by Runs June 22-26
Ryan Laird (born March 8, 1984) is a Canadian country music singer-songwriter. He’s a Two-time Canadian Country Music Awards Recording Artist Nominee, song-writer and philanthropist.
Laird was born in Toronto, Ontario. Along with his father Laird Schneider and mother Laurie Schneider, he has one younger brother, Brett Schneider, and one younger sister, Kelsi Schneider. He grew up on a 100 acre beef farm just outside of Fergus, Ontario, the son of a high school teacher father and a school secretary mother.
At age 10, Laird toured England and Wales as a member of the Cambridge Kiwanis Boys Choir. Laird would go on to sing with the choir for 3 years. At the age of ten, Laird began to perform around his home town, singing at karaoke contests, festivals, and fairs, and also started writing songs.
Laird’s great grandmother influenced his early singing. Although Laird’s great grandmother was a professional opera singer, his tastes always ran more toward country and pop music. Laird credit’s Bryan Adams, Dixie Chicks, James Taylor, Keith Urban and Taylor Swift for demonstrating how much impact can be made by “stretching boundaries”.
Throughout his early teens, Laird’s parents would drive him and his 2 younger siblings around Ontario to various festival and fair events where the 3 kids would perform in the family band.
After studying jazz guitar at Humber College in Toronto, Laird packed his bags and moved his life down to Nashville with high hopes of furthering his career as a performer and songwriter at the age of 19. After a few years in Nashville, Laird signed his first publishing deal with Cherry Lane Music Publishing. Laird would go on to write many songs for the Cherry Lane Music catalogue before parting ways with the company.
He received recognition and media attention across The United States and Canada in December 2008 after putting up a billboard on Nashville, Tennessee’s famed music row asking Taylor Swift to produce his album. The billboard displayed Laird in a classroom holding a note reading “Hey Taylor – I LOVE your music. Will you produce my album?” When asked about Laird and his billboard on E! News Weekend, Swift said, “I definitely want to meet him … I listened to one of his songs and absolutely fell in love with it, and I think he’s got great melodies and he’s a great writer. I think he could really be great and be huge, so it’ll be really cool to maybe work with him.”
Laird was signed to his first recording contract with CMT (Canada) and Sony Music Entertainment Canada in 2011. On March 28 2011, Laird released a music video for his single “I’m Your Man” which charted at No. 10 on the CMT Cross Canada Countdown. The “I’m Your Man” radio single peaked at No. 10 on the BDS Canada Country radio chart. “I’m Your Man” was nominated for a Canadian Radio Music Award.
In 2012, Laird was nominated for two Canadian Country Music Awards which were the CMT Video of the Year and The Rising Star Award. In 2012, Laird signed a new record deal with On Ramp Records. Laird’s third radio single release, “Girl Crazy”, was serviced to Canadian country radio with success. In August 2014, Laird signed a Nashville publishing and artist development deal with Studio Gold Music, Inc.
Laird is actively involved in the BiggerThanThat!™ Movement, performing motivational message driven music concerts at schools with the initiative to inspire youth to dream big and never allow negative influences to stand in the way of success and happiness in their lives.
Laird has release a new album, titled, “Bigger Than That”.
