Songstress Jo Takes the Rock’N’Roll Hall of Fame Stage
This year’s Resident Rockers jam out during Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame’s second year of educating and uplifting local artists.
Photos by Ed Goodwin
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame hosted its second annual Resident Rocker program this past summer featuring artists Songstress Jo, JAMPOP, and Dominic Rodio. Resident Rockers is a program that takes in local artists in Northeast Ohio and provides education on the music industry, networking, and tools to assist their musical careers. Jo shared with me that when applying to the internship she didn’t think she’d actually get in. “When they called me back and wanted to interview, I was absolutely shocked. I was ecstatic,” she adds. “It’s been such a journey, I’ve grown a lot, I’ve rebranded, and it’s been so amazing to see and learn from all these different industry professionals who’ve been there and done that.”
As a student of Ohio Media School, I had the pleasure of spending time talking with to the artists and capturing behind-the-scenes footage throughout the evening. I had a really nice interview catching up with 20-year-old Songstress Jo.
The Tiffin University student from Bellevue, Ohio majors in Commercial Writing, but has been writing her own music for roughly eight years and it shows in the confidence in their writing, stage presence, and vocals. She identifies as a “lo-fi bedroom pop artist” who started off writing poetry, song parodies, and later on started writing about her own personal life experiences.
Jo’s amazing set featured tracks from her 2021 EP Butterfly Soul, a 5 track project showcasing her own personal growth within the last four to five years of her life, much like the rebirth of a caterpillar to a butterfly. A personal favorite of mine includes a track titled “Consumed,” a song containing lyrics about a toxic relationship between two people, one of which feels as if they cannot leave and are completely consumed by the other person. “I wrote that song about a really hard time I was going through with a very manipulative person in my life at the time and knowing that I needed to get out of it but it was very difficult and I couldn’t figure out how to do that.”
Alongside Consumed, Jo gave the audience a taste of what’s to come from the artist in the future by performing an unleashed track titled “Bitchcraft” dropping October 21 just in time for the spooky season!
After all the artist’s sets, Jo, JAMPOP, and Dominic share the stage together performing their original collab “Who Do You Think You Are” recorded at Jim Stewart Recording. During our interview, Jo shared that all three of these artists have very distinct sounds and had to come together to write and create a song for the Resident Rocker program. The difference in their voices and style shows an immense amount of originality and genuine talent; I would love to see these guys in an official group together or at least make more songs together! The chemistry amongst them both through their studio recording and energy on stage was so fun to watch.
I thoroughly enjoyed seeing local artists being uplifted by an establishment such as the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame. This event allowed so many people to become fans and supporters of these hard-working artists who deserved their spot this summer. I wish them nothing but the best during their musical journeys!
Stream Songstress Jo on Spotify!