We've heard great things about a young jazz singer-songwriter from Plymouth called Izzie Anson, we also heard that she'd been invited to perform at this years Sidmouth Fringe Festival and wanted to chat to her ahead of her set. We got in touch and had a good chat about her recent recording session in Nashville, how she got on performing at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival and who she'd choose to be in her very own 'Supergroup'....

Hi Izzie, firstly, please take a moment to introduce yourself, tell us about your music (any new releases on the horizon?) and give us one fascinating fact about you/your band

I'm Izzie Anson, I'm a jazz singer-songwriter from Plymouth, last year I went to Nashville to record my EP Franklin Days with my producer Danny. The EP is themed more around jazz ballads than anything else but I'm hopefully to go back to Nashville next year as I'm currently writing some more upbeat jazzy numbers.... 

You play the Sidmouth Fringe Festival on 5th August, how did this come about? 

I was asked to play Sidmouth a couple months ago and I'm very excited about it

The BBC Introducing team are heavily involved in the festival, I know you were given the chance to perform at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival after sending in a track to them, tell me more about this please….

I had been back from Nashville a while and I'm not too sure why but in January this year I decided to upload my tracks to BBC Introducing. I didn't even think they would get listened to to be honest but fast forward to April and I'm singing at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival in front of Jo Whiley! The guys at BBC introducing are incredible and I'm very grateful for that opportunity it was amazing!!!

How was your experience performing at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival?

Cheltenham was amazing it was one of my first gigs so i was incredibly nervous but it was a lot of fun and everyone was so nice

I saw a picture of you and your band with Jo Whiley, where was this taken and how come Jo was there?

Jo Whiley was presenting the Cheltenham Jazz Festival event which was really cool. My band and I got to meet her, she was lovely and had a great fashion sense! 

You recently went to Nashville, was this for a holiday or were you doing some recording there? What was the highlight of your trip?

I went to Nashville to record with my amazing producer Danny and I don't really have a highlight, it was all amazing doing what I love all day and meeting wonderful musicians, it was all just wonderful!

You’re playing alongside some great acts (Velvet & Stone, Clara Bond & Ennor), have you performed with any of these before? 

I haven't performed with any of them yet but I have listened to some of them and they all sound incredibly talented so I'm very excited about playing alongside them

Are you playing any other festivals this Summer? If so, which ones are you most looking forward to? 

I'm not playing anymore festivals this summer but I'll be writing away because I'm pretty keen to put out new material

Music festivals can be quite messy affairs, what are your top three tips to surviving one? 

Top three tips; take wellies, dry shampoo and plenty of glitter! 

You get some pretty diverse food at festivals, what’s been the strangest thing you’ve ever eaten? 

I don't think I've ever eaten anything that strange…. 

In your opinion, what is THE BEST album in the world ever? 

I don't think I could choose, I love too many albums!

If you could create your very own super-group using any musicians (dead or alive) who would be in the band and why? 

Thelonious Monk because he was a absolute jazz legend, Amy Winehouse, Louis Armstrong and Bob Marley cause I like the whole jazz/reggae thing. I think they would make some amazing tunes together

What advice would you offer to a band or an artist just starting out? Any pitfalls to try to avoid?

Believe in your music and what you do, you never know what you can achieve. A few people will try and discourage you from what you're doing, but keep on going... 

We’re all about discovering new acts at musicmuso, please give us the names of 3 acts/artists that we should be checking out?

You should check out Bekah Bossard she's a very talented singer songwriter also from Devon, I recently watched Sadie Horler at Glas-denbury on the BBC Introducing stage and she was brilliant, Kiera Osment also performed at Glas-denbury and was really good

Lastly, would you rather fight 1 dinosaur sized chicken or 100 chicken sized dinosaurs?

100 chicken sized dinosaurs cause a dinosaur sized chicken would be pretty scary

We'd like to thank Izzie for chatting to us and we wish her every success for the future. We hope to be able to catch her set at the Sidmouth Fringe Festival on August 5th, if you're free, why not pop down, it'll be a great night!

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