Annie Sumi Is Truly a Breath of Fresh Air
Now and then a new artist emerges with something very special to offer, hits the ground running, and brings something refreshingly different to music. Annie Sumi is one of those.
Appearing this Friday, March 30th, for two dinner shows at Bruce Wine Bar in Thornbury, Annie Sumi emanates a gentle, almost mystical approach to music that elevates her songwriting and soars on her ethereal voice. Her presence and her music seem an ideal antidote to our troubling times.
“Annie Sumi wins you over before she finishes her first song,” says Mogens Galberg, of the Greenbank Folk Music Society. “Her natural and beautiful voice, smart lyrical ballads and excellent guitar skills make you realize she was born to do this.”
Originally from Whitby, she kept a promise to her parents to complete her education before embarking on a musical career, which she realized at a young age was her destiny. The moment she graduated from Nipissing University in 2015, she released her debut album, Reflections, and began to tour.
“I realized while I was at school how much I really wanted to do music,” she told Laura Stanley at GreyOwl Point, “At my last year of school, after working throughout school to save money to put together the record, I just decided it was time. There’s an incredible community up there in North Bay so everyone I had met over those four years were there to help me. It ended up being this very organic album, released at the perfect time. It felt really good.”
Her record charted on college radio, she was nominated for a Toronto Independent Music Award, and earned a fan in George Stroumboulopoulos who played one of her songs on his CBC radio show.
It’s not just the beauty of her voice and her music, not just the charm of her onstage presence that makes her something special. It’s the way she shows you the world in a new light. Her songs are like those beautiful dawn moments when the sun comes up over Georgian Bay.
“Everyday is so filled with possibility and it’s magic,” she told Laura Stanley, “It doesn’t matter what people believe in or what kind of thing you subscribe to but I don’t think it’s impossible for everyone to live life in this magical way. Things that are bad happen all the time but I think there’s enough good in people and in the world that we can help each other and open each other up to this way of life that’s good.”
I’ve always thought, “Go to university now and do what you want later,” was the worst advice imaginable but Annie Sumi has proved me wrong.
It seems like she hit the ground running right out of university, and from the looks of it will never have to worry about “having something to fall back on” but I think the experience at Nipissing was an important part of her development. I’ve always thought that there is something very valuable about the university experience that has nothing to do with the curriculum.
I’m just bitter because university was a waste of time (and energy and money)for me. Most people I know speak fondly of it.