We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Joe Summers. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Joe below.

Joe, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. If you could go back in time do you wish you had started your creative career sooner or later?

I am an artist. As obvious as this may seem to anyone reading an article about an artist, it is and has been a strange statement for me to identify with. Writing, saying, or even acknowledging this statement has been something I’ve struggled with the entirety of my artistic life. I even went so far as to “quit” being an artist for close to 6 years at one point, feeling that I didn’t deserve to make art or to claim the title, that there was some metric that I simply did not meet, or that I simply wasn’t “artistic” enough to be considered an artist. This feeling was a major hurdle for me to clear.

I say all of this as a message to my past self, but also to my current self: It has all happened exactly when it was meant to.
The temptation to look back and wish to have started earlier is often present for me, but I have to remind myself that the time spent “not starting” was time spent cultivating a mindset and worldview that would allow me to step into my identity as an artist with confidence and a feeling of assurance that this is in fact who I am. Not to say there is some sort of “destiny”, but there is no rushing yourself. All of the work done before the beginning was time well spent.

I hope that all of this resonates with other artists and professionals. Just because you are not yet where you think you should be, does not mean that has been time wasted. We often only get the highlights of someone’s life or experience, but the time spent growing, learning, and trying is just as valuable as the moments of accomplishment.

Joe, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

My name is Joe Summers and I am a performing musician and actor in San Diego, CA. I have been performing in some capacity for over 17 years since I was 14 years old, when I first got involved with the theater program at my high school. As an actor, I have experience in live theater, on screen, in stand-up comedy, as a puppeteer, as well as being flying trapeze/circus artist and physical comedy actor/clown. I feel that being on stage/performing in front of a live audience has always come naturally to me and it is often where I feel most alive.

I began my craft as a songwriter when I was 15 and have been chipping away at it steadily since. Singing, songwriting, and performing my music live has always been an act of community building and an attempt to connect with others by sharing my experiences of loss and recovery. My songwriting revolves around my experience with traumatic loss. I lost my dad to suicide when I was 19 years old, and music has been my lifeline to reconnecting with myself and the world around me, helping me make sense of such an intense experience and giving me direction going forward. I hope to be an artist that helps others find a place for confusing and nebulous emotions.

As a music performer, I combine my skills as a musician with my comfort on stage as a theatrical performer. When performing at a gig, I like to use my abilities of improv and adapting to my surroundings to provide an appropriate and engaging atmosphere. When performing as a billed musician performing my own original music, I like to create an intimate and introspective space by tying my songs together with story telling in the space between. My favorite atmosphere in which to perform is for intimate crowds where I feel I can draw people in and establish a connection with my audience.

I have also produced and released my own music, all available on streaming services. I’ve found that music production is an interesting and fun challenge for me to explore the music I make on a deeper level and create a whole world in which the listener can place themselves. This endeavor has also given me a few opportunities to produce music for a few podcasts and also to contribute to other people’s music. All in all, music and performing are integral parts of who I envision myself to be as a person and I am excited to be able to pursue the possibilities.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

I feel that in our society, the role of artists/creatives has often been too far blended with the concept of “fame”. I think it is often forgotten that the point of art and artists is to provide perspective on shared life and cultural experiences, and to also help others find a place and direction for their own emotions. Emotional work is not often respected or given the same legitimacy as more “profitable” endeavors, but I think that the importance of emotional connection and exploration cannot be overstated. No matter who you are, there is a song, a painting, a movie, a poem, a play that has moved and shaped you in someway.

I hope that our society can find a way to value art and artists for the important work they do in taking the present moment in which we all live and find a way to contextualize it in a way that brings us all closer together as a society. The work we do is not always as tangible as other professions, but a society without art is a society in peril. Art and creation is important for a healthy society.

Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?

The book, “Man’s Search For Meaning” by Viktor Frankl is one that I often find myself thinking about. It is a non-fiction book written by a psychologist who survived being imprisoned in a concentration camp in WWII. He wrote this book to speak about how he and other survivors with whom he worked after being freed found ways to find meaning in life after going through something so inexplicably terrible and dehumanizing. It speaks about how finding a meaning or purpose for themselves was often the most important step for recovering and thriving in their personal lives. I feel that the message from this book really speaks to the human need to find direction and purpose in life, and that often it is not given to us.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://joesummers17.bandcamp.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/joesummersmusic/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@joesummers3390
• Other: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/4cVqwKLQmYk5CbgJvO6N9R
  Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/joe-summers/1571058986

Image Credits

Chris TJ DeGuzman
David Treadwell