Now in its 34th year, Canadian Music Week is recognized as one of the premier entertainment events in North America focusing on the business of music. We bring together Sound Recording, New Media and Broadcast for one spectacular week of events… Combining informative, intensive conferences, a cutting edge trade exhibition, award shows, film festival, comedy festival and Canada’s biggest New Music Festival. The Canadian Music Week festival spans 5 nights of performances, with 1,000 showcasing bands at more than 60 live music venues in downtown Toronto.  All convention functions take place at the Toronto Marriott Downtown Eaton Centre.

Traditional western and country music. Ranching, rodeo & other agricultural tragedies. Fan of cold beer, gin, military history & campfires.

Following the philosophy “Write what you know,” Luke Nicholson’s new single,“All Your Dresses”  fully displays his gifts for melody and poignant storytelling. The first single from the Toronto singer/songwriter’s forthcoming album, Shape and Sound, pays tribute to two significant relationships for Nicholson. Through the metaphor of clothes, the special moments shared between a husband and wife are beautifully illustrated, while the ideals his father instilled in him, to be a good man and father, are captured through the simple image of a tie.

This album’s journey not only inspired Luke to “find his sound” true artistic identity, but encouraged him to take the reins of the creative process. “Marty Skrzypczyk and I played every instrument and co-produced it from the beds up. Howie Beck did an amazing job mixing and Joao Carvalho did his usual excellent mastering work. I look at this track as my artistic fingerprint, instead of outsourcing parts or players it truly is one voice speaking and it’s really made making music exciting again.”

Nicholson points to his first trip to Nashville in the fall of 2015 as the catalyst to this intrepid approach. Although he had songwriting sessions lined up, his mission became to hit Music City with everything he had by playing every open stage and introducing himself to as many people as possible. “I was a complete stranger with only my guitar as a companion, it was so exciting and inspiring to start fresh in such a historic music city”. The results were instantaneous; he received invites to writer rounds and  was soon spending time with Canadian songwriting legend Eddie Schwartz who committed to championing “All Your Dresses” leading him to Bluewater Publishing President Brownlee Ferguson; who has since taken Luke under his wing, arranging co-writes with some of Nashville’s biggest songwriters further nurturing his songwriting  talents.

Originally from Lakefield, Ontario, Luke Nicholson had his first major breakthrough in 2008, when the track “Breathe” from the film Poor Boys Game earned a Genie nomination for Best Original Song. Nicholson’s debut album Mad Love, debuted on 2012, which spawned three CBC Radio 2 Top 20 singles and earned glowing reviews in Europe, most notably from Rolling Stone Germany who described Nicholson as a “young Elton John or Billy Joel.”

Shape and Sound is proof that pop music still has the capacity to be intelligent yet catchy, mature but fun, and above all, talk about experiences to which we can all relate.

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