Starting today, you can follow the Copyright Alliance on its 35-state road trip by watching artist interviews and reading blog entries, as we showcase artists and creators at work in copyright-dependent jobs across America.
I really found myself inspired by Rochelle Smith. First of all, her music is hauntingly compelling, as you’ll hear in the video or can enjoy on Reverb Nation. She is a skilled technician with sound, from operating a board to welding a microphone wire. She likes buttons, as she put it to me. She also is a popular DJ on a popular Boise radio station, 94.9, the River. Yet she explained to me that many at her station don’t even know she’s a musician; she’s exceedingly careful about not letting that professional role serve to promote her music; she wants her music to be heard on its own merits.
The video focuses on Rochelle as an artist, but it doesn’t capture her emphasis on encouraging artists to put themselves out there, which she does with many in the Boise artistic community. She acknowledged that she needs to follow her own advice, and express herself more through music and put herself out there more as a solo artist.
I chose not to focus in the video on her separate career as a radio personality, but it’s worth noting that Rochelle has managed recording sessions with top artists such as Lyle Lovett, Patty Griffin, and just last month, the Doobie Brothers, who lay down tracks at the station when passing through town. Read her blog about her experiences with that and you’ll get a taste of her charm and humor, as well as some insight into the offstage lives of famous musicians.
