Erica Cooper’s upcoming debut album “Safety Escape” carries between each chord four years of life lessons and struggle.

The 27-year-old Bainbridge Island singer-songwriter’s first collection, set for release in April, has been a work in progress since she was 23, an evolving picture of her talents and passions through education, strife, illness and healing.

“I took a really long time with this,” Cooper said. “I had wanted to make an album for a really long time, and I had sort of sketched out in a book topics that I would like to cover or things that I felt like I had been through and dealt with for a number of years, so I felt like I had something to say about it at this point.”

What she has to say runs the gamut of emotional severity, including thoughts on love, relationships, vulnerability, being present and staying in the moment, loss, addiction, her own struggle with Lyme Disease, self empowerment, setting boundaries and the power of hope.

Cooper began taking voice lessons at the age of 7, inspired by an early love of classical opera.

“I was really into classical music, like arias, anything with a high register because I have a pretty high voice — so I was very attracted to all that,” she said.

She sang in Bainbridge Chorale for a time, and then the Bainbridge High School alumna studied jazz vocal performance and composition at Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle, where she also began playing piano. After graduating she studied songwriting specifically, and started taking audio mastery lessons from engineer and producer Alek Edmonds.

Though it was a love of classical music that got her hooked as a kid, the style on display on her first album reflects the diversity of Cooper’s musical influences: Radiohead, the Eurythmics, Grimes, Joni Mitchell, Enya, Florence and the Machine, Imogen Heap, Arcade Fire and Feist.

“Each track definitely has its own story and feeling,” Cooper said. “But there are a few overarching themes through the album. The main theme, and what the title of the album is about, is disassociation.

“I learned about disassociation from personal experience and from a therapist who is trained in a specific type of psychotherapy called EMDR, which is used to treat people with post traumatic stress disorder. I was in a few unhealthy relationships during the course of making this album so there is an element of disconnection; trying to escape from them. Music and making all the songs on this album was a safety escape for me.”

Despite the health struggles that delayed her early aspirations, Cooper said she and her music would be very different today, for the worse, without having experienced such tests.

“While I was going through it I thought it was setting me back,” she said. “But now that I think about it, it gave me a lot of time at home and in treatment and I don’t think I could have made this music if I didn’t have that time.”

Another boon that at first seemed a burden, Cooper said, was growing up on Bainbridge. A sleepy suburban childhood forced her, the musician recalled, to develop her imagination and creativity early on.

“I think it sparked my imagination because there wasn’t a whole lot to do,” she laughed. “We didn’t have a movie theater until I was in high school. I was just playing outside a lot and hanging out with my friends and scheming up stories in my head and stuff.

“I think if I had lived in the city it would have been different,” she said. “There would have been more influences. It was almost like the lack of influences helped me.”

So, too, did the supportive artistic community on the island which, Cooper said, lives up to the hype.

“My music teacher was very supportive and I sang with the Bainbridge Chorale for a little bit,” she said. “My aunt is a jeweler and she has her work in BIMA, and her husband, who is a metalsmith, he also has a permanent plaque in BIMA. Their support was really important. You get discouraged very easily as an artist, I think.”

Cooper will perform a pre-emptive album release concert, presented by Space Craft, at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 11 at Rolling Bay Hall (10598 Northeast Valley Road). She will share the stage that night with Tango Alpha Tango, and plans to perform all the tracks from “Safety Escape” as well as a few newer songs, too.

Tickets, $12 in advance ($15 at the door) are available now. Visit www.spacecraftpresents.org to purchase and learn more.

Cooper has big dreams of growing and evolving as a musician, reaching and affecting larger audiences on an emotional level, she said. But she also works with more modest goals in sight. Success, Cooper said, would be “to be able to make a living doing this.”

“At least to be able to play piano and sing and travel,” she said. “Because for the last couple of years the reason I was not releasing my album is the fact that I dealt with a lot of health struggles in that time, so I wasn’t able to travel or anything. So I feel like now, if I was able to do that, it would be a big accomplishment for me.

“I feel like that’s success to me,” Cooper said. “Feeling a connection with people.”

Visit www.ericacooper.com to learn more about her work and for the latest updates concerning the release of “Safety Escape.”