July 23, 2024

Living the dream with rising country music star Lena Paige

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In this episode of Living the Dream with Curveball, host Curveball interviews singer-songwriter and country music star Lena Paige. Join us as Lena shares her journey from writing music with her mom at 15 to hitting the charts with several songs. Discover how she got started, her international tours, and the incredible story behind her song "Roses in December" which made it to the top ten country songs in Europe in 2020.
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> Speaker A>Welcome, to the living the dream podcast with curveball. if you believe you can achieve Chee Chee.

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> Curtis Jackson>Welcome to the living the dream with Curveball podcast, a show where I interview guests that teach, motivate and inspire. Today I am joined by singer songwriter country music star Lena page. We're going to be talking to her.

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> Lena Page>I'm curious.

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> Curtis Jackson>Oh, absolutely. You got several songs that have hit the charts. We're going to be talking about, you know, how, Ronnie mill Southstarter wanted you to rerecord a song that he done, everything that you're up to and how you got started. So thank you so much for joining us today.

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> Lena Page>Absolutely. Thank you for having me.

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> Curtis Jackson>Why don't you start off by telling everybody a little bit about yourself?

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> Lena Page>Well, I am Lena Page and I live in franklin, Tennessee. I started writing music with my mom when I was 15 years old. Before that, I had been in several competitions throughout the state of washington. My mom is originally from kentucky, Henderson, Kentucky. And she, is, the, niece of Merle Travis. So Merle Travis invented the Travis picking style that you hear, like on Kansas, dust in the wind.

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> Lena Page>ah, he wrote 16 tons. And what do you get?

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> Lena Page>Another day older and deeper in debt. He wrote that, he was a major, inspiration to Chet Adkins. Chet Adkins, developed his style of guitar playing around Merle Travis. And, Tommy Emanuel also fashioned, his way of guitar around Merle Travis.

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> Lena Page>So I come from a long line of musicians.

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> Lena Page>Unfortunately, I didn't pick up the Travis picking style, but I began singing, pretty young and I started doing backup vocals for my mom.

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> Lena Page>And then, moved to Nashville back in 2003 and started doing, backup vocals and session work and touring for different people. So that's kind of where I got started in Nashville.

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> Curtis Jackson>Well, you've also toured with a lot of international artists as well, so kind of tell us about that.

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> Lena Page>Well, I toured internationally with, Gilly Larson. he was a country singer. He's passed away since, but, toured with him in Norway. but, probably the greatest achievement was my mom and I wrote the very first song we wrote was, roses in December. And that song kind of self promoted itself. I put it out on Facebook and Instagram and, reverb Nation, Deezer, all of those platforms, Spotify, iTunes and didn't really promote it a lot because I was promoting another song that I was told was more commercial, in the US here. But people in Europe heard roses in December and it actually, made it to number six in the top ten country songs for the year of 2020 in all throughout Europe. So BBC radio contacted me and, interviewed me over the phone, and it was really fun because that was the first song that my mom and I had written together.

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> Lena Page>So, it was, It was pretty incredible.

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> Curtis Jackson>Okay, tell us about some of your musical influences. Who influences you, and people will recognize that, make, you do what you do well, goodness.

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> Lena Page>I had a lot because I loved everything.

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> Lena Page>Everything. I'm extremely eclectic in my, in my genres of music, but because my mom wrote traditional country music, traditional country music was really a foundation for my music, that I loved. So, growing up, I listened to Dolly parton and Patsy Klein and Kitty Wells and, Hank Williams and, gosh, just the very gene, Watson, a lot of the older style, Willie Nelson, but then my dad liked Gordon Lightfoot and, you know, like, the Eagles. And, so I grew up listening to, like, things like that as well. And then I really grew to love, like, old r amp b, I guess, like, I guess, like Etta James.

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> Lena Page>And, I loved singing the blues.

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> Lena Page>So then when Susan Tedesky and Derek Trux, they. They came out. I love that style of blues as well.

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> Lena Page>but I sang a lot, I sang with a funk band once, and I sang, I've sang with all different genres, I guess. so I had a lot of influences all over the map.

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> Lena Page>I can't really say that I had one in particular, except, I guess, my mom. My mom was my major influence because we wrote together all the time.

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> Curtis Jackson>Okay, so tell us about the new songs, civil War, and how Ronnie Mills starter came to you and wanted you to record it.

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> Lena Page>Okay. well, actually, civil War started. I had never heard this song before, and I don't think a lot of people have heard this song before. It was on Ronnie mill Sapp's album, in 1993, and he was promoting probably one of his 50 number one hits, or 60 number one hits. Whatever he's had, he's just amazing. And he was a huge influence in my life as well. but living in Franklin, Tennessee, I run into a lot of celebrities, and, you know, like, Wynonna Judd lives down the street, and, colle, there's Vince Gill and Amy Grant, and, Jamie Johnson and, Leann Womack. And, we have a famous writer that lives literally across the street.

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> Lena Page>so I run into these people all the time, and, I ran into Yogi Milsap, who is Ronnie Milsap's daughter in law. And we became friends, and she came over to the house and she said, you know, I would love for you to cut this song that Ronnie did. it's written by Carol Chase and Cindy Richardson, and it's called civil War. And I thought, okay, well, I'll listen to it. I've never cut anybody else's songs before, so I didn't know, you know, if I had, if I should do that or what. The process was getting mechanical rights and doing all of that. So I listened to the song and I fell in love with it. The lyrics are amazing, the melody is amazing. they did such an incredible job of, a play on words in this song. And so I called Yogi and I said, I'm going to cut this song. And she said, oh, that's cool, great. I'm super excited. And so, I went to Kent Wells, who is Dolly Parton's producer. He's also my producer who produces all of my music. And, he said, yeah, you definitely have to cut this song.

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> Lena Page>It's you. It's your song. And so I said, okay, cool. So I contacted, so we cut it, and then I had to get mechanical rights to put it on my album. So I contacted Yogi and I said, I don't know how to get ahold of Cindy ah Richardson or Carol Chase. And she said, oh, here, here's her phone numbers. And she gave me their numbers. And so I just, I contacted them directly and just asked if I could release it. And they said, absolutely. I sent them a copy of it and I said, do, have your permission? And they said, yes, absolutely, go for it. So that was just a thrill. I was super excited, super honored, and, so now it's out in the world, and I'm praying that it does really, really well. I did Joan of Arkansas with Tanya Tucker. That was one of my cuts. And I also did you ain't no match was one that I kind of promoted.

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> Lena Page>I may bring that song back out to life again here pretty soon, but it's all going, my second album is called singing in the key of country, and, that's coming out as soon as I gain some traction on civil War.

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> Lena Page>I'm going to put out my second album. And the song that I'm going to be promoting is called invisible tears. And it's the last song that my mom wrote before she passed away, and she just passed away in November. So the song is very, very sentimental to me. So I'm looking forward to doing that. And we're working on a video for that song as well. But back to civil war, it's an incredible song and we're super happy about it and I hope everybody loves it.

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> Curtis Jackson>Absolutely.

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> Curtis Jackson>Tell us about other upcoming projects that you're working on that listeners need to be aware of.

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> Lena Page>probably just my new album coming out, singing in the Kiev country. It's, I think I have it all completely done.

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> Lena Page>I'm, looking to do a duet on one of the songs that my mom and I wrote called best, loving around, and did, a duet with a young man. but, it was kind of a demo style, so I'd like to get back in the studio and record it. and I'm also looking for new co writers. I'm co writing, on tomorrow with Paul Rock, who has a hearty, I think he's got a hearty cut. Don't quote me on that, but he's got, he's got a cut out right now, and, it's doing really well. And so he's going to come over to the house on Saturday and write, a new idea that I have. I'm super excited about it.

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> Curtis Jackson>Okay. So listeners can keep up with everything that you're up to throw at your, contact info.

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> Lena Page>So to keep up with me, you know how Facebook works, they're terrible. They, somebody had 9.2 thousand followers and I, somebody reported my, Facebook is spammed. So I had to start completely over again.

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> Lena Page>so I'm no longer Lena page. I'm Lena page music.

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> Lena Page>So if you add music in there, that helps. It's Lena page music, and I'm on Facebook.

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> Lena Page>Spotify, TikTok, it's not Spotify, Instagram, but if you want to listen to my music, I'm on Spotify and iTunes, pandora, all of the majors, all the major, platforms.

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> Curtis Jackson>All right, close us out with some final thoughts. Maybe if that was something I forgot to talk about, that you would like to touch on any final thoughts you have for the listeners?

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> Lena Page>Well, I just want to thank everybody. I really do. without you guys, I could not continue to sing and, and do what I do. I could. But, I love, I love it when I'm performing and I'm looking down the crowd and everybody knows the words to the songs and, oh, just, it's so heartwarming to me. And my mom, you know, like I said, she just passed away and, it was such a thrill for her as well. My goal, was to make it to the grand old opry before she passed away, but, that didn't happen. But I'd still love to make it to the grand old opry today, someday.

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> Lena Page>And I cannot do that without my fans.

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> Lena Page>And so I'm praying that everybody comes together and they love the songs and love my music and, and get me to the grand old opry because I am traditional country. I love traditional country. I believe that it's coming back again, and so I'm I'm promoting that. Let's all band together and start listening to, independent artists or artists that are really promoting traditional country music and getting that genre back on its feet again. That would be so incredible for everybody.

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> Curtis Jackson>Let's do it, ladies and gentlemen. Check out let's do it. Let's do rich music. Absolutely. Please be sure to follow rate review share this episode to as many people as possible. Check out Lena's music jump on your favorite podcast app. Give us a follow a review. If you have any guests or suggestion topics, Curtis Jackson, 1978 is the place to send them. As always, thank you for listening and supporting the show. And Lena, thank you for joining us.

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> Lena Page>Thank you, Curtis.

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> Speaker A>For more information on the living the Dream podcast, visit www.djcurvefall.com.

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> Speaker A>until next time, stay focused on living the dream. Dream.