Norma MacDonald

Norma MacDonald is a singer-songwriter born and raised in Cape Breton, now living in Halifax, NS. She likes Gram Parsons records, talking to strangers, potato chips, David Lynch movies and swimming in the ocean. Her fourth album, Burn the Tapes, is a sonic conglomeration of these affections. Recorded over 13 months in rural Upper Musquodoboit, NS (at Phil Sedore’s Mountain Road Studio), it marks MacDonald’s first time taking the reigns as sole producer. Burn the Tapes is at turns scrappy and slick, naive and confident, playful and heavy. From the summertime, old-friend nostalgia of the opening track “Company” to the quirky, unsettling country-noir of “Lighten Up” (a duet with former Guthries baritone, Gabe Minnikin), to the dark, orchestral Springsteen homage “To Nebraska”, Burn the Tapes plays like the soundtrack to long night time drive that’s over too soon.

MacDonald’s third album Morning you Wake received glowing reviews in Canada, the U.S and Europe and was the #3 most played album on Galaxie’s Folk Roots channel in 2011. It received three Music Nova Scotia nominations in 2011 (Female Solo, Folk and Country/Bluegrass Recording of the Year). Her second album The Forest for the Trees was nominated by the ECMA as Female Solo recording of the year in 2009 and was heralded by Exclaim! as “nothing short of delicious”.

For upcoming tour dates, please visit www.normamacdonald.com