC0MsGZSRLxg
Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/sonia-leigh/277679205