Hello and welcome to applause performances, sampling the sounds of Northeast Ohio.

Here's Cleveland singer-songwriter, JSSZCA.

Jessica, you were a big time swimmer in high school and in college, but I know that you also like to sing.

And that's something that your mom really encouraged you to do.

Can you talk a little bit about that?

Yes, of course.

So growing up, I always loved to sing.

I would always kind of be up in my bedroom singing along to a karaoke machine or dancing around and singing, but I was always afraid to get on stage in front of people.

So I really leaned into sports at that time and I loved swimming also.

That was really like my main focus.

But I started singing.

Probably in high school, after my mom kind of encouraged me to try out for a musical that our high school was doing.

It was "Grease" and I loved that musical.

Yeah, you like, you knew all the words, right?

Yes.

I did too.

So, but I was really like, I don't want to do it.

You know, and she's like, no, you have to audition.

So I did and I got the part of Sandy and that was really great experience because it was nice working with like, you know, a cast, a team of people.

Working together and putting on a musical one that I really loved, so it kind of helped me get out of my shell a little bit.

So she encouraged you to go out there and do it.

It must have been fun to sing all those songs from "Grease" on the main stage.

Yeah, it was.

Was there any way that your swim team days helped you kind of prepare for the stage?

That's a good question.

I think a lot of the times like when I was swimming I was constantly singing a song in my head really and kind of like always kept me on pace because I was a long-distance swimmer.

So yes, I would say it did because of the pressure of getting up and racing Going off the diving block, you know, everyone's looking at you.

So it did it gave a lot a background of just having to be on and perform just a completely different style.

One's racing and competing.

The other one's entertaining.

What about the breath work?

Seems kind of similar?

Swimming and singing?

Yes.

Thank you.

It definitely helped with breath work for sure.

The song we just heard, "Carnation Queen," it's about your late mom Cindy.

So I grew up in Alliance, which is known as the Carnation City.

And every year, there's this really big festival that the town gets really excited about.

There's lots of events going on.

But one of the biggest events is the Carnations Queen's Pageant.

And my mom was a contestant back in 1975, and she won the crown.

So she was a Carnation Queen.

And I grew up, you know, idolizing her and going to every pageant with her.

So when I wrote the song, I really wanted it to capture her energy and her spirit, things that made me think of her whenever I would see them or smell them.

She always smelled like patchouli oil, so that's one of the lyrics in the song.

But yeah, I kind of tied it all together.

Calling of the "Carnation Queen."

Because my grandma passed away and we found a trunk in the basement and my aunt was like you have to come and look at all this stuff because it's a lot of great memorabilia.

My grandma held on to everything from my mom being the queen and being in the pageant so we even have the the flowers that she had when Those are hanging up in my house, they're preserved.

The sash that she wore.

And the best thing that was in the trunk was all of these reels of footage.

So I got them digitized and got to actually, you know, feel like I experienced seeing the entire pageant, but it was a really cool experience.

And I was like, I have to, you know tie this all together.

And so that kind of was an inspiration behind it.

That's so beautiful that you got to have all those memories and keep them and then pay tribute to her in song.

Yeah.

That's really special.

Tell us about the next song you're gonna play.

It's called, "That Was All."

"That Was All" I wrote, basically, to my parents, for my parents and about them.

But it's also focusing on me navigating through grief.

I lost both of them.

And it was really difficult for my family, obviously, and my brothers and I.

But I picked up my dad's guitar one day and just kind of was plucking around at the strings, and I was feeling very overwhelmed and just kind of down, and so when I found this little melody that I started humming over, it really resonated with the feeling that I was having, the tone of it.

So it's honestly probably the most honest song I've ever written, it's very raw, I never went back and edited any of the lyrics, which is... A process that you typically do is going back and saying, oh, you know, I could make this better here.

I didn't do that.

So I wanted to keep it as natural to the feeling of when I was sitting on my couch and I first wrote it.

I wanted it to feel very natural and raw.

And it's basically about, you now, going through the mundane things when you're dealing with grief, because I feel like a lot of people.

Don't talk about those things.

And it's small things, but they're painful.

My parents' phone numbers are both still on my phone.

It's just kind of highlighting those little moments that you go through and trying to continue to live your life and move on, but at the same time, thinking back to all of the memories with them.

And the most important one is just the love that I received from them.

And that's really what the focus is.

And you wrote it on your dad's guitar.

Mm-hmm.

You moved to Cleveland after college, and you decided to start a band called Top Hat Black.

Going back to your stage fright, that seems like the opposite of something somebody with stage fright would do is start a bad.

So talk about, take us back to that moment.

So when I was in college, I started playing with a cover band just to make extra money on the weekends We would play like at bars and weddings And I really liked playing, you know with other musicians and being on stage, but I you know, it's still terrified me I would get so nervous about it.

But I really started to kind of get into songwriting at that time and I was like, you know, I really want to start a band.

So I put out ads on Craigslist.

At that time, it wasn't as scary as it is today.

And I ended up making a lot of great friends and musicians that I still play with today is how we all met.

So we started a band, it was a blues rock band called Top Hat Black.

And we recorded a couple of EPs.

And we would play around the town all the time, like we had a lot of shows and would play festivals in the Cleveland area too, and it was fun.

It was a fun experience and great group of guys that, you know, we all became friends.

So you just told yourself, I've got to stand this down.

I've gotta get out there and do my thing.

I think I kept leaning into it because it was scaring me and I wanted to overcome it so I kept trying like no maybe this time I won't be afraid but it never really goes away because it's I think it's just how I process excitement too.

Your guitarist is Nate Jones, who is also your husband.

Tell us a little bit about him and how he influences your music.

Nate is always helping me.

He's an amazing musician.

He can hear a song and know what notes are being played and the chords.

So that really helps me because I don't know notes and chords.

I go off of feel.

So when I write a song, I'm always checking in with him, you know, Is this, do you think this is working here?

Should I change this?

Should I changed that?

And he's very honest and supportive in that process.

So, you know, I'll write a song and he basically charts the rest of the music so that I can bring in other musicians to play on it.

So yeah, definitely.

Definitely complements each other so well yeah it must help to have him up there with you when you're performing definitely makes me feel a little less nervous.

Yeah.

So the next song we're going to hear, it's called "Wolves."

Tell me about this song.

So Wolves was inspired after I read this book called Women Who Run with the Wolves.

I am familiar with that book.

And it just really opened my eyes to just embodying feminine power and feeling empowered kind of not having to fall in line with how society and cultures kind of expect women to be in the role that we play.

So I wrote this song and I ended up reaching out to a producer that was in I had seen him work with other artists.

I'd never met him before, so I reached out kind of on a whim and I sent him an Instagram message and was like, would you ever want to work on songs together?

And he responded and we started, you know, working on music together.

His name's Nathaniel Hunt.

He goes by Muzzy Fossa.

So yeah, we started collaborating on songs and became friends after that.

So.

I love that music really helps you connect with other people and try different styles and experiment with different sounds.

You've been able to find healing through music, but you've also been able to lean into crystal singing bowls.

You've learned how to use these.

So can you talk a little bit about that and what is sonic healing?

Yes, so I recently got certified in being a sound healer.

So I focus on using the crystal singing bowls and sound therapy and sound healing is something that's been around for thousands of years.

A lot of different cultures use it, but it's using specific frequencies that are said to be in alignment with our energy centers or our chakras within our body.

Playing these specific notes and frequencies can help you to relax, reset your nervous system.

It can reduce stress and inflammation within the body.

It's a really great way to aid in other wellness routines that you have.

It's not supposed to replace any kind of medical treatment.

It's really supposed to just be that mind-body spirit to bring it full circle.

So I really fell in love with it, and I'll just host like little sound baths, which is basically you just show up with a yoga mat and a blanket and a pillow.

It's best to lay down in the dark or have your eyes covered, and just really allow the sound and the frequency of the notes being played to just kind of bathe you in sound.

And when that happens, you can have a lot of different experiences or responses to it.

But the main goal really is to just help you feel like you're more in alignment and in harmony with yourself.

We often think that sound is just noise, but it's really not because our bodies are absorbing everything that's around us.

We're, you know, made up of 70% of water and sound travels five times faster through water than it does through the air.

Before we say goodbye, tell us about the last song you're gonna play.

It's called "Scorpion."

Scorpion is one of my newest songs.

I'm hoping to release it in October, the end of October around Scorpio season.

I am a Scorpio myself.

And Scorpios sometimes get a bad rap in the Zodiac astrology world because we can be intense.

But we're a water sign and water signs are known to be emotional.

Just at a different depth than I think most people are sometimes comfortable being in.

So I was inspired when I was writing the song, just understanding, you know, what's the scorpion, why that's the symbol of a Scorpio being a water sign.

So it's kind of just honoring that I can be emotional and intense at the same time.

So it kind of inspired me to write that song.

So hoping to have that out in Scorpio season so that it really resonates.

Jessica, thanks so much for joining us and for sharing your music and story.

Thank you for having me.

I'm really, really happy to be here and grateful for the opportunity.