Sienna Spiro Is Wise Beyond Her Years
The 20-year-old artist with a once-in-a-generation voice talks “Die On This Hill” and the secret to making timeless music that resists the algorithm.
- Written by: Iana Murray
- Photos: Mathias Apap
Open TikTok these days and you’re likely to find someone possessed by yearning, falling to their knees and clutching their chests to a song called “Die On This Hill.” The song’s most clipped line, “God, I wish something mattered to you,” is a mournful cry for a relationship crumbling apart, but it’s the artist’s full-throated belts that really make the track. That voice — sumptuously coarse and gravelly, with a weighty gravitas so immense it could sink a ship — belongs to a 20-year-old London-born artist named Sienna Spiro.
With those raspy, soulful vocals, the rapidly ascending singer-songwriter delivers a powerhouse ballad so visceral, it’s as if she sends you her anguish intravenously. Spiro started writing songs at 10-years old, and even then, her emotions ran deep. “I mean, they’re a lot better now,” she says of her repertoire, laughing. “Honestly, they weren’t bad for a 10-year-old!” Her parents raised her on the sounds of Aretha Franklin, Nina Simone and Etta James, jazz-heavy influences that continue to course through her music. At 16, she dropped out of music college to pursue a singing career, a decision she has mixed feelings about if only because it was the first place she felt accepted. “It was like High School Musical, I’m not gonna lie” she reflects. “I was always made to feel really weird and like strange and isolated because I made music and because I loved art, and I went there and just found my people.”
When we meet over Zoom, the singer-songwriter is relaxing at her home in London. In a whirlwind year, this is one of those rare moments where she can plant her feet back on the ground. Earlier this year, she released her debut EP, SINK NOW, SWIM LATER, a collection of eight introspective tracks that speak of a young woman thrown in the deep end of relationships.
Afterward, she took those songs to the stage, supporting Sam Smith on their New York residency and Teddy Swims on his US tour. (She can also be seen singing in the latest holiday ad for GAP.) After a year on the road, the only direction left to go is up, and Spiro has high ambitions. When I mention that her lush, operatic compositions could translate to a Bond theme down the line, she jokingly pleads, “Pray for me!”
In the distant future, she envisions a quieter life surrounded by her three dogs: “I really want to grow up and retire on a farm, so that's kind of a dream.” As for right now, Spiro is living out another dream entirely.
Iana Murray
Sienna Spiro
Heartbreak feels like the throughline of your music so far. What do you think it is about heartbreak that makes it such a deep well to draw from?
I think you can be heartbroken in so many different areas in life, not just romantically. I think I find myself more heartbroken by friends. Not in a “feel bad for me” way, but nobody really wanted to be around me when I was younger. I don't know for what reason that was, but I really struggled to keep friends, and my way of dealing with that was overcompensating and giving a lot of myself to people. And that would always never be enough, because obviously, those kinds of people aren't meant to be in your life. And I would often find myself really heartbroken over situations like that.
TikTok has played such a major role in your career. Can you talk about that point in time when your songs were beginning to blow up and what emotions you were feeling?
TikTok is such an interesting one because it's an immediate reaction to something, and you have to be really intentional about how you use it. I've used it to connect with people and make a sounding board in a way, and find people through music. To be completely transparent, it has really extreme effects. If you post something and it has a great response, you feel amazing, and if you post something and it doesn't, you have to be really strong-minded to not let that sway how you feel about your audience.
Was that something you had to learn firsthand?
Yeah, I'm so grateful for any response I get. I really try to see everyone individually, and go through comments and be present in that way. But I think the one thing that you need to be really careful of is when you start putting things online, and then you go back to write more music, you don't think about that while you're doing it. It’s very dangerous to think beyond the room when you're creating a song.
We read all the time about how TikTok is shaping the music industry in terms of songs becoming shorter and how artists are encouraged to cater to the platform. But your music comes from such a different place and you’re still finding success.
It's no one's fault, it's just the way we consume media — but because everything's in short form, and you have a 20-60 second audition, basically, when you post on TikTok, and you try to win people over with that — you start to think in that way. And I think songs, like you said, have become shorter, and I think people are taking less care in constructing these songs. It starts to create something that's not timeless, because you're thinking in such a small capacity. You can easily fall into that trap.
I have in the past. And I think I really try to be as timeless as I can with my music. I think the way you do it is by not thinking beyond the room, you have to just be completely present and drop all ego. Something that's honest just comes from you. And I think that is how you're gonna withstand all this, because everything's gonna change, and humans are timeless. I'd say the way I try and approach it is by really allowing it to come from me and not think beyond anything else.
You played your first live shows this year, how has that experience been?
It has been such a journey this year. I'm not a natural performer, and so I really had to learn that craft. I'm still learning. The last tour I just did — my headline tour — I don't know how to describe it other than amazing. When you think about something in your head and then are able to bring it to fruition, I have really struggled with doing that and bringing visions to life. This is what “Die On This Hill” is about, but I’m very stubborn. And I think when you stick to your vision and be a little bit stubborn, it's so worth it in the end. I felt so proud of that last tour, because I felt like there was so much work put into it. I did five tours this year, and each show led me up to that.
In what ways did you have to learn how to be a performer?
Most people aren’t natural performers. (Obviously, there are a few exceptions like Gaga.) I was a very awkward teenager, and I felt really uncomfortable in my body at the beginning of last year, and I didn't really want anyone to see me. Being on stage, being looked at, was really scary. Moving and being present in my body was really hard, because when I moved on stage, I felt awkward. “Are people looking at my right hand?” They’re fucking not. And I'm a terrible talker. I write songs because I can't talk. So when I have to address a room full of people, I really struggle. Like anything else, you have a relationship with the stage, and you have to grow, and you have to feel comfortable, and you have to know what your boundaries are. This whole year has just been experimenting, and trusting myself and gaining confidence.
I was watching this interview you did with Elton John, and he talked about how playing live is also really important for songwriting. Have you thought about how these live shows will affect your music moving forward?
I mean, obviously he's right. He's Elton John. I think after you play live, you have a craving for what you want to play live. You know what songs feel the best, you know how you might want to move, what you want to add into your set. And I think this whole year of playing live has made me really think about what I want to play live, and how I want my sets to sound. I sing a lot of unreleased [music] because I don't have that many songs out, and you sing it differently live. It really affects the record in a way, so I keep having to go and re-sing all these songs. For example, I had “Die On This Hill” for a long time, and “Die On This Hill” [had] so many different versions. It was a really fast guitar song at one point, and I played it like that the whole Teddy [Swims] tour. And I was like, “This is wrong.” I was playing with a key change at the end. It was so different. The way I sang it, and the inflections in my voice, and the ad libs I chose in that song, all came from playing live.
You’ve also spoken about being influenced by movies, and your music does have a cinematic quality to it. How has cinema shaped your music?
It influences me in so many ways. I love strings and I love drama, like “You Stole The Show,” for example. I pretty much have strings in every song. Also movie music is very intentional, and it can sometimes have quite a classical tone to it, and so I tried to carry that through. For example, a song like “Butterfly Effect,” it's classical piano on a pop song, which I think is so cool. And it can also influence me in stories. I'm a very visual person, and I wrote a song called “Dream Police” that's out, and that was inspired by the story of Inception.
Your style also feels very 60s-inspired. How did that image-making come into your work?
I started off being really scared to wear anything that showed anything, because I was very insecure about my body. I didn't want anyone to see what I had going on under there, and I started off really covering it. And then I think as you grow older, as anyone does, you grow into your body. And I was always inspired by the ‘60s. I loved it. I just thought, “Why can't I take inspiration from that?” And so I found Edie [Rose], who's my stylist now. She's amazing. She's an influencer, but she has such a good sense of style. We worked together, and found pieces that felt very nostalgic and had those ‘60s silhouettes, but also felt fresh and modern. And I think it's really important to me to have that separation from my everyday stuff, to have a different kind of confidence on stage. I grew up watching all the ‘60s performers like Nancy Sinatra, Dusty Springfield, and I can tap into that confidence when I dress in that way.
Now that you’ve turned 20, what are you excited to experience in your 20s?
I wish I had an answer for you. I know what I want to do is to write my album now, and I'm ready for that. I've been waiting till I felt right to do it, and I definitely feel right to do it.
Iana Murray is a writer based in London.
- Written by: Iana Murray
- Photos: Mathias Apap
- Date: November 12, 2025
