Artist of the Week: Sam Reda

Senior Sam Reda will be playing guitar in the upcoming Love Fund Concert with his band, Orlo. He’s played guitar since he was five years old and plans on playing in a band in college.

What made you decide to start playing guitar?

“It was really my parents’ decision. They’ve loved music their entire lives and my mom just really wanted me to play guitar. She started having me take lessons when I was five. When I started liking music myself and started finding bands that I really liked, it was that point when I realized guitar was a way for me to dig even deeper into music and start playing music from the bands I liked. That’s when I really fell for it.”

How do you like the other instruments you play compared to the guitar?

“Well bass is pretty similar just considering it’s an octave down and it’s just more one note at a time. Drums I’ve really started to love as well. My guitar teacher really made me get a good feeling for rhythm and we studied rhythm a lot together. It really helped me out when I first sat down at a drum set because I could really get the rudiments and rhythms. I already had a sense of time going for me, so once I got my own drum set that kind of opened up another can of worms.”

Is there anyone in your life who has inspired you as a guitarist?

“I would probably say my dad because just growing up he knew so much about the instrument that really made me interested and drove my passion to want to know more and get more in-depth into it. He would always encourage my progress and everything else. So I owe a lot to him.”

What type of guitar do you prefer?

“I like the electric a lot more than the acoustic, because there’s just so much more room to go and explore dynamically. Sonically, there’s just a lot more notes that you can play on an electric than an acoustic. You can run everything through pedals, you can use different amps, use different pickups, different woods of different sounds. There’s just a lot of room for exploration with electric versus acoustic.”

How did you feel the first time you performed in front of an audience?

“I was pretty nervous the first time I played with [senior] Tom Schotte because that was really my first experience with the early version of what our band is now. I barely even knew him, we practiced for maybe two weeks before we played together for the first time two years ago at a school concert. We kind of just threw together a couple songs that we all kind of knew how to jam to and just put it together at the last minute and got on stage and made it happen. It ended up pretty well. [Afterwards I felt] pretty rewarded and pretty motivated to keep going with it. I’ve definitely been a lot more relaxed with getting on stage because we do practice more now, and just having more exposure to it makes it a little easier to do it the next time.”

What’s your favorite song to play on the guitar?

“I would say my favorite song to play right now is “Blue Veins” by The Raconteurs. I would say it’s my favorite because it’s kind of a weird take on a minor blues. Blues has just been one of my favorite genres to play, and Jack White leading that band is one of my favorite artists. The way those two combine and mix together, it’s just one of my favorite songs and being able to play the chords to it and improvise the solo to it, it’s just really up my alley.”

What genre of music is your favorite?

“Just rock in general. I really like music that sounds raw and that early, early blues, garage blues is really my favorite. Just that it doesn’t sound perfect. The notes don’t have to sound perfect, the chords don’t have to sound just distinctly chimely. Kind of like [what] we hear in today’s music all the time. Just back then everything was kind of thrown together, everybody knew what they were doing. They didn’t have to take a bunch of takes to record a song, they were just all killers at what they did and threw it all together using moderately accessible equipment at the time. Just the way those old records sound sound way better to me than any autotune or anything like that.”

What’s been your favorite performance you’ve done?

“Definitely the Restart the MusiKC last year when we played at The Uptown. That was definitely my favorite. A lot more people showed up then we thought would and everybody was playing really well. Even though, when we played “Whipping Post” I was supposed to sing the second verse by myself and my mic did not work, but out of frustration I really dug into the solo I played for that song and I felt a lot better after it.”

How do you feel music has impacted your life?

“It’s been huge, it’s definitely been my biggest passion in life for sure. Just everything around my room — I have amps and guitars, a stereo set up, and music posters everywhere. It’s definitely been an outlet for me. If I’ve ever had any problems, I could always just pour my negative emotions into my guitar playing or listening. If anything, it’s helped me get through a lot of stuff and it’s definitely become a huge part of who I am. It’s become a part of who I am friends with, it’s always been a huge part of my family, just a big part of who I am.”

Check out Sam’s music here: