Rising Stars: Meet Anica Stemper

Today we’d like to introduce you to Anica Stemper.

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
Music has always been my favorite language. My Mom tells me I’ve been singing since before I could fully form sentences.

I picked up a guitar at the age of 11 and started writing songs. I started producing them on Garageband when I was 17, then switched to LogicPro a few years later. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with them, but I loved making them. When a show called “The Shannara Chronicles” came out, I was mesmerized by the theme song. It’s a dark, cinematic track by Ruelle called “When We Go Down.”

It was the first time I’d heard a song so haunting and epic at the same time and it’s exactly what I wanted to make. I wrote a song called “Broken Drums” that same day. A year later, it was featured in an episode of “The Shannara Chronicles.” That was the first time I thought: “I might be able to do this for a living.” So I kept making music, and performing at bars and restaurants wherever I lived. After graduating college in San Diego, I hopped around the Northwest–Seattle, then Portland, then the Oregon Coast, and lastly the San Juan Islands. My music has been featured in nine TV shows and one movie since then.

Now, I live in Nashville in hopes of finding a community of people who love music as much as I do. I’m working as a fine dining server to keep writing for TV and films. If I can do that for the rest of my life, I will be indescribably happy.

Can you talk to us about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back, would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
I pick up and move every year or two to keep a fresh perspective and spark inspiration for new music. I feel like I’ve lived a hundred different lives, and it’s not always easy starting over.

But I suppose I do it to myself. Why stay in one place when there’s so much to see and I’m not bound to a desk job? The beauty of making music is that you can take it with you wherever you go, and I certainly do.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I would say that my music ranges from dark and cinematic, to romantic and acoustic, to raw and lofi. I love a song that invokes any kind of emotion, especially melancholia. There’s something beautiful about happy music because you can take the joy that you feel and spread it to people who need it.

But sorrow is special to me because you’re taking an emotion that’s looked down on and rejected by many and saying to the listener: “I see you. I feel the same, and it’s okay to experience it. Let’s sit in this together.” A lot of my music is somber for that reason.

It’s more reminiscent of having a cup of tea on a rainy day, as opposed to lying in a field of flowers in the sun. Both are lovely, but one is just more calming to me. I also grew up loving Celtic music, so some of my more cinematic tracks have an ancient feel to them that I love melding with modern sounds.

Any big plans?
I am working on lots of new singles, possibly an EP. It has more folk influences than my previous music. I never want to stop experimenting with my music. The day I feel like I’m done growing as a musician is the day I need to sell my guitar and find a different hobby.

My long-term goal is to keep writing for TV and film because the feeling of my art being added to heighten someone else’s is euphoric. I want to stay in Nashville for another year or so, but who knows where the wind might blow?

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.anicamusic.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/anica_music/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AnicaStemperMusic
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/anica_music
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3TmXtFdeneYE0CHHOTZ8Qw
• SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/anicamusic