Christina Martin

Christina Martin is playing The Marquee Ballroom on Saturday 24 October, and it's a Canadian tuxedo party. The dress code is denim on denim, and the set is built around Canadian classics, with Martin and a line-up of special guests taking turns on the songs. It's a full afternoon of music: BASYL, Caleb Vallelly, Dave Sampson, Jeff Mosher, Natasha Sophia, Rebekah Higgs and Roxy Mercier are all on the bill, backed by a Halifax All-Star Band.

Martin is a Halifax-based singer-songwriter who draws on pop, rock, folk and Americana. She launched her solo career in 2002 with Pretty Things and has put out seven studio albums since, with an eighth on the way. She grew up on the East Coast before moving to Austin, Texas in 1999, where she sang and danced in the rock band Young Heart Attack. Later, she started her own label, Come Undone Records.

Her work has picked up a few awards along the way. In 2009, Two Hearts (2008) won the ECMA for Pop Recording of the Year, which earned her a performance for Queen Elizabeth II. In 2018, Impossible to Hold took the Music Nova Scotia Award for Pop Recording of the Year. One track from that album, "Lungs Are Burning," was written to shine a light on the crisis of addiction after she lost her brother and friends to it; she toured the song across Canada from 2016 to 2019 in partnership with the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health.

The show starts at 16:00, with doors opening at 15:00. Tickets are C$30 for adults and C$20 for youth under 19, plus fees and tax, and youth must be accompanied by an adult. The Marquee Ballroom is at 2037 Gottingen Street.