Inviting audiences to open up and hear things differently is an important part of what I do. But I still love to sing songs with words, too.

Inviting audiences to open up and hear things differently is an important part of what I do. But I still love to sing songs with words, too.

Whenever I'm onstage, I try my best not to think that I'm performing. It's simply another part of my day.

When we listen to improvisational jazz, or solo classical violinists, the way they phrase and inflect melodies feels vocal, like they’re talking to us. When I was figuring out how to perform solo, I wanted to move back and forth between bass riffs, melody, and harmony, so I often used sounds instead of — or alongside — the words of a song. I found that if I sang a line using the consonants, vowels, shadings, and inflection we recognize as human language sounds, people responded as if I were talking to them.

My biggest musical influences are probably my parents.

I couldn't do anything without faith. I couldn't open up my eyes, I couldn't walk, I couldn't speak, I couldn't sing.

Then I came up with this crazy idea just to walk out on the stage with no band at all and just start singing whatever came to mind. I actually fought the idea for a while because it seemed almost too radical, but it became obvious what I was supposed to be doing.