Listen Here
By: Leah Alsept
Email: Alseptl@findlay.edu
Jason O came to the University of Findlay on Mar. 15 as a part of the university’s Music Bach Concert Series, he performed his signature style- looping music, for the audience. With dread locked hair and guitar in his hands, the multi-talented musician performed the free show in the AMU on campus.
Jason O has released three albums as a solo act and has toured with his band My Hero Zero as the front man for nine years. He cites his musical influences as Jason Mraz, John Mayor, Maroon 5, Ed Sheeran, among others. O plays several instruments; drums, trumpet, guitar, piano, ukulele, strumstick, harmonica, baritone, bass. He showed off the skills of these instruments in the AMU by looping the sounds of his trumpet, guitar, and tambourine to build the sound of a full band.
Looping music, defined by Musical U, is when sections of music and beats are repeated over and over to create a song. Looped music is something that O knew he wanted to do when he was just 16 years old. Seeing Keller Williams, a well-known looping musician, perform, O joked, “I remember thinking to myself, ‘If I could do that, I wouldn’t need to have any friends.”
Recounting his first song-writing experience, O gave some background on his roots in songwriting, calling himself a “saver,” realizing that he was writing poetry and songs when he was very young.
“I think I’ve always been a songwriter, but my first ‘official’ song was more like I just couldn’t stop hearing it in my head,” said O. “That’s why I learned how to play guitar, because I was a drummer at the time.
“I was trying to sing this thing I was hearing in my head to someone, and they were like ‘Yeah we don’t know what you’re talking about,’ so I was like ‘Ok, cool, let me learn how to show you what I’m talking about.” O said the rest was history.
O visits and performs for universities and schools across the country.
“I like performing at schools because it’s a very different environment than a lot of other performing situations,” said O. “Specifically, colleges, it’s a lot of curious people who are in a place in their lives where they’re looking to enrich their minds, playing music for people at that place in their lives is really special because they’re actually trying to connect to what you’re doing.”
O gave advice to aspiring musicians about what kinds of troubles someone would run into and how to get through it.
“It’s probably gonna be hard,” O said. “There’s gonna be a lot of ups and downs. Just get used to it and have a good team and family around you, that’s the only real way to be happy in the middle of all of it.”
Jason O was the last performer for the Music Bach Concert Series of the semester. His music is available to listen to on Spotify, iTunes, and his website, jasonomusic.com.
