Biography

Artist and songwriter Doriana Spurrell makes captivating songs that feel unabashedly and beautifully human.Supported by the lush, velvet timbre of her voice, her style shifts effortlessly from upbeat alt-rock Americana anthems to elegant folk ballads, fueled by narrative, tautly poetic lyrics. Through her music, Spurrell observes the world around her with clarity and nuance; she sounds both vulnerable and completely at ease in her own skin, despite her ongoing struggles with anxiety.

“Music is a wonderful teacher,” she says. “It’s hard to figure out who you are and where you fit in—I’m still discovering what I want out of life and in my music. But writing helps me make space for myself.”

Inspired by other storyteller-artists like Brandi Carlile, Elliott Smith, and Nick Drake, whose music narrates a relatable mixture of joy and pain, Spurrell’s songwriting often explores the real-life experiences of friends and relatives in rich, vicarious detail. “I’m drawn to powerful emotions, moments in life that feel crazy, or exhilarating, or sad. Life experience! That’s how it works. You have to vent your sadness and share your joy.”

Born and raised outside of Durham, North Carolina, Spurrell grew up with a deep appreciation for all aspects of Southern storytelling tradition, from local folk art and oral narratives to mountain bluegrass music. During her early-teenage punk phase, she picked up her father’s old guitar one day and taught herself to play Green Day’s  “Good Riddance” — a moment that led to a lifetime of playing guitar and inspired the next phase of her musical journey. A few years later, she graduated from the highly selective UNC School of the Arts high school program for classical guitar. “That experience taught me to see the guitar differently—it’s a complex instrument with a very long history. The logistical aspects of playing didn’t really resonate with me at the time, but I learned how to solo, how to experiment with chord progressions, and how to understand songs in ways I couldn’t before. Those tools are incredibly valuable.” 

Despite her training as a classical guitarist, Spurrell’s songwriting process is uniquely language-focused: Her musical arrangements are built around lyrical lines, not vice-versa. “I know not everyone listens to the lyrics of a song, but I do. When I write, it’s the lyrics that come to me first.”  For her, the words are what matter most. Now studying creative writing at Emerson College in Boston, Spurrell is delving deeper into her love of writing in service to her music. “I love poetry, and the connection to songwriting is obvious. But I’m also fascinated by the process of storytelling: how we create fiction from reality, and how that fiction draws us in and connects us. I’ve always loved writing stories—that’s what led me to write songs in the first place.”

With the release of her debut solo EP Forward, Spurrell offers the world a glimpse of her keen perspective through a series of five stunning folk-Americana tracks about the small things in life. Written entirely by Spurrell, Forward was recorded and mixed at Night Sounds studio in Carrboro, North Carolina by Meghan Puryear and features a cast of talented North Carolina musicians, including bass guitarist Billie Feather, a fellow UNCSA graduate and Spurrell’s first guitar instructor. Each song presents a hyper-focused story about the kinds of exchanges and events that, combined, make up the intimate fodder of daily living.  “I wanted the album to capture all the small, immaterial things we pass through and beyond. Things we don’t always notice when they’re happening,” she says. “It sometimes feels like you’re not making progress until you see in hindsight where you’ve been, what you’ve been through. But we move forward. We move through these things, and keep going.”

Written by Anna Elise Anderson