Jessica Rotter: An Example To Follow For Creativity (Interview)

https://soundcloud.com/jessicarottermusic/pray-for-rain

Prick up your ears to the various instruments that whisper a new story that has been on Jessica Rotter’s mind lately:

Looking to all round and grey clouds swiftly moving up in the sky to the riffs of the guitars

Fixing your hair while the cellos are calling a gentle wind to breathe and blow (a kiss away) in your face

Before drops the beats of all the percussion, letting you figure out the early drips of the rain about to fall in the grassy plain:

You’re experimenting Jessica Rotter’s plain creativity for her debut single: Pray For Rain, from her debut album Plains

A great single it is indeed, creating one unique conversation between her lyrical voice and the multitude of instruments involved in this track.

Besides, even if the songs begins with sad emotions from a falling out of love

The ambient atmosphere sounds somewhat playful and cheerful, which would give a subtle taste of irony to the song,

Or, just as if the singer was eyeing a new bright rainbow after the cold rain.

Following the success of charting #1 on HypeMachine with her mashup of Stay/Animal with Emily Colombier, Rotter is embarking on her most powerful and ambitious project to date; the full length release of Plains.

Produced by Cazz Brindis and mixed by Scott M. Smith, who’s worked with Carole King, John Mayer, Katy Perry).

Plains is an 11 track record breathtakingly stunning and cinematic.

Nice background, to say the least, her family roots are steeped in music, with her grandfather writing songs for Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin.

Rotter describes herself as a « musical storyteller » with classical training from Pepperdine University in opera, musical theatre, and directing for theatre and film.

The songstress’ voice has been heard across multiple genres, from movies, TV shows and commercials to backing vocals and collaborations with other artists—all in addition to her original songs. T

The list of artists she has worked with reads like a who’s who of the music industry today: Daft Punk, Carole King, Alicia Keys, Sam Smith, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, and others.

Lucky enough to interview such a great artist, and most of all, suh a nice person, let us discover who’s Jessica Rotter:

INTERVIEW

1) How long have you been working on your album?

Since this is my debut album, some of these songs were written in the last 5 years!

But most of them were written in the past two and we have actively been working on it for the past two years.

2) This album involves a lot of great musicians. Tell us about the symbiosis between all the musicians, and the overall artistic vision to create your musical concept of the album?

It was an amazing journey finding the right team of musicians to bring this sound to life. Once we got everything locked in, it worked really well.

The musicians are some of the best in Los Angeles and I only work with nice people!

So we all got along really well and everyone was open to my vision and accomplishing exactly what we wanted in this album.

3) Releasing an album titled Plains on the Earth Day, writing a song called Stars, and praying for the Rain in front of a shining Winter Sun… What is your relation with Nature?

I don’t know how I didn’t realize it was all so nature-y when I was writing it because it’s so obvious now.

I guess I’m inspired by this gorgeous earth around us. I definitely believe we all come from something bigger than ourselves- whether you call that God, Energy, the Universe- and the most beautiful part of creating is knowing that you get to use the gifts you were created with to make one.

The gift of the earth inspires my gifts of songwriting and performing, I suppose. It’s also something universal – looking around and taking in the light from the sun at different angles or appreciating a landscape or even understanding how a flower grows – that transcends everything.

We have all seen it and we all understand those visuals viscerally. We are all on different journeys but we all travel on the same earth.

4) How do you challenge your creativity when it comes to the poetry of your lyrics? And when it comes to the poetry in your musical composing?

There are just so many songs in the world so I try to have something new to say.

I find inspiration and then I try to go past that to a level or two deeper or more complex. And I love the relationship between lyrics and music.

I have a couple of songs where the lyrics clash with the music in an ironic way and I love that because conflict always has multiple faces.

But I also like how a song can tell a story without listening to the lyrics.

There is a lot of thoughts in the instruments I used, the tempos of the songs and the arrangements.

5) Being fond of Celine Dion, Mariah Carey, you’re actually into the ‘Voice Performance’. Therefore, how did that feel to collaborate with Alicia Keys? What did this collaboration consist in?

Celine & Mariah were big in my desire to become a singer as a child.

I got to sing backup in a concert with Alicia Keys and Carole King – I don’t know if I’d call it a collaboration! But I got to share the stage and sing an intro to a duet they did.

They are both such amazing women and performers and it was such a magical musical moment.

6) What has been your most challenging collaboration? What has been your favorite feature film/commercial? Why?

I think the most challenging jobs are when I have to sing like another person – I was the voice of an actress from New Zealand in a movie so I had to belt out a song in an accent which was slightly difficult at first. But it’s always good to challenge myself.

My favorite movie to work on so far was Pitch Perfect 1 & 2 because we got to be so creative and we were so important to the film!