Jared Harper, an alt-indie singer-songwriter and guitarist from San Francisco, contributes a distinctive yet recognizable sound to the field. Jared Harper has appeared on The Voice US (season 18), performed in London, San Francisco, and LA, and kept music fans entertained during lockdown with live stream performances. His distinctive sound is a result of the influence of The Strokes, Arctic Monkeys, Oasis, The Beatles, and John Mayer.
Jared Harper begins his song “Picture” by introducing his newly cut, electric, and ion-driving new sound to take you through the middle of the year and beyond the summer. Over 1,000,000 streams of his music have been obtained across all platforms. Check out the exclusive interview below:
1. Did you have any formal training or are you self-taught?
JARED HARPER: First of all, just wanted to say thanks so much ILLUSTRATE MAGAZINE for the interview! Honored I get to share a bit about myself with you all. I would say I’m relatively self-taught when it comes to singing. I took guitar lessons briefly when I was around 10 years old and always sang in the shower but never really took singing lessons as devoutly as I did with guitar. I stopped guitar lessons to pursue baseball actually and then when I revisited guitar years later, I taught myself by watching YouTube tutorials. I ended up taking some vocal lessons from a couple different coaches but didn’t go longer than a couple weeks. Those few lessons did so much for my voice and sound later on.
2. Who were your first and strongest musical influences and why the name ‘JARED HARPER’?
JARED HARPER: The Beatles were really the ones that kicked it all off for me. Before I started taking singing seriously, I was only playing guitar and I had quit playing it for a couple years until freshman year of high school. I vividly remember getting home one day from school and feeling the literal need in my body to get my hands on a guitar and start playing some music. I couldn’t tell you why I landed on The Beatles but they were the perfect band for that place and time in my life and learning what song writing was all about. Another influence would be seeing the Arctic Monkeys at Outside Lands and how they captured their huge crowd with a mesmerizing performance. I remember after one song Alex Turner didn’t even say a word but he slicked his hair back with a 60s greaser style comb and everyone lost it. The energy of the crowd and their stage presence just solidified for me that I want to be a performer. Jared Harper is my real name so it only felt natural to perform as myself with that name, but it also never crossed my mind to have a stage name before I had already started gigging. I do every now and then play around with the thought of what a stage name would be if I had one, but I can never think of a cool one like “Prince” or “Childish Gambino.”
3. What do you feel are the key elements in your music that should resonate with listeners, and how would you personally describe your sound?
JARED HARPER: As a singer-songwriter it’s a big deal to me for my lyrics and melodies to connect with the listeners. I believe melodies are what hook our attentions and the lyrics keep you invested when you start finding that deeper meaning of what the song means to you. It’s almost like when you check out a book for its aesthetic cover and find there’s a story hiding behind the look that explains all of the reasons why you picked it up in the first place. My sound at the moment is a soft blend of rock and pop with a positive connotation to it. I wouldn’t say I write happy songs but I make sure they feel that way. I like the contrast of sadder lyrics with happier music because it comes out more interesting and confusing for our bodies to understand. Like I feel like I should be dancing right now but the lyrics say otherwise? I also don’t want to be that bummer at the party singing sad songs.
4. Do you think is it important for fans of your music to understand the real story and message driving each of your songs, or do you think everyone should be free to interpret your songs in their own personal way?
JARED HARPER: It’s incredibly important to me that people find their own personal meanings to my songs and not know about why or who I’ve written it about specifically. My theory is that we find our favorite songs when we need them the most and the real magic comes from those moments of discovery where you uniquely connect to it in a special way that you might not share with anyone else. I would hate to take that away from anyone. I also like that my songs can be interpreted in different ways. It is fun for me to hear what people have to say about my songs after they hear it and who or what they think it is about, and many times different people share different takes on what it is about.
5. For most artists, originality is first preceded by a phase of learning and, often, emulating others. What was this like for you? How would you describe your own development as an artist and music maker, and the transition towards your own style, which is known as POP?
JARED HARPER: I love breaking things down analytically so I actually I think about this all the time. I think naturally, people tend to behave like others that they want to be like or idolize and it started this way for me. I’m also a sponge of my environment so I took in a lot of what I like and don’t like from a range of things, which slowly turned into my own culmination of who I am as a musician. I’ve been at a point now for a few years where I’m fully in my own style. I feel confident and comfortable with what I can bring to the table, from the songs I write, to how I play guitar, to the voice I use to sing and how I present myself on stage. I do find that the artist/bands I love the most are the ones that tried something new and continued to expand their horizons. I’m constantly learning and growing as an artist – I enjoy finding and thinking of new ways to progress music and do something different.
6. Do you feel that your music is giving you back just as much fulfillment as the amount of work you are putting into it or are you expecting something more, or different in the future?
JARED HARPER: Absolutely. I have always been a shy guy, so it never gets old to me when I see reactions of people enjoying the things I do that are out of my comfort zone. It’s an odd thing to think that you can write, sing, or perform a song that resonates with a random stranger and all of a sudden, you’re connected. It’s a huge compliment when someone comes up to me after a performance to tell me how much they enjoyed it but it’s less about the words in that situation and more that they went out of their way to say something. Not many people know this, but I am deaf in my right ear. I’ve had people who also have hearing challenges reach out to me saying how inspiring it is for them to see someone similar to them in front of people singing. It’s a great reminder that I am in a special position that can help inspire others and it really means a lot to me. I would love to take this thing to the moon and beyond! Music and performing is my favorite thing to do so I am going to work as hard as I can to take this as far as I can go.
7. What’s your view on the role and function of music as political, cultural, spiritual, and/or social vehicles – and do you try and affront any of these themes in your work, or are you purely interested in music as an expression of technical artistry, personal narrative, and entertainment?
JARED HARPER: I think music is one of the biggest attributes that define all cultures in the world. It plays such an important part in our lives. Music helps to define major culture experiences that we all share and brings people together. Like entire crowds chanting the riff of a song at sporting events when the song isn’t even playing – that’s memorable! To me, seeing that I can influence someone to smile, laugh, or dance with my music or performances means the world and that’s all the I need to keep this train on trucking.
8. Could you describe your creative processes? How do usually start, and go about shaping ideas into a completed song? Do you usually start with a tune, a beat, or a narrative in your head? And do you collaborate with others in this process?
JARED HARPER: Every song is different as I’ve had some come to me in 10 minutes and others get finished after a couple years. For the most part, they all start with some sort of inspiration, whether it’s a word, person, or chord, and then slowly draw out the road map turn by turn. Typically, you get the chord progression out of the way because that’s your base layer for the song followed by melodies and everything else. For my latest release “Picture,” it all came to me at once while I was walking around my house and so I quickly grabbed my notebook and guitar because a lot of the time when a song comes to me, I find I either have to get it down right then and there or I forget it forever. Within 10 minutes the song was finished. I remember the line “I see us in a picture” hit me first and I had already been playing around with some chords and they just melted together finally, which also happens with other songs where I’ll be playing a chord progression, leave it for a couple days, and then later a hook will come to me that fits those chords perfectly. I have written with other artists! I mostly write solo only because that’s how it happens most naturally since an idea can hit you any part of the day. I think collaborating with other creatives is a fun part of the industry and I look forward to collaborating with more artists on projects in the future.
9. What has been the most difficult thing you’ve had to endure in your life or music career so far?
JARED HARPER: As mentioned earlier, I would say being deaf in my right ear has posed the most difficult challenge. Although I’ve only known to live with it my entire life, it still draws a lot of hurdles day to day but I’ve learned to turn it into a strength. It brings a constant learning curve to everything I do but I’ve learned and honed my skill to be able to adapt to certain situations. Being a musician wouldn’t be the most typical path for someone who can’t hear in one ear but I love music and there hasn’t been an obstacle I haven’t been able to overcome so far.
10. On the contrary, what would you consider a successful, proud or significant point in your life or music career so far?
JARED HARPER: I’ve fortunately had many moments I’m proud of in my career and life but one I look back on often is my first time performing internationally which is also still the closest I’ve ever been to walking out on a gig. I had landed in London for the first time ever and had a gig just four hours later that night which I was excited for but there was so much to take in that it was almost numbing. I arrived at the venue early to set up so I was hanging around for a good bit but that last hour was one of the hardest things I’ve had to mentally and physically overcome. With all the travel and nerves, everything seemed to hit me all at once. I was fighting to stay awake, not throw up, and be ready to do a show in 5 minutes with the room filling up to a packed house. When I got the green light from the sound engineer I slowly dragged my body and soul to the green room to get my guitar. Immediately after picking up my guitar I fell to the seat of a chair where my manager would find me fighting to not to pass out, since I was taking a bit to come out to the stage. Against all that chaos and panic though, that night became a defining moment in my life as not only did I climb from some rock bottom I’d never experienced before but it ended up being one of the best nights I’ve ever had living on this planet all in the matter of a couple hours. My set ended with a crowd of people singing along and that has been a highlight to this day.
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