Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Cameron Landers. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Cameron, thanks for joining us today. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

I began playing guitar in the fifth grade. I began with droning on the low E string and playing a melody on the A string. It was simple, but this was the foundation. Later, when I began to be influenced by East Indian music, I found that beginning stage of learning the guitar helped me understand the fundamentals of melody and the power of that droning style. I would watch and listen to other guitar players, see what their hands were doing, hear what came out of those positions on the guitar neck. Playing music with other people was the real way that I learned the guitar. Listening to other people and then hearing what should come out of my instrument. One thing I would have spent more time studying is reading music. I have begun now, but at thirty-six, with two kids, time is not on my side. Still, I don’t regret the way I went about learning my craft. To me, being organic, listening and not getting stuck in preordained structures is the joy of music. It is the skill of listening that has helped me develop my craft, my voice. When Covid hit, I had to play music on my own. That was when I started my project, Cameron Landers Trio. I call it a trio, though it is a solo project, as a statement on the pandemic. I play bass, guitar, piano and synth. The drums I arrange from clips. The pandemic was an obstacle in my learning to listen to others, interacting with music. But I grew stronger from it, and I had someone else to listen to: myself. Which, in the end, helped me hear what I was doing right and what I was doing wrong.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

When I am asked why I play the guitar, I always tell them one thing. I play guitar because of Marty Mcfly. Yes, Back to the Future. It was the scene when he plays Johnny Be Good at the school dance and his line when they all stare at him, silent, “I guess you guys aren’t ready for that yet…” From then on I wanted to be Marty, and most of all to learn the guitar, to leave an audience speechless from hearing something completely new. I began playing the guitar in the fifth grade. My earliest influence was funk, hearing my mom play it when she did work around the house or just when she wanted music on. It was always funk, Parliament, Gap Band. I loved it,But I was also drawn to classical. I loved and related to the emotional depth of Beethoven’s music. I grew up pretty overweight. I had and still do fight insecurity issues. Classical music, complex, lush, raging with emotion. That was the supreme influence when I began learning the guitar.
I am proud of how far I’ve come in learning the guitar, but I am also proud of what I have put together in my project, Cameron Landers Trio.Though it is a solo project, i program tracks from my albums onto my loop station minus the lead guitar parts. I play over the tracks and tell a story. That is what I am most proud of. My albums are instrumental, but for my performances I tell a story over the songs, connecting them. It is a unique experience. You go on a journey when you see the Trio. I am in the process of recording an album and for this one I will have the story going along with the songs, though there will be breaks for instrumentation. There are some Jazz elements to my music but there is also lowfi, blues, ambient, afrobeat. I am proud of the voice I have found in sticking with the learning process and hearing my own voice come out.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

My goal is to have a creative career. I play shows and record but I am not living off my music and writing. That would be my dream and end goal, but my mission is to keep learning, keep finding something new, to invent music. It doesn’t mean that I am looking to make really complex music, because I don’t. I just want o be myself and show that to other people and to connect with other musicians.

Looking back, are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

I wish I would have got on social media a little earlier. I didn’t want to become absorbed into my phone and the need for feedback, but in the end I see the resource that it is and I regret not learning more about it and making more of a presence. Social media is such a huge stage if you can get yourself out there. There are defiantly downsides. I want to always be genuine, be myself, and sometimes that doesn’t fit an algorithm. Still, now that I have got on social media and put myself out there, I see the wonderful benefit of meeting other artists and seeing their work and taking another step toward my goal of living off my work.

Contact Info:

• Website: cameronlanderstrio.bandcamp.com
• Instagram: @cameron_landers_trio

Image Credits
Rachel Lander, my wife, took all of the photos.