Gabriela McBride: Inhabiting the Sound

Just as the wind sifts through trees and sunlight filters through branches, New York City based singer-songwriter Gabriela McBride’s lyrics exist in the liminal space between the dreamlike and the deeply grounded. From time spent in Chicago at her uncle’s recording studio, Gravity, to the ever-present background music that filled her childhood home, music has never needed an introduction in McBride’s life—it simply is. Even in the cadence of her speech, music radiates around her as effortlessly as breath in cold air.

Her first single, The Garrison, produced by Mike Viola at his studio in Los Angeles, captures a haunting yet soothing intimacy. The vulnerability of her voice and guitar creates an atmosphere both eerie and familiar, drawing listeners into a sonic embodiment of autumn—crisp, nostalgic, and fleeting. Each note, each lyric, carries a depth beyond her years, as if the weight of time itself resides within her melodies.

McBride studies history and music at Columbia University, where she continues to play, write, and perform with the same ancient reverence that laces her music. Her songwriting draws from such unspoken moments that shape human connection. McBride approaches music as both a storyteller and an archivist– she weaves together past and present in timeless narratives. She invites listeners into a space where memory and imagination converge, where melodies carry the weight of history and the lightness of fleeting emotions. As she continues to evolve as an artist, her work remains rooted in the belief that music is not something to only hear, but something to inhabit. 

Do you remember when and how music became your medium?

I think it has always been my favorite thing to do. I started going to this jazz choir that met in a church a couple blocks from my house when I was six years old. Or, I went once when I was four or five and wanted to be in it– but they didn’t let in little kids, and I would always go to their concerts and I was so obsessed with them. They let me in when I was six and just did that after school during the week, for years, and it became my favorite part of the week. I also grew up taking classical violin lessons and playing in orchestra, which was definitely formative. My family is super musical, it was always part of the way that we communicated and interacted. There was always music playing in my house. So I just knew, very early on, that it was my favorite thing in the whole world. 

When did you start writing songs? 

In a serious way, probably at the end of middle school, when I was about fourteen. I mean, I wrote songs when I was little, like 10, 11, that was like, I loved to sing and write words but I was working with the violin and was like – I don’t know how to write on this thing. I knew I wanted to write songs which motivated me to get better at guitar. I kept doing it and trying and trying and by the time high school came I was like– Ok, I think I know how I can do this.

Your single “The Garrison,” what was creating that like?

I wrote that in the fall of freshman year [of college], and then got to tweak it throughout the year, and play it live several times. It’s always a good feeling to see what works live and get to rework stuff after playing a show or whatever. And then over the summer, I went to LA to visit Izzy [roommate], and stayed at her house where her dad has his recording studio, where we recorded it in a few days- such an lovely and lucky opportunity.

Lyrically, the imagery is really alive. I was wondering if you could speak about creating those words. How do you translate image to word?

I think that the songs I’ve been most proud of, are the ones that kind of came out the way that they are. I definitely have songs that I mull over a lot more. But for The Garrison, all of those images had been in my head and I just needed to put them down, and it was quite fast. I think also writing songs,– I mean anyone who writes creatively, it’s not a process that you sit down and do, it’s more that as you go through the world, and notice the way you perceive things, those ideas are formulating in your head all the time. Like I noticed that I was thinking about the “taste of the air” when I had gone upstate the weekend before and then, filed that away as an interesting sensation. I had just been thinking about them, and they had been there for weeks. 

You talked about singing live– do you think that when you sing live, you interact with the songs differently? 

I don’t think I interact with them differently. I think when I play live, I don’t think about what I’m playing. (Leila: because you enjoy it). Yes, I think it’s so fun. But I think playing live, or performing in general, it’s more of like a – it’s about the physical feeling of singing and playing, like that feels good. I enjoy playing music, but I don’t necessarily think about what I am saying to these people. That would be a lot. I’m just like, I am going to play these songs now. It’s definitely more about the music at that point then words. But I guess songwriting is always about both of those things. 

How would you describe your genre, and do you find that that shapes your sound at all?

I feel that I’m very novice in my releasing of music to say what genre I am. In high school I always played in rock bands and wrote a lot more on electric guitar. But then “The Garrison” didn’t feel like other stuff I had written. I don’t feel intense pressure to morph my music into one particular sound. I hope that it like, is good, and all sounds slightly different. But I don’t know, yea. 

Do you notice your style and playing changing?

I think focusing on my guitar parts and has been a really big way for me to make the music that I want to make. I felt a lot in high school that I had ideas that were out of reach because of physical and technical incapabilities. And, yea, I think the way I make music has changed because it’s a lot more guitar focused now. I like that I can accompany myself in a more significant way than I once could, playing along with a vocal melody in certain spots, and I really really fuck with fingerpicking these days.