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FROM OUR NORTH AMERICAN CORRESPONDENT
Lawrence Lebo

The year 2020 has started off well for Canadian singer Dawn

Tyler Watson. She’s already walked away with two Maple Blues
Awards (CA) for Recording of The Year and for Songwriter of
The Year!
She’s also
nominated for
her first Juno

(CA) in the
category of Best Album of The Year, and for a Blues
Music Award (US) in the category of Vocal
Instrumentalist. With more than two decades of
performing arts in her playbook and five albums

to her credit, Montreal based singer-songwriter
Dawn Tyler Watson has earned her place among
Canada’s Blues elite.

Born in Manchester, England, Dawn moved with
her family to Ontario, Canada at age four. Jazz was
her first inclination. She moved from Toronto to

Montreal to attend the jazz program at Concordia
University. Post-graduation she was invited to add
songs to a compilation of Montreal blues artists,
which sent her career in the blues direction.
Watson began performing using guitarist/arranger

Ben Racine and his band as a pickup band and
has continued to do so now for several years. In
2017 she and Racine’s band participated in the
International Blues Challenge in Memphis,
Tennessee, and won the IBC title! Her most recent
recording “Mad Love”, with Racine and other studio guests was released in April of 2019.

I asked Dawn a bit about herself and her career and this is what she told me:

B
LL: Congratulations on your two Maple Blues Awards! How was the experience?

DTW: Thank you! It was a super exciting night! I was the first artist to perform, and the Album of

The Year category came up almost immediately afterwards. I was still pretty pumped up from
performing, so I was a little caught off guard! But I am super thrilled and humbled to have been
nominated for four awards this year, let alone to have won in what I felt, was the most unlikely of the
four to win; Songwriter of the Year. This is a huge honour for me. It’s very affirming.

LL: I’m sure you’ve worked hard to earn your accolades. Can you tell us a bit about your journey?