On Tuesday, Ballerini released her first book "Feel Your Way Through", a collection of poems that chronicles her 28 years of life so far and the lessons learned in the process.
On Wednesday, Kelsea Ballerini won her first CMA Award trophy, reaching the long-awaited professional milestone: the annual music event and the annual music video, both of which are "Half of My Hometown", in collaboration with Kenny Chesney, he Also from Ballerini's hometown of Knoxville, Tennessee.
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After announcing her pre-television victory, when Ballerini was hiding in a hotel near the Bridgestone Arena in Nashville to attend the show that night, she heard a knock on the door.
"Kenny showed up at the hotel and brought a bottle of wine. When I was doing hair and makeup for the show, he sat in the room with me," Ballerini called on Zoom the day after the CMA awards ceremony. Tell the bulletin board at the meeting. "Through this song, we became very good friends. This is a wonderful 24 hours."
In "Half of My Hometown," Ballerini sang a sense of connection with her hometown. Since the release of his first album "The First Time" in 2015, Ballerini has won four No. 1 Billboard Country Airplay singles-as the author of each song in her album, her music is in every subsequent one. The album has become more intimate and personal, whether she is writing a new romantic obsession ("Yes Boy") or looking for the courage to choose fragility rather than perfection ("Homecoming Queen?").
On Tuesday, Ballerini published her first book "Feel Your Way Through". This collection of poems records her 28 years of life so far and the lessons learned in the process, and her work will shine with new brilliance.
"It feels like a cannonball," Ballerini said. "When I launched'The Homecoming Queen?' I remembered that I said,'You have always been vulnerable, but this time it's taken a step further.' If I didn't have a song like "The Homecoming Queen", I wouldn't Have confidence in yourself or trust in yourself to do this? and "Half of my hometown".
In March 2020, Ballerini released the acoustic project Kelsea, just as COVID-19 disrupted her tour and promotion plan for the album. For Ballerini, music has long been a place of celebration and community. Losing these things due to the pandemic, the singer-songwriter disconnected the music from the writing process for the next eight months. "I never intended to write a book. I have all this extra time. I realized that I have a lot of things to deal with, and it all has to do with all the things that I have been too busy to think about for a long time," Ballerini said .
In "Feel Your Way Through", she revealed more of her story than ever before. Two particularly powerful poems-arranged back to back in the book-tell the two most difficult moments of Ballerini.
One of the poems "His name is Ryan" described in detail a tragic experience in 2008, when, as a sophomore in high school, Ballerini saw a 15-year-old classmate Ryan MacDonald in Central High School was shot and killed by another classmate in Knoxville.
A line in the poem reads: "His name is Ryan. He died on the cafeteria floor with a gunshot wound in the chest./I'm not sure, but I think I saw him take one last breath." This poem Describing in detail the continuing impact of losing classmates, Ballerini expressed his gratitude for surviving. "But I'm still alive," at the end of the poem, "because there is a boy named Ryan, I know what gift it is."
"Some of my closest friends don't even really know me, but the truth is, this is what happened," Ballerini told Billboard. "But when I heard fireworks on the show, it happened again. When I was in a large group of people and I saw everyone starting to look in one direction, it happened again. It was traumatic. I want to pay tribute to Ryan honestly and want to tell his story elegantly. I very much hope that it is just what happened and not political. The beauty of putting it in a book is that I can Speak exactly the way I want."
Because her experience is something she rarely discusses, Ballerini said that she did not go as deep as she had hoped in the recovery process, although she said, “It is very important to get the help you need, whether it’s treatment or more. Many, if that’s what you need. I think it’s very important not to shut down, and getting help is not a sign of weakness—it’s a sign of strength."
In "Kangaroo", when Ballerini made a speech in the first year of high school, a boy's cruel comments coincided with her parents' breakup and intensified Ballerini's struggle with body image. In this poem, Ballerini describes the use of weight loss pills to lose weight—an attempt that quickly becomes a cycle of washing, overeating, and excessive exercise.
"Before that, I had been struggling with body image and body deformities, but at that moment I could trace it all back to the real place," Ballerini said. According to this poem, Ballerini dropped out of the loop at the age of 18, and over the years she has embraced a healthy lifestyle.
"This is a trip; I don't think it's a straight line," she said. "I have a few days, especially as a public facing person, I will walk the red carpet, when I live with my organs, people will think I am pregnant. It's really exciting. But at the same time, What’s important to me is to be healthy, to be able to keep up with my dreams, goals and aspirations for myself. Everything I do now must be grouped into one category, “Is this healthy? Does it help me keep what I want to be? People? When I attended the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show, a group of people said, "You should lose weight." "I thought,'I am a singer, not a model. If I say that I have never felt insecure and that I love my body every day, then I am lying. But I think that when you say it out loud, when you tell people When you show your journey, it will eliminate the shame and the tingling."
For Ballerini, writing this book—just like making her music—has always been its own way of healing and a way of showing her truth to the world.
"I think the most powerful thing in the world is a community of people who heal and grow together. The first step is to talk about it, so this is my step for talking about it," she said.
Another theme of this book is Ballerini's journey to find the courage to say what she thinks is important-even if there are mistakes in the process. In the poem "The Right Side of History," she talked about the strong opposition she received in a tweet earlier this year after fellow artist Morgan Wallen was filmed publishing a racially slanderous video.
"The news from Nashville tonight does not represent country music," Ballerini wrote on Twitter, quickly being criticized by others in the country music industry. In this poem, she used a few lines to solve the situation, "Am I going wrong, am I saying wrong, if - plus that tweet, I want to be rightly oppressed for history The voice raises his hand."
"I am a peacemaker, a person who pleases the people. I am afraid to annoy anyone," Ballerini said. "This is indeed my core, but when you do this, you won’t defend anything. I think the older I grow, the more I find my faith and what I want to hold on. I feel that I have a responsibility to do this. . This does not mean that I will always do it right. I was very embarrassed and difficult about the content of this poem, but in hindsight, I was in the wrong direction and I would accept it any day of the week."
Ballerini has been looking for her own voice for the past few years, and using her platform to stand up for other women in country music, when country radio broadcasting is an uphill battle for female artists.
"I think in the first few years, I just persisted in my precious life. I don't think I have any ability to understand the lack of women until I understand. I grew up with Trisha, Reba, Shania, Faith, and Jo Dee, and this list is still there. Go on. There are always women on the radio. So suddenly I received a few songs and I looked around,'Carrie and Miranda and...what happened? You have to be as sharp as a woman to break through. But this It means that the women we get-Maren, Mickey, Ashley, Gabby, Carly, Lauren-don't need to develop. You will get a fully formed artist who is sharper than ever before. This is what a breakthrough is needed. I think This is why you are seeing more and more female superstars emerging now, because no one has the privilege of sitting down and letting people help them solve their problems. They have figured it out a long time ago."
This fall, Ballerini finally returned to the tour happily, opening the show for the pop brother trio Jonas Brothers. Ballerini said that fans can look forward to the new album next year, although she is not sure how the album sounds.
"I am very invested in this book, it is really all I can think of. I am very happy to live a life that can be written during the holidays, and then figure out what the record is for next year. But writing for the album, not for the album Writing is really great, because I think it makes me a better writer. And I think it will appear in my songs."
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