OVER DEZE AFLEVERING
Tabitha Meeks moved to Nashville from West Palm Beach with a folk band and a voice she’d been told five or six times wasn’t strong enough. The band didn’t last. One of her first Nashville experiences was getting fired as a backup singer 30 minutes into rehearsal. The guy who fired her said she’d have plenty of time for opportunities like this — she was, what, 21, 22? She was 28.
That could have been the end of the story. Instead, Tabitha got a gig at a bar called Sambuca during COVID, where nobody was around and she was forced to be the lead singer for the first time. That’s where she found her voice. She released 30 or 40 songs over the next few years — different tempos, different moods, different sides of herself — and watched to see what people responded to. The retro pop thing hit. Nancy Sinatra meets Nora Jones, she calls it. Happy energy, piano solos, not taking life too seriously.
We talked about the Pitch Meeting show she co-founded with her now-husband (and Morse Code Alum) Eric Fortlaza, building a social media following by posting nothing but live performance videos, the sync placements that are starting to pay off (including a Hulu show she can’t name yet), living in a shitty house so she could follow her dreams, the two voices in every artist’s head, and why couples therapy is non-negotiable. Then she played ”Waiting For My Day” on piano — a song about patiently trusting that your day is coming.
She actually played two songs in the studio. I picked Waiting For My Day to be the standalone because it showed a more tender version of the Tabitha I know. But this girl has serious chops as a pianist! For eveidence here is a link to the moment in the main conversation where she plays her (much flashier) set piece “Life of the Party” Watch it.
🎥 Watch the full conversation on YouTube
🎸 Watch Tabitha perform “Waiting For My Day”
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