For songwriter Stephanie Thom, songwriting picked her. “When I started writing songs at age 12/13 it came totally naturally and it’s been like that ever since. It’s the only thing I innately do.” Born and raised in Aberdeen, Scotland, the first in her family to be raised in the city, Stephanie attributes her poetic leanings to her rural roots, her family’s oral histories and the essence of folk culture. In contrast, it was the record collections of her rebellious parents, whose cherished teenagehood in the hippy era, informed a wide-array of music listening in Stephanie’s early years. “My own listening palette is all over the place since I’ve loved and studied music my whole life, but it was always my parents soul records that spoke to me the most, early on, and I’ve found that there has always been that soulful thread in my favorite music.” Now living in Brooklyn, New York, where she always had her sights set on, Stephanie’s dream is to write songs with the greatest artists of our time. “What I love the most about songwriting is the opportunity it gives you to explore. There’s no rules on how you say what you want to say, or what the song sounds like, what’s important is the feeling and what the song does for you. Songwriting gives me permission to just have fun and I so appreciate that about the process.”