By Jason Riley

When I was about five years old, I rounded the corner into my grandmother’s living room.  What I saw there stopped me in my short little tracks and was a true revelation to me.  What I’d collided with was a gaggle of guitars, fiddles, a banjo and a mandolin being prodded along by my granddad and his brothers and sisters.  I didn’t know it then, but this was a hootenanny.

They were singing and playing “ol’ timey” music, American folk music that they had learned from their dad as they backed him up as he fiddled and called square dances in barns and living rooms in the early part of the 20th century.  There I was, dumbfounded.  I had no idea that my people could do this sort of thing and I wouldn’t have been any more surprised had I turned the corner and found them all walking tight-ropes or riding elephants.

Sitting amongst the older generation was one of my favorite cousins.  He was older, he had long hair, he had a Gibson Firebird (that’s very modern looking electric guitar) and he was sitting on a Fender amplifier playing along.  It was like a gang of old people and one hippie.  I decided at that moment that I wanted to do that too.  I wanted to play an instrument, make music and be part of the gang.  Obviously, it was my birthright, right?  Well…

As it turns out in life, once you start making decisions about things like that you start yourself on a path.  Things just emerge for you along that path: signs, roadblocks, forks in the road, crossing guards and traveling companions.  Music set me on my path and is largely responsible for the adventures that continue along the way.

On my first day of Kindergarten I met Eddie.  These days he’s Edward Daniels, acclaimed songwriter of Las Vegas, NV (he’s also an awesome dad too).  We started our first band before we had instruments.  We made recordings of improvised songs with whatever we could find to make noise on.  There were hits like “Nerds Rule” and “Gone with Gungadin”, whatever that meant.  I would love to know what happened to those tapes!  Anyway, we eventually got real instruments, learned to play them together and had a real band that played real gigs in High School.  We had great music teachers  who supported all of our extra-curricular music making and really encouraged us.  Please support your school music program!

After High School I ended up in Music school studying classical guitar.  No parent really wants their kid to follow their dreams onto the nefarious, mean street that is the music business.  They are wise to want them to be “doctors and lawyers and such” as Willie Nelson also recommends. My folks were no different but believed in me ANYWAY!  Love ya, Mom.

I always thought “I don’t need to be super rich or famous, if I can just play music for a living I’ll be happy.”  Sweet, ignorant kid!  So in an effort to self-fulfill this prophecy and “pay my dues”, I had a great time mis-spending my youth making rock records and playing clubs for little money.  Yay!

As you move along the path of life, there comes a time when many people start moving in the direction of marriage and family.  The path provided me with a new traveling companion, another musician and music educator.  Imagine that.  So I married her!  Out of necessity, my music business started to become more lucrative.  I started working with groups in many different genres that included superlative musicians.  I began to make solo records too.  I got gigs working with bands across the country or in Europe where they’d fly you in for the shows and put you up in swanky places with good food.  Not a bad path.

Eight years ago we had our daughter.  A new traveling companion.  Then a son.  Even Teams!  We were so fortunate to be able to plan our lives and family to this point.  I felt really lucky to have the ability in my work schedule to allow me to stay home with the kids while my wife was teaching during the day.  Children change your outlook on everything.  Our most recent stretch of the path has really been about them.  I’ve listened to less Led Zeppelin and John Coltrane and we’ve returned to a playlist of some of those time-honored American folk tunes known as “Children’s music”.

Wow, there’s a lot more out there for kids today than when I was a kid.  We found a lot of great stuff and I’ve made a lot of great friends in my foray into kids’ music (more on that in a minute).  Dan Zanes is a personal favorite, and Justin Roberts has been super helpful.  I also see there is a disconnect in kids’ music where the culture tries to get them to grow up too quickly (Cyrus or Beiber anyone?).  This is where I think the Kindie Music movement has really stepped in to ease the transition.  Thanks to these great people there who really care about kids, childhood and parenthood for that matter.

I’ve been able to maintain a demanding schedule (whenever I could neglect my family) playing, traveling and recording. We even released a new solo CD this year.  “Funky Folk” is my very first family album.  It comes directly out of where my head has been these last years as a playing parent.  It’s not a record I dreamed of making, it just happened.  The path gives you kids, you make music for them.  Seems perfectly natural and I hope the album came out that way.  It also pays a bit of a tribute to my elders and my own childhood with new arrangements of tunes that are part of our collective tradition.  There’s a few “ol’ timey” selections on there.  It’s as much for moms, dads and granny as it is for the littlest relatives.

These types of opportunities have allowed me to generally “be there” at this stage in our lives.  I still get to do plenty of really cool stuff.  Remember Eddie?  I’ll be backing him up on next months’ run to Nashville.  I still have swells of ambition and the primeval “hunter” can get a bit distracting from time to time.  Even the Funky folk tour took me away for 2 weeks, that’s a long time for dad to be gone.  It’s encouraging to know I have the support of my traveling companions.  These are my funky folks.

It’s extremely exciting to see what will come down the path next. I’m making a living playing music AND I’m the world’s greatest dad.  So sayeth the coffee cup.  If I could talk to the 12 year old me again, I’d suggest that he go ahead and shoot for the “super rich and famous” part too.

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Jason Riley proudly endorses Godin Guitars (Canada), Dean Markely Strings (US) and Wegen Picks (The Netherlands). For More Info on Jason and his music please visit JasonRiley.com