Singer-songwriter Sacha was born in Montreal but moved to the small town of Warkworth, Ont., with her family when she was just a toddler. She didn’t know then that the quaint rural setting would be a major influence behind her pursuit of country music years later. It was about 10 years ago that the musician decided to chase her dream career, and she knew there was a long road ahead. “I look back and I don’t know how I did it,” she says from Nashville, Tenn., where she now lives part-time. (When back in Canada, she lives in Oshawa, Ont.) “I remember looking up studios, finding the head contacts and just messaging them.” She discovered that Canadian musician advocacy group SOCAN has a house in the country-music mecca where you can stay for free if you’re a songwriter, so down south she went. “I remember walking up and down Music Row and handing out my CD,” she recalls. She self-released her debut EP, The Best Thing, in July 2020 and has since released hit tracks with Canadian heavy hitters like The Reklaws and, more recently, Tyler Shaw. But the tide really shifted in 2021 when she was named one of Country Music Television’s Next Women of Country, a program that supports up-and-coming women artists and earned her much more industry attention. And after a decade of hustling, the artist’s biggest break yet came this year: her first record deal with a major label, Sony Music Entertainment Canada. Now that she has a full-length LP in the works, 2024 looks like it’s set to be the year of SACHA. “It feels like a full-circle moment,” she says. “It’s been a long time coming. I’ve been working toward this dream forever.”

SMALL-TOWN LIVING

“My parents are musical—they had a band—so we had every instrument in the house. They’d have rehearsals—we’d have backyard bonfires and everyone would play around the fire. Music was playing 24-7, [so it’s] been a way of life for me since [I was] young. There were a lot of good times and bad times living in a small town—there was zero diversity— but we still felt at home. It was all we ever knew. We grew lots of our food in our backyard, and we’d have sleepovers with friends who lived on farms. It was the country-music, country-living lifestyle.”

GROWING PAINS

“I always had this dream to [pursue a career in] music—I’d do talent shows and write songs. But then life happens and you have nowhere to go; you have to work full-time and pay your own rent. I was in survival mode, so the dream took a bit of a back seat. But I always knew it had to happen. There was a point when I was working for this company that ended up folding, and I was like: ‘To heck with this, man. I’m going to do music.’ I picked up a guitar and started writing. Taylor Swift was just on the scene, and I was so encouraged by her. I hit the open mikes, started putting myself out there—terrified—and the rest is history.”

FOR THE ART

“[Songwriting] is a really tough road. It’s devastating at times. The only reason I’m here is because I have a strong conviction. It’s like do or die. There’s this haunting thing inside me that keeps reminding me that this is what I’m here to do.”

TRUE SOUL

“I can do anything, really, because I’ve had every musical influence, which has prepared me to play all sorts of genres. But for me, country music is a natural thing. I grew up on milk farms in a small town, playing Garth Brooks, Shania Twain and Faith Hill with friends. It’s just authentic to me and takes me back to my roots, and I love the fact that I get to tell my story through country music.”

NEW SOUND

“I have evolved. The stuff that I started out doing was more, like, backwoods bluegrass folk-Americana. Now, I’m more into the pop-country world. But you’re hearing every influence in country right now, whether it’s hip hop, soul, gospel or rock—it’s all meshing together. I’m working on my album right now and pulling from all the stuff that I love.”

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