Heliara Explores the Many Faces of Love on Everything’s a Love Song EP, Led by Heartwarming Focus Track “Confessions to my Daughter”
Ottawa-based singer-songwriter Heliara shares Everything’s a Love Song, a deeply intimate and emotionally rich EP that explores love in all its forms. Blending pop, rock, indie, and genre-spanning influences, the six-song collection unfolds as both a personal reflection and a universal meditation on connection, vulnerability, and what it means to love and be loved.
Originally conceived under the working title Eclectic Love Songs, the project evolved organically as its deeper thread revealed itself.
“I wanted to explore different types of love and different musical genres,” Heliara explains. “When I realized each song reflected a different form of love, the title Everything’s a Love Song just made sense.”
The EP culminates in its most personal moment: “Confessions to my Daughter,” a heartwarming and vulnerable closing track that captures the depth of motherhood and unconditional love.
What makes Everything’s a Love Song particularly striking is its unexpected alignment with the Ancient Greek concept of love, which categorizes love into distinct forms such as eros, agape, mania, and storge.
“I found out about this after I had already written all six songs,” Heliara says. “When I looked into it, I almost fell off my chair. Each song I wrote corresponded to one of those forms. In two cases, it was right down to the title.”
That sense of intuition carries throughout the record. Written and recorded over a year and a half, the EP showcases Heliara’s growth not only as a songwriter, but as an artist learning to trust her creative instincts.
“I’ve learned that my creativity is limitless when I’m in alignment with myself,” she shares. “The lyrics come naturally without me asking them to. I tweak them to make the message more universal and pithy, but the essence of what I am communicating feels quite channeled in a way.”
Written in the quiet stillness of a 3AM moment while caring for her sick child, the chorus for “Confession to my Daughter” arrived in a rush of emotion.
“This is a song that my daughter will have forever,” Heliara explains. “I want her to know these things about herself and about me as a mother.”
The track is made even more special by the presence of her three-year-old daughter, whose soft backing vocals appear from the very first line. Musically, “Confessions to my Daughter” blends warm, country-tinged verses with soaring, Motown-inspired choruses, building toward a powerful, modulating finale.
First off, care to introduce yourself to our readers?
Hi! I’m Heliara, a Canadian singer-songwriter, storyteller and indie pop-rock artist based in Ottawa. I’ve been writing songs for as long as I can remember, and I am a passionate music and language nerd. I’m also a mother of two and a former flight attendant with some interesting life experiences and lots of stories to tell. But above all, like all of you, I am a human navigating this beautiful and messy journey we call life. I write music for two reasons: 1) as a way to process my own life experiences and emotions; and 2) to connect with others and spread the message that no-one is alone on this human journey. There is no greater honour for me than to know that one of my songs has resonated with someone else and that I have given a voice to someone who sees themselves reflected in my own human struggles, pain, doubt, joy and resilience.
At what point did Everything’s a Love Song shift from its original concept (Eclectic Love Songs) into what it is now?
The working title of my EP was Electic Love Songs because I wanted to write a whole bunch of love songs, each about a different type of love, and explore different musical genres and textures while doing it. I wanted a punchier title than that placeholder, though, and one day, when I was explaining the concept to my husband, he spontaneously threw out: “ok, so everything’s a love song” and I thought: “that’s my title”!
When you realized each track aligned with a different form of love, did that change how you approached finishing the EP?
It was an astonishing discovery for me to realize that each of the six songs I had written corresponded perfectly to a different type of love as identified by the Ancient Greeks, as I hadn’t been aware of this alignment at the time of writing them. (Yes, being the language nerd that I am, I had actually taken one year of Ancient Greek in university, but this concept had not been discussed in class.) And in the case of two songs, even the title I had unknowingly chosen was a translation of the concept in Ancient Greek : “Self-love” (“philautia”) and “Obsession” (“mania” ). So it is neat to know that I am somehow in tune with the wisdom of the Ancient Greeks and also humbling to know that I am not inventing anything new here in 2026!
While this “Ancient Greek realization” didn’t change my already-written songs, it certainly influenced my messaging and the roll-out of the EP. On social media and during live performances, I have been continually emphasizing how the Ancient Greeks conceptualized love and how it is all still so relevant today.
“Confessions to my Daughter” feels deeply personal—what made it feel like the right choice to close the EP?
“Confessions to my Daughter” felt like the right choice to close the EP for several reasons, some lyrical and some musical in nature. Lyrically, the word “everything” is repeated 11 times in this track, and, seeing as the title is “Everything’s a Love Song”, I thought it tied things together nicely. My favourite lyric, which comes up during the bridge, is the following: “You’re my everything / You mean everything / I want everything for you” and the final lyric (after the key change for the final chorus) is “I want everything for you”.
Musically, this song features a “happy” major chord progression, so I thought it was an uplifting way to end the EP. I tend to favour “dark” minor chord progressions, tension and dissonance in my music, so while containing my characteristic vulnerability and honesty, this song stands apart from the others as a tender and heartwarming finish.
And finally, children are the future, and I think having my 3-year-old daughter close out the EP with her adorable little voice not only brings a smile to listeners but also injects a note of positivity and light to the listening experience.
How did it feel to include your daughter’s voice on the recording?
I will cherish our “collaboration” forever and it is so meaningful for me to know that she will always have “her” song, with the truths it contains about her and about me as her mother. It was such a precious experience to have her come into the recording studio (Audio Valley Recording Studio, located here in Ottawa), where my producer Steve Foley lowered the mic to the height of a 3-year-old. She put on headphones and sang over the almost-finalized track, matching my lead vocals and adding in little flourishes of her own, which became the soft “echo” on the finalized track.
Her older sister already has her own song (“Her 3 Keys”, available wherever you get your music), which I wrote while on my first maternity leave and recorded while pregnant with my now 3-year-old. So we can say that my younger daughter has been surrounded by music since her earliest moments!
Which song on the EP feels the most universally relatable to you?
“Self-love”! I believe that the message that it is not always easy to love oneself resonates with most of humankind. Humans can be very hard on ourselves! This song (which came to me while washing dishes) is inspired by the chaos of everyday life and speaks to relatable experiences such as : letting fears hold us back, comparing oneself to others, and every day being a new opportunity to love oneself better.
Every time I have played this song live, someone (often a mother, but not always) has come up to me afterwards and said that they relate to it, which, as I mentioned above, is the highest praise a songwriter can ever get!
If Everything’s a Love Song is a snapshot of where you are now, what do you think the next chapter might sound like?
I won’t yet reveal the working title of my next project, but I will say that it is on the darker and rawer side. Things are shifting in my personal life and the songs that are coming to me reflect that. I believe that it is powerfully healing to acknowledge one’s own darkness and confront the past with honesty. Pain, suffering, sadness and trauma are all part of the human experience, and to be able to express it is a step in releasing it.
So if “Everything’s a Love Song” is a celebration of love, this next chapter will be a celebration of truth, healing, survivorship and resilience.