Country musician Tony Stevens says a number of factors convinced him to move his family from Surrey to southern Alberta over the summer.

“Just a little bit of everything, you know,” the former Clayton-area resident explained in a phone call. “My record label (Willing Records) is out here — that’s not really the main reason, but you know, having kids, and the Lower Mainland is, you know, getting a little less affordable by the year. You know what it’s like. And the area that we were living in, the neighbourhood is kind of getting subject to development, like towers and SkyTrain stuff coming down the pipe. So we just didn’t really want to be stuck in that construction for the next five to 10 years either.

“Once we started looking around, the area west of Calgary just kind of called our name. Now, here we are.”

Raised in Coquitlam, Stevens moved to Surrey as a 13-year-old and now likes “Whiskey In Colorado,” title of his biggest song so far.

For a couple of reasons, Stevens was back in B.C. in mid-September, first as a Breakthrough Artist/Group of the Year award-nominee at the Canadian Country Music Association awards in Kelowna. A day later, he headed southwest to perform at Barnside Harvest Festival in Ladner.

For Stevens, such gigs further cement his reputation as a rising star in Canadian country music.

“It’s amazing to be recognized in any kind of form, especially by the CCMAs, which in Canada is kind of the highest form of recognition in country music,” Stevens said prior to the gathering in Kelowna. “It’s definitely affirmation that, you know, I’m doing something right. Whether or not I win it, it’s a different story, but it’s definitely an honour to be on the same list as those other artists also nominated.”

For the record, Cameron Whitcomb won the Breakthrough Artist award over Stevens, Noeline Hoffman, Zach McPhee and Sacha. While in Kelowna, Stevens kept busy with a few showcase concerts, and also presented an award during the CCMAs.

Stevens first caught our attention in 2024 when he was named a SiriusXM Top of the Country contest semi-finalist.

Released in May 2025, his debut album Days Like This now boasts close to six million streams. Also this year he won BC Country Music Association awards for Male Artist, Song and Songwriter of the Year.

This fall and winter, Stevens plans to record some new songs.

“We’ll possibly do some sort of tour, but none of the details are in stone yet,” he said. “But we’re right back on the recording train looking to cut a few more songs before the end of the year and start releasing them for the next project, early next year. It’s super-exciting because the new songs, I just want people to hear them.”

More than a decade ago, Stevens survived a wakeboarding accident in Tulameen, northwest of Princeton.

“I blacked out, thought I just had a bad headache the next day,” Stevens told the Now-Leader in February 2024. “I was working a lot (in construction) and one thing led to another. My body couldn’t rest and recover from it, and I had internal brain bleed. It got to the point where the bleeding was pooling in my skull and pushing my brain into the other side of my skull, creating blindness, basically. I couldn’t walk properly. I was rushed to the hospital and spent a week there and avoided doing super-invasive surgery, but it was a long road to recovery.”

After hospitalization, he was on bed rest for weeks.

“I just got to thinking, you never know how long you have in this life and when your day is up, so why not just go and do the things that you’re passionate about? So, my wife and I chatted about it, probably eight or 10 years ago, and I kinda just took the first steps from there to get into music, my own music.”