Sound of...Podcast
Highlighting Maryland's musical artist's that have played our showcases and beyond! Hosted by Stephen Harrod (AKA Scott of the Andes), we delve into the songwriters journey and intentions as to why they create. If you want to know about Maryland's local songwriters, this is the podcast for you! Be sure to catch one of our showcases going on throughout the year, happy listening!
Sound of...Podcast
Burnsie-EP3
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Check out all Burnsie's music at https://burnsie.bandcamp.com/music !
Saver every moment of a tobral. I still can't be the one with full control.
SPEAKER_03Hello everyone. Welcome to Sound of Podcast, the podcast spotlighting Maryland's local music scene. This episode features Bernsey. She hosts one of my favorite open mics called the Annapolis Roundup. It's at 49 West. We talked about her music origins, her experiences in Nashville, and what it means to build a music community. Had a great, great conversation with her. Here it is for you, episode three on Sound of podcasting. Yay, we're bowling now. Oh my god, welcome to the show. Thank you. I've never done an intro like this, so it'll be funny if it's sponsored by, like I said, no one. No one is sponsored. It's fine. It's a it's a labor of love, much like art. Speaking of art, we're here with Bernsey, or should I use your full name?
SPEAKER_00You can say Bernsey. Or you it's it's both. You can introduce me as both.
SPEAKER_03I I know well Callie Burns.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_03Callie Bernsey.
SPEAKER_00Um Callie Bernsey is totally fine.
SPEAKER_03Well, I noted because when you did the showcase with us in your bio, you had your full thing, and I was like, oh, interesting. She used her her name in that way and not full or not artist artist name. Um let me ask you, is are those different for you? The the personalities of your your real name is Callie and your stage name is Bernsey, are they are they similar? Does one bleed into the other?
SPEAKER_00Great question. So personality-wise, Bernsey is a little bit of a persona, but what you see on stage is what you get. Like Callie Burns definitely comes through in terms of like the goofball nature, the silliness, um, the genuineness. Like that's still me. Um, but I chose Bernsey as my artist moniker because I did want a way to separate myself and my life from my music. Um, just a way to compartmentalize and kind of organize myself and organize my life. Um, and I knew I wanted like a one-word type of deal.
SPEAKER_03It's just like you gotta have the one syllable, you gotta have it.
SPEAKER_00It's two Bernsey, two syllables, one word. But so Bernsey was actually my nickname as a as a kid growing up. Um all of my coaches and teachers called me Bernsey because I grew up a big lacrosse kid, and it's common to just like call somebody by their last name or a nickname version of their last name, and it was also my uncle's nickname growing up, so and I'm very close with my family. My family is everything to me. So when I was going around trying to come up with ideas for this solo project and what my stage name would be, I was like, oh, Bernsey. That's easy.
SPEAKER_03So I think it's I think it's important if if you decide to go down the road as as an artist, as a songwriter, that you do have those I I don't want to say like two persona, but persona type of things, because I always remember there was a quote from um shock rocker Alice Cooper of he said that who you are on stage shouldn't be who you are off stage. And granted, he's Alice Cooper, he has the theatrics, the pageantry. But I I don't think he's wrong in terms of I think songwriting, you're you're obviously coming at it from a vulnerable, open angle, and and who you are off stage isn't necessarily that you know, might be different from that. Maybe you are a little bit more outgoing IRL, and then maybe on stage you're more reserved or or flipped either way. But it's always interesting to me if like when I came back here and going to the open mics, and everybody's using their real names. And I get it, maybe some of them aren't, you know, going down the the songwriter um route, but it's always I don't know, and and also I I don't have a a name that a real name that rolls off the tongue. That's the reason that I I changed it for for something.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_03When did you get into let's let's go way back.
SPEAKER_00Okay.
SPEAKER_03When did you get into music?
SPEAKER_00I will answer that, but first I have two things I want to say to your uh earlier point. Um I like that quote from Alice Cooper. It's funny. My stage persona, in air quotes, as Bernsey, is very much my most extroverted, most outgoing self, despite the song matter being very introspective. Like my role as Bernsey is very much outgoing. And my in real life persona, or not even persona, but my in real life personality as Callie Burns, when I step off of the stage or when I'm, you know, back down to earth, so to speak, is a much quieter, a little bit more reserved, um, a little bit more shy, which is hilarious. People are like, you're not shy, and I'm like, well, I am a little bit, but the humor kind of masks it. Um but yeah, so that's that's kind of the story about Bernsey versus Callie Burns. But when I do open mics and when I host the Annapolis Roundup or when I write artist bios, I am specific and intentional about giving both my full name and my stage name because although they're separate, there's not a whole lot of difference. I'm am Bernsey. Bernsey is Callie Burns. It's all it's all almost the same. But anyway, now into the nitty-gritty. So how I started, like how I got into music, was that the question?
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Well, and I asked uh this question of multiple people, but I guess what are your first memories of music? Like I don't know if you can remember that far. I can.
SPEAKER_00I have a few different stories and points along the timeline. Um, one of my earliest memories is sitting in my sitting in the back of my mom's old Volvo with my mom and my brother singing at the top of our lungs, um, Cher's hit, Do You Believe in Life After Love? That song had such a chokehold on our entire house. Like we all collectively just loved that song. And that was kind of when I think we, my parents and I, realized I had a little bit of like a stage personality already in me because I would get up on our little uh on the hearth of our fireplace and like perform that song, other songs, whatever was on the radio, whatever grabbed me at the time. And I was young. I was I don't remember how young, but like pretty young. Um, and then I was in musical theater productions at the age of like six. Um, did musical theater. I was in the all children's chorus of Annapolis here in town. I grew up here.
SPEAKER_03Do you remember the first musical?
SPEAKER_00My first musical was I was a munchkin in the Wizard of Oz.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um, I sadly can't remember who it was with. I don't remember the production. No, it was like the The Wizard of Oz.
SPEAKER_03Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. But it was just a children's theater production of it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03But it's an original song? Or they were or it was songs from the movie.
SPEAKER_00Songs, it's it's um, I guess songs from the movie. Like it's it's it there's like slight variation, but yeah, the original story of The Wizard of Oz. Um, and I was a munchkin. I've actually, fun fact, I've been in three different productions of The Wizard of Oz, and each time I was a different role. When I was a kiddo, I was a munchkin. Then like late elementary school, I was in another production of it, and I was one of the gumdrop kids. Yeah, what are they called? I don't remember now.
SPEAKER_02There's a lot of killed there's a lot of people. Yeah, I was one of them.
SPEAKER_00I was one of them. And then in eighth grade, uh at my middle school, I was Auntie M. The very famous role of Auntie M. And it was a lot of fun. But yeah, I've I've always been a musical kid. Um, children's choirs, musical theater, continued that all the way through college. Um, and then songwriting started around like my 11th grade year, is when I was like, oh wait, I can actually create the songs myself.
SPEAKER_03Do you remember what the first song you you wrote was about?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and it was bad. It was it was awful. So this was kind of you have to realize this was kind of at the time, this was just shortly after um Taylor Swift's song 15. Do you remember that song? I remember that album. I don't know. I'm not much of a Swifty, so I don't know.
SPEAKER_03I was not 15 when it came out, but yes. Maybe I don't know.
SPEAKER_00Well, I'm not much of a Swifty, so I don't know chronologically like where that song falls in her discography, but it was around that time. And um they say imitation is the highest form of flattery, and I remember I had a lot of angry teenage girl feelings about what was happening in different friend groups, and I wrote a very angry anti-girl song that kind of mimicked themes on that record of Taylor Swift's, and it was not good. There was hardly a melody, the lyrics were bad, but I was banging out the keys on piano, and I came up with a song, and that was the beginning of the end for me.
SPEAKER_02Did you show it to people, or did you kept it? Did you hide it away?
SPEAKER_00I kept it really secretive. Um, I remember uh after school one day, I was hanging out in the band room at our school, and I showed one trusted friend who was like, okay, cool. And then I showed my grandparents, and of course they were like, Amazing, you're gonna go far, kid. And I was like, no.
SPEAKER_03You said piano. Was piano your first instrument, or what was your first instrument? Besides voice, of course, which is the instrument of God. Well, as my old roommate used to play.
SPEAKER_00The instrument of God. I love that. Yeah, no, I was actually gonna say, I mean, my first instrument was my voice. Um, people ask me all the time, what instruments do you play? And I'm like, well, my instrument is my voice. Um, but yes, piano was the first like accompaniment instrument. Um, I took lessons for several years. I played violin a little bit in elementary school, just because I you kind of had to.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, they're like, pick an instrument. Yeah, pick one.
SPEAKER_00And I picked violin, and uh, wouldn't you know, I was not great at it. I never practiced. Um, I have really funny memories of sitting in a townhouse where I was living with my mom and I mean with my uh stepmom and my dad at the time. We were living at a townhouse here in Annapolis, and I have really funny memories of just agonizing violin practicing in the middle of that living room. Um, but no, piano was my first like auxiliary instrument, and then I picked up the ukulele, as does every Twee teenage girl. Um I've heard about this. I didn't know this term until recently. Twee. We have Zoe De Chanel to thank um and if and others. Um I was like a huge tumbler American apparel, indie sleaze kind of gal for a little while. So ukulele was a a drug to me at the time. Um I picked that up. There's a few funny videos somewhere on the internet, somewhere deep, deep, deep in the web of me doing Jason Moraz covers.
SPEAKER_03I'm gonna find it. On the ukulele. I'm gonna post it on the extra. I think you should.
SPEAKER_00I might, I might, I might give up the goat, and I might give that to you because I trust you. But yeah, so ukulele, and then finally, all that to say, then it wasn't until college that I picked up the guitar. Um, I went to college for music therapy, actually. Like to study music therapy because that's what I thought. Yeah, that's what I thought I wanted to do, and we were required to take guitar classes as part of the curriculum. So it wasn't until college that I picked up guitar and um my rebellious nature, I did not love being told what to do in that class. So I just I learned the basics, and then the rest of everything that I do and write, I've just picked up on my own by mimicking the people that I love and admire.
SPEAKER_03So I think there's always that depend and and musicians come from all walks of life in terms of where their training is. And for me, I remember guitar. Yes, I wanted to play it because you you want to emulate whomever, but then the understanding and the order of the rank and file of well, you gotta practice it in this way, and it just didn't it didn't gravitate. I I didn't gravitate towards it. I think it was that organization in that way, and and and something that I've learned as I've got older is that everybody learns different ways.
SPEAKER_01True.
SPEAKER_03And um, but I remember going to Garrett Park guitars in the Shout out Garrett Park, we love them. But it was it was far enough, far back enough that it was where the that area where the circuit city used to be. Yeah, yeah. I don't know if you but it was there. I took one lesson and that was it. Um I was like, yeah, this isn't fun to me anymore. And hearing other musicians' stories, like Dave Grohl comes to mind if he took one actual drum lesson and that was it for him. Of he was like, I don't like I still like doing this, but I don't like this inorganized type of way. So I feel like everybody's path is different in terms of the learning that happens. You're regardless, you are learning whether it's emulating somebody else's songs or their their picking or their their style, and then some people take the more formal approach, but but it always is interesting to me of the idea of institutionalized art.
SPEAKER_00Oh, that's a whole other rabbit hole that we could go down, but I wanted to say a few things in response to that. This might be a hot take, but I do believe that talent to a certain level is innate, and I think musicians and songwriters already have something in them that makes them, you know, what's the word I'm looking for? Shoot, that makes them more predisposed to picking something up quickly, whether they've had formal lessons or not. And I think, shoot, I had like a very profound thing to say, and it just left my brain entirely. That's fine.
SPEAKER_03Um I mean, uh well, the to piggyback off of that, uh, it's almost like a willed thing. Yeah. Maybe that you will it into existence.
SPEAKER_00Yes, I think I definitely think it's it's more like that, where I I knew I've known for the forever that music was gonna be a big part of my life and that there was never gonna come a time where I would not be musical in some way, but formal circuitous lessons were not something that I was ever really like moved by or strongly motivated by, which is really funny. I I went to college for music and I learned very quickly, oh, I'm actually not the type of student that can really handle this type of structure and this type of critique and this heavy influence by my teachers. But the second thing I was gonna say to your point is I think also a lot of our learning as musicians happens subconsciously or without our awareness. Like, depending on the style of music that I've been really, you know, clinging on to will directly impact my songwriting, whether I know it or not. Like whatever I'm listening to at the time will influence the choices that I'm making in my writing or will influence the vocal styles I play with or the finger styles that I play with. And so I think like people like Dave Grohl, these masterclass musicians, I think a lot of it is just subconscious and below our level of awareness.
SPEAKER_03I I think it's a sum of our parts type of thing, too. Uh I want to kind of brush on, or maybe not brush on, uh open up to your your time in Nashville and what led you there. You were going that was where you went to school for music. What uh made you land on that choice?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, great question. So when I was applying to different colleges, I had no idea what I wanted to do, where I wanted to be. I just knew I needed something different. I knew that I was really, really curious just about the world. Um, and so I was looking at colleges that were as far away from our hometown as as possible. Um, and uh at the time, a friend of mine from high school, I went to Severn School in Saverna Park, a friend of mine from high school who I knew through all of our music and theater programming. Um, he was a student at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee. And he was having, he's two years above me, and he was having a phenomenal time. So I remember when we were scheduling college visits, um, my mom and I decided to go down to Nashville to visit Nashville and visit my friend. Uh shout out Ryan Webster. If you ever hear this, you are the influence. Um, and we visited him in Nashville and got to see the campus, and it was beautiful. It was a small campus, which is I knew I wanted a smaller community. Um, and it was a beautiful campus. I actually really liked Nashville a lot more than I expected because all I had heard about Nashville at the time was like, oh, country music this, country music that. I'm sure everybody like, you know, when you think of Nashville, you already have a prototype in your head.
SPEAKER_03Everybody speaks with a twang.
SPEAKER_00Everybody speaks with a twang, y'all. And um so anyway, I I loved my time visiting Nashville. And when it came down time to choose a college, I settled between Radford, Virginia, Radford University, or Belmont University in Nashville, specifically for their music therapy programs. Um, and something was calling me to Tennessee, and I lived there almost 10 full years.
SPEAKER_03You've brought and and you know, I had heard a lot about Nashville in terms of when I was living in Los Angeles, it was it's funny to me because so many musicians, singer-songwriters, you know, obviously they want to go to the big cities because you're getting more of the the creme de la creme or or the cream of the crop. But when I went to Los Angeles and started talking about that, they were like, oh no, you gotta go to Nashville. And which was interesting to me, and I feel like it's I don't know, it's a perspective thing. Granted, I think many of the people that I was talking to, they were locals in Los Angeles in the first place, and I always feel like people get um not cold feet, but maybe antsy wandering feet um of just figuring out what what's on the other side of the pond.
SPEAKER_00Sure.
SPEAKER_03Or whatever. And having said that, you've brought, I feel a lot of the Nashville sensibility here in terms of the way that you run your open mics. No, and um but it's it's a perceived, not not even perceived, but you're in in the space that you provide for the writers around, there is this thing of mutual respect that I think is uh I've experienced in kind of different points in time of going around to the different open mics in the Maryland area, but yours is wholly unique in that way. And do you think that was informed by your time in Nashville and just the way that they treat music there?
SPEAKER_00That's a fabulous question, and I'm very flattered and humbled to hear you say that. Um I like to first first and foremost, I like to tell people that I'm Annapolis-born, Nashville informed. Um, so it's funny that you used that word, but I definitely think that the openness and the mutual respect and the overall atmosphere that I'm trying to cultivate in the Annapolis Roundup in my open mic is directly in spite of my time in Nashville. So despite Nashville, and this is my experience, disclaimer like this is just my world that I lived in for almost 10 years. In my experience, Nashville can be claustrophobic, it can be cutthroat, it can be very competitive. There's not a lot of openness, there's not a lot of sharing of resources. And so when I moved back to Annapolis, I wanted to make it a personal goal that music was to be available to everyone and anyone. And I wanted to cultivate a space where we all feel like there is plenty of room for all of us and there is plenty to go around because Nashville at times can feel oversaturated. And I was never in the commercial space. All of my music happened in the independent DIY underground spheres. Um, and even still, sometimes there felt just like a little bit of this competitive edge where you are constantly fighting for the same slice of the pie, so to speak.
SPEAKER_03And and then that's in limited quantity, though. Why do you think that was that the um the resources were limited in that way? Is that just everybody again like checking everybody and making sure, hey, don't you infringe on my uh I don't know, whatever payout? There are whatever money is to be had within that DIY scene, or what do you think that was?
SPEAKER_00I think part of it so okay. I think with the scarcity. Um, and we don't have to dive into that whole nonsense, because that's a bigger, a bigger uh conversation. But um specifically, the I will say the community itself, absolutely incredible. Some of my lifelong friends, like I still keep in touch with my folks down in Nashville. But on a whole, there were only so many independent venues and only so much money that was pouring into the DIY scene because Nashville is very commercialized. It's and not just for country music, like for genres of all types, but it's very much uh label-fueled, management fueled, big, big, big name fueled. Um, and the big names and the big contracts kind of run the circuit down there. Um and like a lot of um, a lot of infrastructure kind of gets in the way of it as well. Uh, during my time in Nashville, some of the local universities and big businessmen that would come in from places like LA or New York were buying up real estate that was just crushing all the independent venues and all the house venues and making it almost impossible to flourish as an underground scene. And so, because of the limited infrastructure and the limited support on a grander scale, that's what made opportunities feel few and far between after a certain point. There was definitely like a huge pivot point. The 2020 to 2021, like those two years, was a crucial pit like I can like point to it as a defining like, oh, things were different before now, things are going to be different after now. It was it was interesting.
SPEAKER_03Do you remember at one point you were like, um, I'm good, I'm gonna oh man. No, I mean we share a kinship in that, and like I was in LA for 12 years. Yeah and I wasn't in the music scene until really kind of the the larger part of like the last three years there, and it was life-changing in that way. But I mean, do you remember was was it just a gradual thing of you're like uh I don't know about this anymore, or was there Do you mean music specifically or Nashville specifically? Let's go with music.
SPEAKER_00Okay. Um there was a point where, and I think this is relatable to many, many musicians, no matter where you are, there was a point in which I had just exhausted myself. Like I was just tired, I was burnt out, I wasn't feeling inspired by the things around me. I was feeling just kind of bored, kind of scared too, as well. Um, but there was a point probably, so I was there just technically just shy of 10 years. Um, and there was a point in my last year and a half, last two years in Nashville, where I just didn't want to touch my guitar. I didn't want to go to shows. And there was some personal things happening in that as well. Like that's a piece of the formula. But there was just a point where um, and I kind of alluded to this when I said that there was a distinct difference in pre-COVID in air quotes versus post-COVID in air quotes. There was a distinct difference in how things felt. It just didn't feel like the community that I had originally. And and also I will say, I am 28, and all of the people that I was in bands with, that I was playing with, etc., they were all easily five, six years older than me. And so the community that I had been enveloped in was quote unquote, and people are gonna be mad at me for saying this, quote unquote, aging out of some of our DIY spaces. And I'm not saying that you can't have a fulfilling and incredible, do-it-yourself independent career past a certain age. It's just the reality of the folks that I was with at the time, some of them were looking forward to settling down and trying out different priorities. And so the community and the my personal drive for doing what I was doing was just shifting, just like natural shifts in everyone's life. It was just starting to shift and redirect, and yeah.
SPEAKER_03So when you came back here and you decided to set up shop and set up the open mic, what was kind of your um I guess uh motivations for like okay, well let's let's get back in the saddle, as it were, and um because I know that that your intent was, you know, obviously that everybody's seen and everybody's heard, but then also what what did it take for you to find that motivation of like you know, you were maybe still kind of spinning from the experience out there, and w where did you pick up from that point?
SPEAKER_00Another great question. You're a great interviewer. I love this. Um, am I allowed to name drop? Is it all just like homies? Yeah, I mean homies.
SPEAKER_03Again, I mean, if you want to put people on blast, no, no, no.
SPEAKER_00That's the good people. That ain't me, Chief. No, no, no. But um, so you know, when I moved back to Annapolis, I was very lost. I I've used the word untethered before. I just felt like I was kind of just spinning and didn't know where I was gonna land. Um, and a phenomenal and brilliant friend of mine, Gage Rhodes, he welcomed me back into the music scene with open arms and he actually pushed me back out of my shell a little bit. Um, he saw, he he has always been a champion and a cheerleader of mine, but he saw that there was this opening in the music scene, opening on a metaphysical sense, um, that that needed someone like me to to fill it. And he was the first to be like, you could do great things here. You just have to get out of your own way, you have to get out of your head. Um, and he introduced me to another amazing co-collaborator and friend, Aaron Yieldhall, um, aka scribe. And the two of them really helped me kind of realize my power again, for lack of better phrasing. And um, things in my personal life had started to calm down and slow down, and I realized I could breathe again. And not to be corny, but as a vocalist, you rely on your breath incredibly. And I didn't realize that my life was also lacking that same space and that same breath. So once things calmed down, and once I had phenomenal friends around me to help me build myself back up again, I was like, okay, I think now I am prepared to take what I learned in Nashville, apply it here, transfer it here, and actually recreate the scene that I've always wanted and I've always dreamed of. Um, and when I was in college and I was in the underground scenes in college, the amazing part of it was just the friends. Like, not even the connections, not even the music for me, but it was the friends. And so coming back to Annapolis, knowing that I had a community already right there, ready for me, excited for me. Um, it's been fun. It's been fun building it from the ground up. Like starting over again is really daunting and really scary. But I've had incredible support the entire time. And I've met people like you, and I've met just a fabulous little little cocoon of a world right here in Annapolis that I didn't even know existed until a year, year and a half ago.
SPEAKER_03What would you say is wholly unique about um why don't we just say Maryland, the Maryland music scene?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I mean the DMV, totally, like I I think of it all as one big music scene. Um, I think something that's unique, and I know people are gonna laugh at me for saying this, something that's unique is that Maryland is not identified by its music. Whereas Nashville is music city. Yeah, Tennessee is known for music and turning out greats, with the exception of a lot of amazing people to come from the state of Maryland. Music is not the identity of the state, and I think we can all just be more relaxed and more appreciative that we do have this phenomenal music community because there's no outside pressure to be Music City, to be the state that makes great music. And I think it's also fueled by just this kind of faster-paced life. Like this is Maryland is still an East Coast, like mid-Atlantic. My friends in the South would be like, oh, you're from up north. Like it's still, we still have some, we have a unique blend of northern characteristics and southern characteristics as a state, I think. Um, and I think that the fast-paced, like northernness to us, mixed with the southern hospitality aspect of Annapolis being a tourism city and Maryland in general having incredible tourism opportunities. I think it just creates this like laid back but still motivated space for music to thrive.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's interesting you say that because I remember I was talking to somebody from they're from California, but they were saying like it's a lot more laid back here. And I'm like, is um I mean, I don't know. It's I guess it depends on like what what inner circle you're going with, because a lot of the people that I know, at least within the music scene, y'all are always busy. Whether it's working, you're like nine to five, or you've got like the gigs that are lined up in in different ways. There's plenty of people that um are just they're actively in it and they're doing it, and there's there's certainly spaces for it. And it's it's interesting to me that you know, uh different um people from different region states whatever kind of come at it from that approach. But also that's their that's their experience. True, I guess.
SPEAKER_00And yeah, I mean we're all we're all constantly busy and we're all constantly motivated, but um I think the difference is just personality-wise, even if music is your full-time thing here in the state of Maryland, like everyone's personalities are just a little bit more relaxed than than my experience meeting meeting people from all over the country. Like I've toured up and down the East Coast and the Southeast. And yeah, I don't know. It's hard to actually articulate and pinpoint what exactly makes it such a special area, but going away for a while and coming back, it's definitely an obvious, an obvious little whimsical little slice of life.
SPEAKER_03Whimsical?
SPEAKER_00Whimsical.
SPEAKER_03I don't know. I mean, yeah, we're funny and all, but you know, when it's time to get down to business, you gotta, you gotta go in there.
SPEAKER_00You gotta get her done.
SPEAKER_03You gotta get it. You gotta fill it in. Um Has has anything surprised you about hosting the the roundup that maybe you hadn't, you know. I don't know.
SPEAKER_00Have there been surprises in starting something from the ground up, having no idea how it was gonna turn out? Is that what you're asking? Yeah, yes.
SPEAKER_03You didn't you didn't plan all of it?
SPEAKER_00Despite my overthinking and despite my overthinking and my need for control, no, somehow there were still things that slipped past me. Um, no, sorry. Sarcasm aside, there have been quite a few surprises. Um, oh I try to be a very positive and uplifting person, but there are a few surprises that have come up that have struck me in a negative way that I wasn't anticipating. And one of those surprises is feeling like feeling like I am responsible for the feelings of others, and I know that I want my writers' rounds to always be an open and vulnerable and safe space, but myself as the host, um I am not responsible for how other people feel in this environment. And I think I wanted to take on other people's troubles and worries because I'm just that kind of a person, but it's hard.
SPEAKER_03That's a lot.
SPEAKER_00It's it's a weird balance for sure. Because I I tell people all the time my art is for consumption, but I am not. And being the host of what has just been an explosively popular event, sometimes if I am not careful and I don't check in with myself, I will take on the energy of the room and I will take on the energy of the people, or I will have things projected onto me because I am the face of and I'm I'm open and I'm understanding, and people gravitate towards my my natural kind of like calm, compassionate nature. And anyway, that's a roundabout kind of theoretical way to word this, and I'm just trying to be delicate. Um, but one of the things that has surprised me most is the personal boundaries I have to set so that my energy is not depleted and it remains the fun and lighthearted event that I want it to be.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. I I think that's you know, boundaries was a thing that I think we all kind of learned when the pandemic started in terms of just in general consumption of the news and I think, yeah, also just what what was important, you know, what were the sustainable things, what were, as my therapist would have put it, the emotional nutrients that we needed to see ourselves through through the day-to-day.
SPEAKER_00And I do think that, you know, using that terminology, I think something like the Annapolis Roundup, the open mic night, I think it does provide an emotional nutrient that our city needs and our music scene needs, but I can do that without sacrificing myself and without sacrificing the health and safety of everyone else, too.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. What what else do you think the city needs? Musically. I mean, if if you had to put like a template of like, let's let's fine-tune some things here and there. Hot take.
SPEAKER_00Hot take. No, that's a good take. That's a phenomenal question. Um hot take. I think we need more all ages spaces. And I think we need more spaces that are not circu um, not what's the word? Jeez, why am I exclusive? No, no, no, no, not centered around uh alcohol consumption.
SPEAKER_03Okay, yeah.
SPEAKER_00All right, I and um shout out to Paris Underground in Saverna Park. I consider them one of our local venues as part of the Annapolis community. They are an all-ages venue and they are alcohol free. Um, and I think that's really important, but I would love to see more spaces that are all ages, at least no pressure to consume alcohol or other substances. Um I would love to see that happen. I also would love to see more, how do I want to word this? More emphasis on the younger up-and-coming artists as well. Um, specifically at 49 West Cafe, we have a lot of incredible, I will say, a lot of wonderful, amazing, incredible, talented acts that have been grandfathered in over the last 30 years of it being a venue space. But I want to see some fresh blood, so to speak. Like I want the city and they're out there. I just want them to know that there is space for them. Yeah. And so if anyone is listening to this, come and talk to me, Callie, Bernsey, whatever you want to call me, come and find me. There is space for you, and we will make it happen.
SPEAKER_02Go play. Go play out.
SPEAKER_00Go play. Yeah. Oh, and here's a big thing. It doesn't have to be good art or good music. It just has to be. It just has to exist. So if you're out there and you are like, oh my god, like nobody's gonna like what I'm doing, that's not true. Just come see about it.
SPEAKER_03I actually love it when, and this was, you know, the the open mics that I chose to inhabit. But when somebody fucks up and everybody starts cheering because they love it, because they get it, because they've fucked up too. Yeah. And it's a human thing. Yeah. And and I've been to like, you know, big shows where people will fuck up and they own it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_03You know, it doesn't and and the only difference is really now we all have cell phones, so these moments can get captured. True.
SPEAKER_00But like And it can feel permanent because of that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and and but you know, it it was an off night, the song was off. There's a bazillion different reasons, but I love those supportive audiences that they they were listening and and they're giving you the pass, or they're giving you the you're human. We're all we're all human. It's okay.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, um, that that reminds me another wonderful human in in the space by the name of Javier Dominique. Um, I I post little things to my Instagram all the time, and I post intentional videos where I don't sound flawless, where I don't look flawless, um, as both a promise to myself and as like a, hey, look, I am no different. I have worked really hard on my talent and on my craft, but I am still just a human. And anyway, I bring up Tob's name because every time I do post what is construed as a vulnerable moment, Tob is always like, I I love you for this. Like, thank you so much for you know showing everybody how real and how difficult it is to be a musician. Like, thank you for showing us when you mess up, and you know, because a lot of people hold me in very high esteem, but I I'm just a gal. I'm just a little dude, like you know. Um, but shout out to Tav too, because his radiant positivity is everything to me.
SPEAKER_03Um it's super infectious. It is being around him in that way. I'm like, dang. Yeah, I wish we're it. He he always talks to me all the time of he maybe he says this to you too, of uh being in the same timeline, I think is what he says. Yeah, and I love that. I love thinking of it in that cosmic adventure type of thing. Because it is true of like whatever getting super existential, but whenever whatever um space we're in, whatever you know part of the cosmos we're in now, it all we were all able to to exist within the same time frame. Yeah. For a lot of the times we view it from a now, it feels like a bad perspective of of course we're alive when this horrible thing's happening. And of and and it's great that we're around for the the good and the better.
SPEAKER_00But I was gonna say how how beautiful and wonderful it is that we are all existing right now and we can make something meaningful out of the craziness. And yeah, I feel very fortunate and very lucky that both my time in Nashville it felt like I was there at the perfect time for my own personal development, and it feels like I'm back in Annapolis at the perfect time for my own personal growth and just natural musical development.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00It feels good.
SPEAKER_03Wrapping it up, what would you say to somebody who's just getting into songwriting?
SPEAKER_00Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_03Make it short though, make it like a tweetable 270. No, you can talk as long.
SPEAKER_00If we've learned anything about me is that I don't know how to be precise or succinct, and that's fine. We we get there eventually. You know, you you sk you learn how to skim the fat away eventually. No, um, anyway, what I would say to somebody just now getting into songwriting, uh, first of all, it doesn't matter your age. You can be 11, 12, you can be 72. Doesn't matter. Just start. Um, that's the first thing. Second thing, I love words. Words have always been the part of music that captivates me the most. I would say first it's the lyrics, then second, it's whatever the vocals are doing, because I am a vocalist myself. Um, but words, oops, words hold the most weight for me in terms of songwriting. My advice or my challenge to novice songwriters is. Find a way to express what you want to express in a way that no one else has tried before. And that's what I try to do. I think of all my songwriting as a puzzle. If there's an emotion or an event that I am struggling to process, I think of it as a puzzle, and it's like, okay, here's what I'm feeling, here is what I'm observing. How can I convey this not only in a way that accurately represents what the feeling or the observation is, but how can I do this in a way that no one else has thought of before, or at least in a way to make someone think about it in a way that they've never thought about it before? So for all the young and old songwriters out there, or if you're looking for a challenge or a prompt for your next songwriting channel, like next songwriting moment, just like think of something that you can feel or observe and write about it differently and just see what happens.
SPEAKER_03Love that. Thank you so much, Bernsey.
SPEAKER_00Thank you for having me. This was so much fun. Woo!
SPEAKER_03Thanks so much for listening. You can follow us on Instagram for show announcements and other episodes. And if you dig the artist stuff, give them a follow. Give them a like. And if you want to go the extra mile, check them out at one of their shows. Buy their merch. Keep the scene alive. And I'll see you out there. Take care.
SPEAKER_01To play, how waiting game again. How are we would show my head honey I all head to play her waiting game again to play her waiting game again?