Warner Robins' own Colby Dee to perform at Cox Capitol Theatre

Colby Dee will be returning home to perform with Kelsea Ballerini on Thursday night.

That's home with a capital H.

Colby Dee lives in Nashville, where she is building her life. But Warner Robins, where she lived as a child and her extended family still resides, is Home.

She has spent the last year opening for bigger acts -- Bret Eldridge, Old Dominion, Jana Kramer. It has been a great opportunity to expand her own audience.

"They get to know a little about you in that 45-minute set and it makes you work hard to relate to another artist's fan base," Colby Dee said. "It is also a great learning experience, you see another performer and sort of take notes -- how they work with a crowd, what is resonating with the audience."

She returns to Middle Georgia after a recent engagement at the world famous Bluebird Cafe, where she admits she was nervous prior to her performance.

"I love that my nerve s kick in.I don't ever want to be completely comfortable. I want it always to be exciting. When I sang the national anthem at the UGA/Vandy game, my hands were shaking and sweating, it was a little embarrassing, but it was good. That adrenalin adds to everything," Dee said.

Dee, although getting bigger and bigger in Nashville, still controls all her own social media.

"I am the one responding to each fan. I love that part," Dee said.

Social media also gives Dee inspiration in her own songwriting.

"I saw a picture -- in the picture everyone was looking at something and holding up their phones to take a picture or record it. Everyone but this one sweet older woman who was really living in the moment. The next morning after seeing that, I had a writing session and I knew what I wanted to work on. Moments sometimes just come to life in the writing room."

She loves all aspects of the country music business, but especially loves the time she has to write.

"Being in that room, the emotions are so raw. It is one of my favorite things. Some writes lasts six hours and all you will get is one verse but that's all it was meant to be that day. You know it when it happens, because you feel it. Music is about feeling what someone else is singing."

"I work hard for my music to be relatable -- to my older audience, to my younger audience. I work hard to find that balance. I also want my music to represent me, so people will know who I am as a person. Songwriters draw on personal experiences. My grandparents getting older, a girls' night out, all of these happening in my own life are influential in my writing."

She will have new music out next year, and fans will get a preview at the show tomorrow night and when she returns for her annual holiday show in Warner Robins.

A few tickets are still available for the show Thursday night.

Doors open at 7, and the show begins at 8 at the Cox Capitol Theatre. Tickets start at $15, and more information is available at coxcaptioltheatre.com.

This story was originally published October 20, 2015 at 3:19 PM with the headline "Warner Robins' own Colby Dee to perform at Cox Capitol Theatre ."