Val Halla

Val Halla is a singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist from Regina, Saskatchewan. She has been featured in both Guitar World Magazine and Guitar Player Magazine, and is currently an endorsing artist with Canadian companies Mack Amps and Carparelli Guitars, and Battle Creek, Michigan based GHS Strings. The daughter of two motorcycle riding parents (a fiddle playing father and a visual artist mother), she first began writing folk songs on her acoustic guitar at the age of 11, influenced by such Canadian artists as Amanda Marshall, Tegan and Sara, Chantal Kreviazuk, Jann Arden, Hawksley Workman, and Blue Rodeo. She was also inspired by folk artists like Jewel, Simon & Garfunkel, and Lead Belly, and the classic rock-n-roll of her parent’s generation like Led Zeppelin and Meatloaf. However the first songs Val Halla learned on the guitar were the grunge and post-grunge rock songs of the 1990’s, from artists like Nirvana, Soundgarden, Weezer, and No Doubt. At 17 years old, and in the middle of her final year of high school, she decided to move by herself to the “big city” of Vancouver to pursue a career in music. In 2007 the self-titled “Val Halla” record was released as progressive folk/rock effort backed by Tayo Branston (drums) and Neil Towers (bass) of well known Vancouver funk juggernaut, Five Alarm Funk. After 7 years of writing, performing, and touring based out of Vancouver, as well as 3 years training and working as a studio engineer, live sound engineer, and producer in East Vancouver at Greenhouse Studios, Val Halla decided to move to the American south to work on her songwriting in Nashville, Tennessee. The sounds that seeped into her already diverse writing style that blended folk and grunge rock, would now create this unique “gruntry” sound (grunge rock meets country and roots) that some liken to the ever fluid artistic style of Neil Young. In 2010, she released a full length album entitled “No Place”, which was met with great appreciation from a veteran music and listening crowd, receiving praise from Gary Allen of the Charlie Daniels Band as the winner of his Tennessee Concerts Talent Competition, Steve Gunner of CCR, Motor-city Mad Man Ted Nugent, and Elliott Randall of Steely Dan who was also featured on the album closing blues track “Drink My Life Away”. Val Halla has toured all across the United States & Canada, playing hundreds of shows including opening many shows for music icons such as Eric Burdon of The Animals, Burton Cummings of The Guess Who, Alice Cooper, Ted Nugent, and Saskatchewan road veterans Streetheart. She has performed at various music festivals including Break Out West, Canadian Music Fest at CMW, Red Gorilla Fest at SXSW, Up + Downtown Music Festival, Launch Music Conference, The Florida Music Festival, and the Ness Creek Music Festival. She has also performed at such staple venues as The House of Blues (Orlando, Chicago, Boston, Cleveland, and Los Angeles), and The Knitting Factory (Spokane and Boise), Exit/In and The Wildhorse Saloon (Nashville), Knuckleheads Saloon (Kansas City), Pine Knob (Detroit), and the legendary Surf Ballroom (Clear Lake, Iowa).