At the tail end of her marriage, Christina Ward used her music as a form of therapy. She wrote, recorded and produced seven songs that ultimately made up her latest release, Calendar.

She began her DIY journey in the midst of quarantining in 2020, when not working meant both having a lot of time on her hands and not enough money to outsource production. The album took around two years to complete, and included songs that she had never played live.

“It’s a completely different thing when it’s just you and you have all these instruments at your disposal,” Ward said. “Being able to create intricate layers and weird songs doesn’t really lend itself well to live performance, so I feel like since I’ve been recording there are a handful of songs that I just don’t play out.”

Despite having been on this DIY journey for almost three years, Ward still finds it challenging to walk the line between perfection and imperfection. She enjoys the learning process of production and the infinite possibilities of the sound that works best for her, but she admits that she feels nowhere near where she wants to be in terms of “having a professional, good-sounding record”.

There is a part of her that tells her not to release any of it; that it isn't the best she can do. The other part of her recognizes that some of her favorite records do not have that “professional” quality, but that didn’t stop her from loving it.

“There’s a line you have to walk,” she said. “This is not the best thing I’m ever going to do probably but it’s still something that I did. It’s still a snapshot of the moment or the time period that I was going through.”

It is difficult to figure out which song will best lend itself to the overall message of an album, but as Ward was creating the title track she knew that Calendar was the appropriate name for the album. Calendar questions how to find redemption in the midst of heartbreak, and touches on all the times she has felt like she’s had to start from scratch.

Much like the songs she has listened to on repeat in hopes of getting through a tough time, Ward hopes that this album evokes similar feelings.

“Whether it’s inspiration or getting through something, deciphering or gaining their own message from the song and maybe feeling less alone or inspired, I think anybody that writes hopes somebody listens to it and takes something with meaning from it,” she said.