MUSIC CITY SINGER/SONGWRITER APRIL KRY DOESN’T JUST WRITE EMPOWERING SONGS FOR YOUNG WOMEN ON HER BREEDLOVE COMPANION, SHE TOURS WITH IT, TOO.
April Kry recently returned to Nashville from her first tour of Switzerland. Not long after, she bopped up to Manhattan for a Musicians on Call anniversary benefit show at the prestigious Edison Ballroom. When she has a moment, she’ll visit the family homestead in Connecticut, but more often she’s in Los Angeles, circling, guitar in hand, with her sister Kaydence, around the writing table.
It’s a good thing she has a Companion.
Breedlove’s new travel guitar is an ideal fit for Kry, whether on a cross-country flight or up late in the studio, cutting a Music City demo of a work-in-progress.
Kry’s website describes the diminutive blonde powerhouse in four simple words—“Tiny girl. Big Voice.”
“I’m 4’11,” she says, “and I’m a small girl, so this Companion is just perfect for my size. It’s also perfect for touring because you really don’t want to be lugging around a big guitar when you’re on a bus or when you’re sitting on a plane. What’s so amazing about this, even with its small body, is the sound. You’re not compromising, which is really important for me, especially when you’re playing it on stage. You don’t want it to sound wimpy. You want it to sound big, and that’s what this guitar—a Discovery Companion Mahogany CE—does.”
In her plentiful videos, Kry, who approaches personal interpretations of cover songs as an important aspect of her art, rarely has a six-string in her hands.
“I consider myself a singer first,” she says, having grown up joining in at church in New England. “That’s always been my first love. I love performing. Just feeling the energy from the crowd and seeing the reactions, that’s really what drives me.”
But for stage work and writing, she plays. Seriously.
In fact, before she visited the Two Old Hippies lifestyle shop in Nashville to choose her Companion, she was already pretty invested, being the owner of a Bedell Kenny Loggins signature model as well as a custom redwood-topped Bedell parlor she helped design, choosing woods alongside Tom Bedell at the workshop in Bend, Oregon.
“I really started learning guitar,” Kry says, “because when I sat down to write and would have a melody in my head, I wanted to relay that in the writing. My dad taught me the basic chords and I just went from there.”
Equally comfortable singing soul, rock or folk, Kry, who started visiting Nashville just after high school, settled on country as her home base because of the storytelling inherent in the form. Now, she enjoys the challenge of the different methods employed on the two coasts.
“I think what makes Nashville different than, say, L.A., is that we usually start with concept first. I find that when I write in Los Angeles, it’s always the beat and the melody that come first, then, after, you figure out the concept. For me, it’s different really for every writing session and producer you work with—it’s going to depend on that. When I first moved to Nashville, I was a little overwhelmed with the amount of talent here. But once you find people that you connect with and feel comfortable with, it just flows.”
Her personal favorite composition, “I Feel at Home,” is a love song penned to her husband.
A defining aspect of Kry’s writing is care. Inspired by artists like Martina McBride, she puts women first in her own songs, hoping to inspire and educate. The recent single “If Girls Ruled the World,” co-written with Chris Hurst and Kyle May, is an alarum call for change, respect and equality.
“That’s huge for me, absolutely,” she confirms. “I remember growing up, seeing and hearing these powerful women singing and just putting out messages that were so important. Those songs really shaped who I am as a person and as an artist. I just want to be that now for young, impressionable females. In today’s day and age you see a lot of, frankly, not-so-great role models for females, and so I just want to be empowering. I want to be inspiring and push females to speak their truth.”
“It’s just incredible what music can do.”
Similarly, Kry loves the fact that Breedlove, by making a stand for ecology within the guitar industry, is committed, too.
“It’s amazing in practice and philosophy—bettering the environment and responsibly sourcing tonewood is not something you see from a lot of guitar companies. I’m proud to be a part of the family and proud to stand by Bedell and Breedlove.”
