Cornelia Murr can usually be found in one of two places: her freshly restored house in the middle of rural Nebraska or on the road playing show after show across the world.
The British-American indie singer-songwriter has lived in London and Los Angeles, and is currently traveling through North America, opening for Matt Maltese. She is taking a pit stop at the House of Blues in Boston on Sunday, Sept. 28.
Each show, place lived, and new city brings memorable moments for Murr. When The Beacon caught up with her, she was traveling from Pittsburgh to Toronto, taking calls on the road in between show dates, seemingly without a moment to relax.
When Murr does have a second to relax at home, it isn’t the lavish lifestyle of a Hollywood star in LA, or a cramped apartment in a big city. Instead, she’s in her new home in Red Cloud, Neb., living in a place that Murr says is “as rural as it gets.”
Her time restoring said house inspired some of the sounds on her second studio album, “Run to the Center,” which was released this past February. The record’s sound reflects birds chirping and the feeling of a breeze on your face-—a stillness only felt by sitting in a rural paradise.
The title track directly references Murr’s feeling of being there, working on not just the house, but herself too.
“[‘Run to the Center’] references stripping wallpaper, which is what I was doing for a very long time in that house,” Murr said. “[The house] afforded me the opportunity to run away from this pressure I felt to make a bunch of decisions in life and certain situations I needed to get away from. It’s a bit about running to a place of peace.”
Murr might have been at peace, but creating this space for herself was not an easy process, calling it daunting and unlike anything she has ever done before.
“I don’t have a background and drywall and stuff, but it was extremely satisfying to turn what was an abandoned house filled with stuff into a very cozy little shelter,” Murr said.
That shelter, and what Murr learned from restoring it, gave her a new set of skills she could use for life, and helped explore her passion for design,though she doesn’t plan to restore more houses anytime soon.
“A lot of it was really hard labor that I hope to never do again, but it’s fun, it’s an art form, satisfying creatively at times, but also very lonely,” Murr said.
Lonely doesn’t begin to describe it. Murr said that in her home of Red Cloud, Neb., the closest city is three hours away, and Walmart is a 45-minute drive. But that loneliness, one of Murr’s inspirations, helped create such a peaceful body of work in “Run to the Center.”
The next time you need to run away from life’s pressures and choices, consider running to the center like Murr did, and maybe refurbish a house if you’re feeling bold.
