With songs including the metaphors of rain, MOYANA — the stage name for musical artist and Northwestern alum Olivia Pierce (Bienen ’24) — highlighted the positives within hard times in her debut album, “PTCHWRK.” Despite this being her first album, MOYANA is already becoming a decorated artist, receiving awards like the 2023 LGBTQ+ Emerging Artist Award from Citibank and having her music featured on shows like “The View.”
MOYANA sat down with The Daily to discuss her new music, a recent show at Beat Kitchen and her experiences at NU.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
The Daily: You just released your debut album “PTCHWRK” at the end of last month. Can you tell me a little bit about it?
MOYANA: It was really fun. We had an album release show for “PTCHWRK” on Jan. 23. It was my first headliner show, and people were really excited. To sell tickets, I just reached out to people I knew individually one at a time, with different texts and emails every day.
(We also had) a listening party in December and a “how to crochet” because the theme of the album is centered around the quilt that I made. The idea is that basically, you try to plan your life out like clockwork, but in reality, stuff usually comes together more like patchwork. It was just really nice to kind of share that concept and that idea with people, and then drop the album and do a show.
The Daily: Can you talk me through your songwriting process?
MOYANA: I would say for my album that I just released, it started with picking out the beats with my producer. After that, I would walk around to the beat and try to think about different moments that were going on in my life.
It took about two years just because I was kind of experiencing different things that inspired the project. If I ever got stuck on a song, I would just try to play it on guitar, just to kind of strip it down, and then see if the lyrics came to me that way, and if I was able to express myself more easily that way.
The Daily: Did you have a favorite song on the album or a favorite single that you released?
MOYANA: I think “HEARTHUNDER” was my favorite single that was dropped leading up to the album just because of the message. I wanted to write a song about rain being a good thing versus a bad thing because all of the cycles that we experience in life have their own purposes.
Thinking about how maybe you’re in a season of drought, or you don’t really understand what’s going on, but you hear the thunder roll so you know that rain is coming. Having faith that your situation can turn around at any moment, even though you may not be able to see it right in front of you. It’s something that was really encouraging for me as I was going through different things.
I also really like “GROWN,” which is the last song in the album. It’s about my grandparents and how they continue to watch over me and inspire me to be a positive person despite different things that are going on.
The Daily: You were part of the Songwriters Association at Northwestern (SWAN). How did that shape you as an artist?
MOYANA: It was fun. I thought they were really cool, really centered on uplifting artists. They also hosted things like Kresgepalooza, so I got to go from room to room and see all my friends perform.
I did a “How I Made” seminar where I showed different songs that I worked on – like their demo phases, like the voice memo phases to the final master product, just to kind of walk people through a more in-depth understanding of my writing process. I think it was really helpful for people to just get insight into how you could go about making a song. So I definitely loved working with SWAN.
The Daily: Did you have any favorite spots on campus or in Evanston that you used as inspiration for your songs, or that you used while working on your songwriting process?
MOYANA: I used to walk around South Beach. I would just walk from school, do a lap down to Lee Street and come back. Honestly, that’s how I got a lot of my writing done: just walking on that path.
I was over there a couple of weekends ago just to kind of reminisce and listen to the album in its entirety.
The Daily: Do you have any advice for aspiring songwriters or artists?
MOYANA: I would definitely say don’t feel discouraged if you think it costs a million dollars to write a song. You can go about it where you pay to get it produced, and then you pay to get it mixed and mastered, and then you pay to upload it to streaming.
But there (are) also a lot of ways where you can really lean on your community to get projects done — reaching out to people who are on the same level as you.
When I went to Northwestern I was able to rent a microphone from the library for free. So I recorded a lot of my music like that and then mixed it and mastered it with different people at school. There (are) definitely a lot of ways to bring the project that you envision to life.
Email: marissafernandez2028@u.northwestern.edu
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