Contributer post by Will Bryant

Alva Leigh is a 22 year singer/songwriter from Mississippi with an incredible voice and a soulful sound. In the past year i've had the privilege to work with Allie contributing artwork to her debut record, merch, promotional material as well as her website. I think that Poppytalk readers will really enjoy her music! In honor of the 5 year anniversary of Katrina, you can download her song "Hurricane" below for free.

Download: Alva Leigh - "Hurricane"

"Her move in the summer of 2005 came ten days before Hurricane Katrina hit. Leigh says, “Gulfport is about an hour east of New Orleans. We had seven feet of water in our house. Our phones went out for three months. And when it hit, I was sitting in the cafeteria at Belmont University by myself, watching these terrible images on CNN. It was weird not to be there. I had to grieve from far away. My stuff was gone, so what was displaced was all of my memories. And displaced is not even a strong enough word.”


Leigh pours those feelings into “Hurricane,” one of the album’s standout tracks. With an arrangement that captures the jaunty defiance and brassy sobs of a Big Easy jazz funeral procession, the song shuffles and swings as she sings of such powerful images as “a cottonmouth sunnin’ on her back porch” and “watching her family wade for my momma’s wedding gown.”




Also, her song "Skyline" was recently featured in a commercial for the Mississippi Gulf Coast.


more from Alva:
- Site
- Myspace
- Twitter
- Merch