Tanya Davis | |
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 Davis (2017) | |
| Background information | |
| Origin | Summerside, Prince Edward Island, Canada |
| Genres | Pop, folk, spoken word |
| Occupation(s) | Singer-songwriter, poet |
| Years active | 2006–present |
| Website | Tanya Davis |
Tanya Davis is a Canadian singer-songwriter and poet, based in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Her style is marked primarily by spoken word poetry set to music.
Born in Summerside, Prince Edward Island, she moved to Ottawa for a time after high school to attend university, and then hitchhiked to British Columbia, where she worked in community development [1] before moving to Halifax in 2005. [2]
Shortly after moving to Halifax, Davis began performing spoken word poetry at various cafés in the city. She soon recorded an album, Make a List, which was nominated for Female Recording of the Year, Alternative Recording of the Year and Album of the Year at the Nova Scotia Music Awards, along with a nomination for Davis herself as New Artist of the Year, [2] as well as four nominations for the MusicPEI Awards. [1] She was named poet of the year in The Coast's annual year-end reader's poll for 2007.
She followed up with Gorgeous Morning in 2008. [1]
She has toured across Canada and internationally as a poet and musician, both as a solo artist and with Jenn Grant. [3]
Davis attracted international press attention in 2010 when a performance video of her poem "How to Be Alone", directed by Andrea Dorfman, became popular on YouTube. [4] She subsequently released her third album, Clocks and Hearts Keep Going, in November 2010. [5] The album was produced by Jim Bryson. [5]
Davis authored a book of poetry titled At First, Lonely in spring 2011, published by Canadian publisher The Acorn Press. [6] She also served as poet laureate of the Halifax Regional Municipality from 2011 to 2013. [7]
In 2013, she wrote the poetic narration to Millefiore Clarkes' Island Green, a short documentary produced by the National Film Board of Canada about organic farming in PEI. [8]
In 2014, she appeared in her first acting role, starring in Andrea Dorfman's film Heartbeat . [9]
In 2020 Dorfman and Davis again collaborated on the short film How to Be At Home , based on another poem by Davis about coping with isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada. [10] The film was named to the Toronto International Film Festival's year-end Canada's Top Ten list for 2020. [11]
Davis has stated in the press that she identifies as queer:
My sexuality is as fluid as my creativity. I don't sit firmly in the category of lesbian, but I don't sit firmly in poet or songwriter either. I love people for people. I think the way I love is queer. [12]
The Northumberland Strait is a strait in the southern part of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence in eastern Canada. The strait is formed by Prince Edward Island and the gulf's eastern, southern, and western shores.
George Elliott Clarke is a Canadian poet, playwright and literary critic who served as the Poet Laureate of Toronto from 2012 to 2015 and as the Canadian Parliamentary Poet Laureate in 2016-2017. Clarke's work addresses the experiences and history of the Black Canadian communities of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, creating a cultural geography coined "Africadia."
Afua Ava Pamela Cooper is a Jamaican-born Canadian historian. As a historian, "she has taught Caribbean cultural studies, history, women's studies and Black studies at Ryerson and York universities, at the University of Toronto and at Dalhousie University." She is also an author and dub poet who, as of 2018, has published five volumes of poetry.
Lorri Neilsen Glenn is a Canadian poet, ethnographer, essayist and educator. Born in Winnipeg, and raised on the Prairies, she moved to Nova Scotia in 1983. Neilsen Glenn is the author and editor of several books of creative nonfiction, poetry, literacy, ethnography, and essays. She was Poet Laureate for Halifax from 2005-2009, the first Métis to hold the position. Her writing focuses on women, arts-based research, and memoir/life stories; her work is known for its hybrid and lyrical approaches. She has published book reviews in national and international journals and newspapers. Neilsen Glenn has received awards for her poetry, creative nonfiction, teaching, scholarship and community work.
Al Tuck, is a Canadian songwriter and folksinger from Prince Edward Island who has spent much of his career based in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Jenn Grant is a Canadian folk pop singer-songwriter based in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Leo Marchildon is a Canadian organist, music director, film/theatre music composer and producer based in Prince Edward Island.
The Canadian Festival of Spoken Word is an annual festival produced by Spoken Word Canada and planned by a local Festival Organizing Committee in each host city.
The East Coast Music Association (ECMA) is a non-profit association purposed towards supporting the music industry in the Canadian east coast, i.e., Atlantic Canada. The ECMA hosts the annual East Coast Music Awards festival.
Slowcoaster is a Canadian indie rock band from Sydney, Nova Scotia. The band's sound is rock-based, with strong influences of reggae, ska, folk and jazz.
Ursula Johnson is a multidisciplinary Mi’kmaq artist based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Her work combines the Mi’kmaq tradition of basket weaving with sculpture, installation, and performance art. In all its manifestations her work operates as didactic intervention, seeking to both confront and educate her viewers about issues of identity, colonial history, tradition, and cultural practice. In 2017, she won the Sobey Art Award.
Heartbeat is a 2014 Canadian drama film written and directed by Andrea Dorfman. It was screened in the Contemporary World Cinema section at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival. The film stars poet and musician Tanya Davis as Justine, an unfulfilled advertising copywriter who dreams of becoming a musician but struggles with stage fright.
Andrea Dorfman is a Canadian screenwriter and film director based in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She directed the Emmy Award films Flawed (2010) and Big Mouth (2012). Dorfman is one of the four co-creators of Blowhard. She mainly creates short and feature films but also works on mini-documentaries for the Equality Effect, a human rights organization. She is currently working on The Playground in collaboration with Jennifer Deyell.
Millefiore Clarkes, is a Canadian filmmaker from Prince Edward Island. She has produced music videos, experimental shorts and documentary films, as well as commercials. She also owns and operates One Thousand Flowers Productions. The name of the film production company is derived from her first name, which means "one thousand flowers" in Italian.
El Jones is a poet, journalist, professor and activist living in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She was Halifax's Poet Laureate from 2013 to 2015.
Kinley Dowling, who performs under the stage name KINLEY, is a Canadian singer-songwriter and musician. She is a member of the band Hey Rosetta! and joined them in 2008. In 2016, she released her solo album Letters Never Sent. In 2018, she was nominated for four East Coast Music Awards, where she won Fan Choice Video of the Year and Rising Star Recording of the Year. She released her second album KINLEY in 2020, where it was nominated for Pop Recording of the Year at the 2021 East Coast Music Awards.
Robbie MacNeill is a guitarist and singer-songwriter who was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. He attended Queen Elizabeth High School and studied engineering at Dalhousie University for two years, before moving to Toronto to work as a surveyor in 1964. In the late sixties and early 70's he arranged, conducted and performed with The Privateers, billed as 'Eastern Canada's Only Professional Fork Chorus'. He went on to work with a number of other artists, and released his own album 'Pieces' in 1984.
The Poet Laureate of Halifax, Nova Scotia is a poet laureate position appointed by the municipal government of the Halifax Regional Municipality, Nova Scotia, Canada. The position was first created in 2001, and has been held by nine poets as of 2024.
Shauntay Grant is a Canadian author, poet, playwright, and professor. Between 2009 and 2011, she served as the third poet laureate of Halifax, Nova Scotia. She is known for writing Africville, a children's picture book about a black community by the same name that was razed by the city of Halifax in the 1960s. "Africville" was nominated for a 2018 Governor General’s Literary Award. The book also won the 2019 Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award, and was among 13 picture books listed on the United States Board on Books for Young People's 2019 USBBY Outstanding International Books List.
How to Be At Home is a Canadian short film, directed by Andrea Dorfman and released in 2020. A sequel to her 2010 short film How to Be Alone, the film illustrates a spoken word piece by poet Tanya Davis about coping with isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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