When Nicole Ariana stepped up to the mic in front of a packed crowd at a downtown Halifax club, she hadn’t had anything to drink. That, she admits, was a relatively new experience, though she’s been performing for a decade.
“I have, over the years, needed a few drinks at first to do a show,” she said in an interview before her set at Hailfax’s Marquee Ballroom.
She had signed up for the East Coast Music Association (ECMA)’s “Dry January” initiative — no drinking alcohol for the entire month.
The ECMA launched the “Pledge to Pause” initiative for the first time this year as
