Former student returns to PCPS for concert

Craig Bakay | Dec 11, 2019

Perhaps you can go home after all.

When Astrid Tanton was in Grade 5 at Prince Charles Public School in Verona, she covered Taylor Swift’s Mean in a school talent show.

Last Friday, she was back in the same gym, and when the audience asked for her to do a Taylor Swift song for her encore, she happily obliged.

“It’s fun,” she said. “You can go home.”

Now 17, Tanton is a recent graduate (Ontario Scholar at 16) of Rosedale Heights School of the Arts in Toronto. She’s been busily building a musical career in Toronto and came back to the area last week to do shows at Sydenham High School and Prince Charles. She’ll be heading to Ryerson for Arts and Contemporary Studies next year.

“Music is universally inspiring,” she said. “I’ve been singing since I was three years old.

“In high school, I was learning what I want to do — share music.”

She describes her music as a blend of mainstream pop and jazz, with R & B influences.

“I’ve been getting more gigs and I love playing larger stages,” she said. “I want to keep performing.

“Everyone says I light up when I perform.”

That she does. And the kids at PCPS loved it.

For this gig, she recruited a couple of friends, Jay Yoo on guitar and Dennis Lee on keyboards.

“I think it’s important to have live musicians when you perform, especially when it’s for kids,” she said. “It gets them more involved.”

And while the school does have a modest fund to pay for visiting musicians and such, Tanton not only declined a fee, she even made a donation to the school’s arts and music program.

Tanton is very active on Instagram with 1,500+ followers.

You can listen to some of her music at https://linktr.ee/astridtanton