We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Josephine Eve a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Josephine , thanks for joining us today. Are you happy as a creative professional? Do you sometimes wonder what it would be like to work for someone else?

Yes, I am so incredibly happy and grateful all the time that music is my full time job. Growing up, I wasn’t allowed to have a “real” job, because my parents told me that I’d have to work the rest of my life, and that I needed to live out my kid years as a kid. My parents didn’t have that pleasure to just not work growing up, so I think it was really important to them that I did. However, when I got my car at 16 I thought, well dang how am I gonna pay for gas and such without asking my parents for help. Around that time tho, some of my friends wanted to form a band, and it became serious enough for us that we were getting paid for performing. That first time we got paid for a gig, was the first time I’ve ever done something that resembled a “job” to me. So, now that I’m 19, performing is the only job I do or have ever done. It’s a plus that I get to do my hobby and passion every weekend and make money out of it. But, I do sometimes think about having a regular 9-5 job, because my friends are always talking about theirs, and It does seem fun at times.

Josephine , love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Well for starters, I’m Josephine Eve. And I’m a 19 year old musician from Kansas City, who’s been performing ever since I was a child. Growing up I always loved music and could memorize the lyrics to any song I set my mind to. I would sit at the computer all day, and watch videos of Selena and Michael Jackson singing “Man In The Mirror” and “Coma La Flor” just crying watching it, hogging it from the rest of my siblings. I just felt music so personally growing up and it ended up leading my parents to put me into School Of Rock(SOR) around the age of 11. I knew some great music growing up but once joining SOR my mind was really opened up to so much more music, and so many genres of music. I was learning music like, Janis Joplin, to Soundgarden, OutKast, Incubus, to The Allman Brothers and just countless other bands. This really shaped me into how I am today and how I perform at shows because I don’t just play one genre of music when I’m doing covers and furthermore in my own original music as well. Everything can’t be placed into one category when I’m playing. This truly brings such a fun dynamic to my shows because hopefully everyone will get to hear at least one thing they like throughout the gig! I’ve only been performing out by myself for the past year and a half, so I’m really proud of how far I’ve come along in that short amount of time and the amazing opportunities, memories, friends, music, and growth as a musician I’ve made in this past year and a half. Performing is like a second nature to me now, so I love that I get to share that part of me at gigs with the people watching and supporting, and am just always working and striving for those people to have a good time at my shows.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

So when I was in School Of Rock, my friend Eli Froment, that was in SOR as well, wanted to start a band with some of the other members. There was 5 of us and our name was Grindstone. When we first started out, covid hit almost immediately into starting this band so our practices, ended up turning into zoom calls, which as you can imagine.. didn’t work. So we waited it out and by the time I turned 16, mandates went down, and we eventually started practicing again. After we got a nice set going we started calling so many different places and just asking to perform for free, and if someone said no, we’d just call the next person. Someone was bound to say yes. And some people did. We had some of the best times at those gigs and it really helped us start to make a name for ourselves. We would go to Jerry’s bait Shops jam nights almost every Wednesday and we made amazing friends and connections there. Now throughout this time we were building our Facebook which seemed like the best app to use to let people know where we were playing, to book with us, and what we used to reach out to other bars, fairs, venues, and party’s through their Facebook accounts which seems like that’s the way most people reach out now. Through the dm’s. We were also using Instagram but FB made it way more easier for us and the audience to see when our events were. So as much as social media helps and could really help you build an online platform, it’s super important to go out and actually physically do the work sometimes, and is a great way to authentically make connections that can really then help build your social media so people can find you again.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

Seeing gigs are often times free. And it is seriously such a fun thing to do. So the best way to support is to just come out to a gig. There’s no pressure on tipping or having to dance or anything, but seriously just you being there and hopefully clapping makes such a difference. Also social media is a great way to support us too. Following and liking our posts every once in a while always helps out and is appreciated. In the music community everyone is honestly so supportive of each other’s music and grind. No matter what’s going on personally we all know that what the other person is doing is hard work and endeavoring. And that’s what creates such a thriving creative ecosystem in the Kansas City music community and that’s how you can help as well.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://ffm.to/mycolorschangeovernight
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/josephineeve111?igsh=MXY4MWlzdmxqd3p4OA==
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100086622283580&mibextid=LQQJ4d
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/channel/UCsix8nljZtH3lmqafT6DWCQ?feature=shared

Image Credits

C.J Gier
Katherine LeClair
Ava Snyder