Community, Music & Art: A professional musician and artist relocate to Woodstock with their two young kids to have more space to create and grow | KT & Marco Benevento

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I’m excited to invite you to my conversation with KT and Marco Benevento. KT is a metalsmith, jewelry artist and t-shirt designer and Marco is a pianist, songwriter and record producer, who has been a fixture of the New York experimental music rock and jazz scene for the past two decades. He is the founder and recording engineer of Fred Short, a recording studio in Upstate New York, and a member of the rock groups Benevento/Russo Duo and Joe Russo's Almost Dead.

I photographed Marco and KT for Urban Exodus back in 2016. When I first met them they were just a few years into their transition from NYC to the woods of Woodstock, New York. They had both hoped that eventually they would find their way out of New York City but it wasn’t until Marco had made it to a level in his career where he didn’t need to live in a city to survive that they felt confident to make the leap. It took the couple three years of house hunting, with their baby girls in tow, before they finally found their perfect place in the country.

Covid threw the Benevento’s a major curveball when Marco’s touring income, that their family was dependent on, completely dried up. KT and Marco put their heads together and came up with a number of creative ways to stay afloat. Marco collaborated and recorded with other artists, hosted virtual concerts and started a local outdoor concert series. KT began designing T-shirts, making jewelry and hosting pop-ups. Her local Woodstock community - that she cultivated through years of helping and volunteering  - championed her work and were her biggest customers.

This is a story about taking risks and making creative pivots, being held and supported by the community in hard times, and the amazing way music fosters deeper connection and compassion.

Transcript

Alissa Hessler: 0:00

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Marco: 0:33

We know the importance of nature and fresh air in our lives. And like we take advantage of it when we can hear I'm in here working and practicing and playing and recording. And then I'm just like, I gotta go outside. And it's the best reset button ever. And when you go to the city, or I go to other people's places, or whatever, and I'm like, where's the reset button? This is crazy. There's no moment you can maybe go to the roof deck for a minute or somewhere but just having nature around all the time. It's like calming, soothing, I mean, I love being home.

Alissa Hessler: 1:06

Have you ever dreamed of making a radical shift? What does it take to build a more intentional life? What is gained from reconnecting with yourself with community and with the natural world? I'm Alissa Hessler. I've spent the last decade meeting with people all over the world who have made remarkable transitions in their lives. How do they do it? What did they sacrifice? What have they learned? Stepping away from convention isn't easy. But we all have the power to reclaim the things that we've lost, to slow down to change course, to create the life we want for ourselves and for future generations. The urban Exodus podcast shares, practical advice, and inspirational words to embolden and guide you on your own journey. These are the stories of those brave enough to venture down the road less traveled. This is the urban Exodus. Urban Exodus is community supported programming, please consider sponsoring an episode or making a contribution so we can keep these conversations going. The easiest way to contribute is to click the support button on the top of urban exodus.com. You can also become a member of the urban Exodus community, to peruse our archives of hundreds of photo stories and interviews of people who left city life or subscribe to Apple podcast premium to have access to bonus episodes, or rapid fire interviews with guests and our new mini podcast ditch the city where I answer listeners questions and offer practical advice on a whole myriad of topics. If you have a question for an upcoming episode, that you'd like us to consider, please send us a DM on Instagram, or through our contact us page. Thank you for helping me continue to do this work. I couldn't do it without all of you. And if you haven't already, we would really love it if you'd leave us a five star review on Apple podcasts or Spotify, or whatever service you listened on. And please recommend urban exodus to your friends. I'm excited to invite you to my conversation with Katie and Marco Benevento. Katie is a metalsmith jewelry artist and T shirt designer. And Marco is a pianist, songwriter and record producer who has been a fixture of the New York experimental music rock and jazz scene for the past two decades. He is the founder and recording engineer of Fred's short recording studio at their home in upstate New York. And he's a member of the rock groups Benevento Russo duo, and Joe Russo's almost dead. I photographed Marco and Katie for urban Exodus back in 2016. When I first met them, they were just a few years into their transition from New York City to the woods of Woodstock, New York. They had both hope that eventually they would find their way out of New York City. But it wasn't until Margo had made it to a level in his career where he didn't need to live in a city to survive that they felt confident to make the leap. It took the couple nearly three years of house hunting with their baby girls in tow, before they finally found their perfect place in the country COVID through the bene Ventos, a major curveball, when Marcos taurine income that their family was dependent on completely dried up, Katie and Marco put their heads together and came up with a number of creative ways to stay afloat. Marco collaborated and recorded with other artists hosted virtual concerts and started a local outdoor concert series. Katy began designing T shirts, making more jewelry and hosting pop ups. Her local Woodstock community that she had cultivated through years of helping and volunteering, championed her work and were her biggest supporters. This is a story about making creative pivots. being held and supported by community in hard times. And the amazing way music fosters deeper connection and compassion I'm absolutely thrilled to have on the podcast Katie and Marco Benevento. We've just been chatting and laughing together, because it's been like maybe eight to 10 years since we saw each other. And I was sitting in your studio there, and we had the best visit. And you guys were recent, kind of transplants. And, and so were we, and we had so much to talk about and had so much fun. And so it's really great to reconnect with you now. Now that we've had both had the passage of time to like, find roots in our community, I'm really excited to just talk to you and hear about your journey, because it's been a long time. So welcome. First off, I would love if both of you would just give a little bit of your backstory because I know some of it, but I actually don't know, each of your individual backstories I know you're like, you know, meeting one another but where did you grow up? And just kind of the past that you bought taken that brought you together?

Unknown: 6:15

Yeah, no big deal. Just just summarize your whole life. Like a nutshell, just

Alissa Hessler: 6:22

like a little.

Unknown: 6:24

Alright, alright, I'll do we'll do a quick one market but amento New Jersey suburbs, went to the city a lot, went to college in Boston, played music all my all my life, loved music, and then started the band started touring and met Katie, through mutual friends and lived in Brooklyn for a while. And now we moved out of the city after having two kids. And here we are in lovely upstate New York. And that's the quickest I can do with that.

KT: 6:52

I grew up all over the Midwest, we moved every probably like three years to another Midwestern city. I was in a family of four, four sisters total. A lot of girls and spent a little time abroad. I came back to the states for college and started going to see live music of my people that were my age, which is how I met Marco. We fell in love and the rest, you know, then Brooklyn to hear. So that's when we met and then like I lived on the West Coast. My parents lived on the west coast. So whenever our friends bands would play anywhere on the west coast from that came from the east, we'd be like, Oh, you can stay with us. When you come to Oregon. You can stay with our parents when you play in the Bay Area. And everybody just did that. And so it kind of became like a family of rapscallion vagabonds that all hung out together.

Alissa Hessler: 7:51

What did your lives look like when you were living in New York? You're newlyweds in New York. Maybe your first child has arrived. What did your life look like in New York then?

Unknown: 8:02

Well, it looked like a Brooklyn apartment with a lot of pianos and keyboards stuffed in every room, stroller stroller. You know, we, we were Yeah, we were definitely outgrowing our little apartment. The apartment was shrinking and all the gear was was piling up and we needed more space to live in as well as more space for me to have like a studio or a place to work. For me. It was okay, I have this husband who is a musician. There are musicians coming over all the time I have this fate, we have this baby. Okay. There's like four people sleeping in random places in this environment and my baby, our baby wakes up at like, six o'clock in the morning. And I would just be like, Okay, we have to leave. We gotta leave until like 10 because no one's gonna be awake until 10 they've been out all night. Walking the streets of Brooklyn you thinking to myself, Why are coffee shops and like, muffin places or anything open at six o'clock in the morning. Nothing's open to like eight and you're just pushing your stroller around like okay, how long is that gonna take? And it was just like, oh, la it seemed like a lot of extra work. Yeah, I also had a van so I'd like pull up to the Brooklyn apartment with like a van full of gear like during the morning and be like, and people I have to park this unload all the all the gear and park you know, yeah, the city is just a cram. It's just tough and it's so expensive to have a comfortable place to accommodate all the stuff that you have.

Alissa Hessler: 9:37

Let's talk about UK because now you have moved into the new space because the last time I saw you, you know you were what we call in the weeds of motherhood when if you are a creative person, even if you have time it's so hard to turn the muscle back on to create when you're in it. So I know you said at that time you're like I used to be a jewelry designer and someday I will again. And now you are. So I'd love for you to talk about that and starting that back up.

Unknown: 10:07

Yes. So I did actually before the pandemic hit, I was making a lot of jewelry and selling it online around this area. I like found the time once my both of my kids were in school for a full day. I also have a sort of an A kilise heel for like a volunteering. So I was at their school, I volunteered so much because it is a school that parent involvement is very important too. It was a slow progression, but I kind of like got God into like, okay, can't even amento has a jewelry line, like this is what it is producing it and making it and selling it. And then I bought a silk screening kit. And I was like, Oh, I really like doing. Also, sort of my studio on the basement was really my jewelry studio was going pretty pretty well. And then I started silk screening and making all of Marcos merch for his tours. That's why I started doing it. And then I then it was just kind of like a slow roll into my just designing my own merchandise and selling that also, also with my jewelry. So it is sort of like metamorphosis into like two entities at the moment. And I gotta say, like silk screening. And doing that, and designing T shirts basically has been a really good going really well. And the I'm not sure if it was the pandemic, right, and people, other artists and people that support, you know, like homesteaders and crafters and makers that made it sort of flow us a little bit was a lot of support during that time. And it's continued on it helped it all grow bigger that that I'm like, oh, okay, jewelry is really wonderful. And I do love doing that I've sort of like my studio is good, the jewelry studio is good. The silk screening studio is good. I've been spending more time silk screening, just mainly because it's like shorter amounts of time, it's a lot easier to do. The materials cost less to make it make stuff I still, I'm like gearing up for the holiday season coming up, because I do sell a lot of stuff during that time. But I did get into a point where both the studios were combined. And it was like, I was busy all the time doing both things, like all the time and I read back on the urban Exodus article of like, oh, I want to have a jewelry studio. And like all these lofty thoughts that I had at that time, or that I thought were lofty. And then I'm reading back on and I'm like, Oh, I totally did that.

Alissa Hessler: 13:09

You did that. Yeah, that

Unknown: 13:12

I figured it out. And I did. And it's like moving in all different directions. So I'm drained, do focus.

Alissa Hessler: 13:20

That's a big thing. And you have built a recording studio, I think that there's a lot of fear associated with leaving a city like you're gonna leave all of your opportunities behind you. And your world is gonna get way smaller, and it's gonna be harder to maybe like build a business, like what you have created. What would you say to those people to just, you know, talk about the steps that you took even the hard parts of that journey?

Unknown: 13:48

Well, I was just gonna say, you know, maybe maybe we got lucky on a cool town, very musical music oriented sort of town, arts oriented town community driven, like Katie was saying about our Achilles heel of volunteering too much there's a lot of people have that are volunteering and making a great community here. So I guess I would say you know, like, do your research like make sure if you want to, like split town, like don't just go to some random I don't know, you know, check it out. Like we had the opportunity to move to a ton of other places and I'm glad that we sort of waited it took us three years to find the spot. And you know, if one person likes it and the other person doesn't you still gotta look for another spot like you got to really get it together. So I would just say find a good spot and I feel like that is added to the to our success and I feel like we've had a lot of success but and like to communities is a big is a big reason. You know why it is like that. And also Katie getting involved and going to school and like poking her nose in there being like what's going on? And you know, ultimately, it is what you make of it. But you know, I would say yeah, I'd definitely say Don't hesitate. It is a little tricky now after the pandemic, like a lot of prices have gone up, and a lot of people want to leave the cities. So it's kind of interesting. But you know, yeah, if you want some more space and some more room, some with some more obligations, yeah, you know, it's good. I feel like wherever we would have landed, we would have found and created and cultivated the kind of life that we were looking to create, we just happen to land in a sound that already had that going on between its citizens, but but so many people are leaving, like, it's the urban Exodus, like, so many people are leaving those places that more remote towns are getting an influx of like, cool, creative, or, you know, entrepreneurial sort of people and with the internet is an amazing tool to have to whatever, go to meetings, or sell your art or, you know, like, market your new product, or whatever it is, it's an amazing thing. Would you

Alissa Hessler: 16:11

say that of your clients? Now the people that you work with? Are a lot of them local, based on the community that you've cultivated in your area? Or have you expanded beyond that?

Unknown: 16:22

For me personally, with my silk screening, it's totally been local jewelry is like still like it's people all over the country. Really not I a little bit outside of the US, but it's mostly the jewelry goes further with the silk screening is like local. It's amazing. Like I can walk into my town and be like, Oh, my God, look, do we will pray there was certs that I made or even and and clients, my friends and other people being like, Oh, you do small? You do small runs of prints? Can you make sure through my bakery? Or can you do suffer this. And so that's been really good.

Alissa Hessler: 17:08

Calling all small business owners, are you looking to expand your customer base beyond the reach of your local community, speak to our loyal audience of over 38,000 listeners by sponsoring an episode of the urban Exodus podcast. For more information, visit urban exodus.com/podcast. You got involved in your community, you built real community where you were. And now a lot of your sales are based in your community. But then you have the kind of wider reach and over time that will build but like the power of making community and being involved in your community, once you get there. I think that that's especially if you want to build your own business to be successful. And I know that you know, during the pandemic, all touring stops and musicians make most of their money touring. How did you weather that time? And what were the goods and what were the Bad's?

Unknown: 18:06

Yeah, it was crazy. I mean, like everybody, it was like, we were like, Oh, my job depends on everything that we shouldn't be doing right now. We figured out that one of the first things I did was like, a concert in my friend's backyard. That was like 20 of my friends are gonna pay this much. Can you play from fans? Fans, right, it was the I was fans. And I was like, Sure I'll come play on the patio. And I got like, you know, a little some money. And then I like you want to do it again and literally started like that. I didn't like another friend's backyard. And then I did some online concerts with a bunch of people that were hosting that stuff. I did some streaming concert solo, and I did everything I could to like make some money now and it was weird. It was definitely scary and strange. We got a loan from you know, the PPP thing because our business was basically not a business because of it all. I mean, I made it work every week we thought of like merch things for on Bandcamp we like would make a t shirt. Yeah, exactly. And like yeah, okay, necklaces. We were like we would like you know, try to go to the grocery store like once every 10 days. I don't we didn't eat meat for like a year. We're like saving money. Like not like, anyway, yeah, it was it was crazy. But yeah, I just I hustled you know, I did whatever I could. It was very strange. But like also it was kind of cool to feel like the fans come out of the woodwork a little like, like, oh, this person wants a hand like the music to this song hand written and you know, they'll pay a lot for or, you know, I was like, I'll write out my music and you know, or they'll they took let people took lessons from me that weren't even piano players like any musicians would just like want to talk about Um, like you want to talk about music or there's like, No, I just kind of want to talk about the time so I, you know, lay on that tour. You know, so it was like there's I did like a cooking show even. You know, I was like out there on Brooklyn Marga would have bento does cooking lessons does piano because I did like COD's private concerts, you know, and like, it was, it was kind of it was, you know, I also, I made I made lemonade for sure. You know, we made it happen. He has good fans, he has good loyal fans that knew when that all right, like the people that love music, and like go to music for their church, basically, like at that same time, they couldn't go to live shows, but they could support musicians in that way. And they totally did.

Alissa Hessler: 20:55

Amazing,

Unknown: 20:56

was there it was, it was really quite a remarkable thing. There were some circumstances just like, hey, him be like, we're so sorry, you can't play and just pay him. Yeah. And they were, you know, it'd be like, like a husband and a wife and their little five year old kid, just like, I don't know, just played piano, you know, I would just play whatever. And I'd say, hey, what do you want to hear? It was kind of it was kind of surreal, you know, looking back at it now, and but, you know, we needed a way to connect, because we couldn't connect. And people were like, reaching out to their friends who are musicians and trying to get their personal fix or whatever. And I was there to give it to him because I wasn't doing anything. You know, I Yeah, we made it. We made it happen. And then slowly, you know, concerts came back outdoor concerts, nobody backstage like all that's all that crazy stuff. And then event, you know, here we are. Now fast forward to kind of everything basically back open. I mean, what my tour schedule is back to where it was last time I saw, you know, like 150 shows a year, essentially, really, like I was making a lot of stuff. We were hanging out with our kids a lot, right? Like, we have an eighth grader and a sixth grader at that time. So they needed to be like, basically, we're homeschooling them. Even though they had zoom with their teachers. It was also crazy. We were doing a lot of that. And then there was piano lessons every day, everybody would take piano lessons from Marco, me as well, that we played, we did a lot of playing music, and kind of like, our friend owns a squat that has an outdoor head and outdoor sort of eatery during that summer, where every weekend I would go and just like sell all my wares that have a table and sell stuff. And it was really kind of seemed like simple and fruitful. And like fun and community even though we weren't supposed to really be like, do together. It's sort of built our community even more because of people that came out and supported and like did that for each other safely. Right. We're all outside. We're all it was a really a wonderful time to bond even more with our community that we've already had that I think it really kind of like, brought us to a place where we're like, Oh, great. We all got each other. Like there's gonna be no nobody's gonna fall through the cracks or like nothing's gonna be too terrible for anybody because we this is a large community of people that really love each other and then we started I don't know if you know this, but we in June Marco through a festival It was sort of like after COVID and we could all like gather and be together. And we he put together a festival that we had the Benevento family band where we all cousins and Marco and I even his dad was heard of it that we all played a set of music together for a paying audience which was very frightful right people paid to come see you saying Baba was only done like trying, trying to read like music is sort of, I think like playing music in college. And, and liking it and then and then being married to this really successful, wonderfully talented musician and all of my friends are super talented, great musicians that I was like, oh, and I'm like momming it for a long time and we jewelry and other art that I'm I am just like, music that's like my set. That's like a way side hustle. Like it's not Even a hustle is just like for fun. So getting back into it a little bit.

Alissa Hessler: 25:06

In the pandemic, I started singing again and I was in bands forever. And I studied music and was a jazz singer for a time and was in like electronica rock and roll bands and stuff. But again, the people who are musicians that were going to be musicians forever, kind of like rose to the top, the people that were like, I'm scared to jump into this or like, maybe I don't want to do this as my job completely stopped. And it's so hard to get back into it. But it's so joyful and makes me smile, it puts me in a flow state. And there are so many things that music for me is what art or drawing or like cartooning or reading or writing is for other people. And I think that we like put things off that bring us joy, and I wondered what that has been like for you to reconnect with music again.

Unknown: 25:57

It is been really wonderful and I music is a thing I've noticed I found out this about myself just like reconnecting with this like, from January to June when we played our gig with the Benevento family van. Like I really like to have solidarity with other people that are also like, you don't know what we're doing. And we're all like, but but then Merkel's like, yeah, you do you know what you're doing? And he's like playing he's like, You guys are great. And we're like, not great. Let's go. They're all good. Not quite at all my cousins are like, can play a little bit, but not really. I'm like, Put your finger on this. And I liked I liked like being in that with them, makes it feel really wonderful and good. And like puts me in the flow state, but

Alissa Hessler: 26:51

fears too, and just like going into it

Unknown: 26:55

altogether. But when it's like just Marco and I like all good. You know why Billy's just played around with playing guitar or drums or singing or whatever when he's playing, but I never I would never perform that at you. Everyone want me to anyway? No, no. I like having like all these. And like, it was like, five amateurs. And Marco was like, so wonderful to do to have that experience. And we're also he has a really wonderful family of cousins that I'm like, Okay, we need Can we start working on our set for next year now?

Alissa Hessler: 27:38

Well, it's so cool that now you actually throw your own festival. Now, I noticed that about you, even when we met eight to 10 years ago, where like you are very involved in the business of music, which I don't think a lot of musicians like you get kind of separated from it by I don't know, labels or management companies. And I wonder what your kind of music job is like, from a day to day basis?

Unknown: 28:07

Oh, I definitely I talked to my manager at least two or three days a week. And we are we're figuring out what we're doing. I mean, I basically no, a lot of it is like figuring the calendar out, especially after the pandemic, just like bands are just going for it just trying to get back on the road, trying to hold these dates wanted to err on these specific times. So basically, a lot of what I'm doing these days is just planning ahead. And I know my schedule, this seems crazy to the end of 2023. We're just working that out of one detour. I have my band that I tour with. And I also tour with a band called Joe Russo's almost dead. And the acronym is Jay read. And we play all the music of the Grateful Dead. And I don't know if I was in that band when you came to visit us. I don't

Alissa Hessler: 28:59

think that you were but then I had mentioned your name to someone and they were like, Oh, he's in the Grateful Dead band. And I was like, oh, no, I don't think you're right. And then I Googled it. And I was like, oh, yeah,

Unknown: 29:11

that was I would say that's a pretty huge thing for me, that happens is last time I saw you, because I'm you know, 40 shows a year or 50 shows a year with those guys. And we're playing big venues like red rocks, and you know, for 1000s of people and it's super fun and it's the Grateful Dead. So it's the Vanderbilt worried there we got it's the best, best, great music all around from crazy experimental music, almost jazz, kind of weird stuff to like, you know, sugar Magnolia, like great, great tunes. So that's, you know, it's a whole spectrum of music, and it's really fun and it's with all my friends who I've known for so long. So that fills up the schedule. So we're I tour with Jay rad and with my own band and just really just trying to figure out, there's only, you know, 52 weekends in a year. So just trying to figure out the best times. So I mean, if I'm doing 100 100, almost 100 shows a year. Yeah, you know, it's like, I'm playing on like, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, like just touring around the country and doing all sorts of random other small gigs. But yeah, that's basically what's what I've been doing. And then and, of course, the studio has allowed me to have some more people here to record and to do stuff like that. But it's kind of the same old thing, you know, just like figuring out touring and putting out music and like you were talking about earlier about social media figuring out like, a good post or a good video or a good song. Or, you know, all that is the hustle of all that stuff, which, you know, I mean, you know, I can do I don't know, post everything. It's okay. I mean, it's definitely like a thing, and like, whatever. It's what you gotta do, you know, some bands are like more on it than others. And I don't know. I might not be crazy on it. But um, um, there, you can find me. I wondered

Alissa Hessler: 31:10

if you guys could describe your home, your studio, the landscape. I know that before when I was there. You were dreaming of peacocks. And I know that you have gotten some peacocks. Now you've had goats. When I was there that you used to take for walks. What creatures do you keep? What is your home look like now? Well,

Unknown: 31:33

we got to detox. How many peacocks? We have to go to we have we have six peacocks.

Alissa Hessler: 31:41

Are they all male peacocks?

Unknown: 31:43

There's one lucky lady. Yeah, we have Lita we had to go to get chickens. And then we built a big sort of a peacock palace for them outside. It's a giant place. Really all of them. But that's it. That's all we have. Do we have a cat when you were visiting us?

Alissa Hessler: 31:58

You had a cat? Do you still have the

Unknown: 32:00

two goats? Yes. Two goats. Exact same goats? Yeah.

Alissa Hessler: 32:04

Oh, they're really cute. Awesome. And there's a pond on your property. And I guess now the garage is your recording studio, which is amazing. You guys mentioned already that there was this, you know, kind of big influx of people during the pandemic, we definitely felt it here. Property values here have probably gone up like 40 to 30% since the pandemic, which is pretty crazy, to the degree that you know, people that were working in this community before they were saving up to buy a house like now can't buy a house. And I wondered what that looks like in your community of Woodstock, if you've seen the same things. And just any thoughts?

Unknown: 32:46

Yeah, I feel like didn't didn't wasn't it like Kingston and like Rhinebeck were like the two highest? Or like the highest property values after the pandemic? Yeah, in the United States? Like, we go to San Francisco.

Alissa Hessler: 33:00

What advice would you give to new arrivals on ways to weave themselves into their community to plant roots there to feel at home there because there can be a real feeling especially now of being an outsider,

Unknown: 33:15

volunteering in your community as much as you can to meet people and to like provide your what you provide to the community full on and just like without any kind of strings or like conversation or anything like that, but just to really like become a part of, of your lace. I think that's what I would say, just become a part of your place.

Alissa Hessler: 33:42

Yeah, I think that's great advice and to use the skills that you have to that you're like being you know, if you feel like there's a hole or something if somebody asks you to help then you just always say yes,

Unknown: 33:55

you just do it for sure.

Alissa Hessler: 33:58

So I wonder you guys have been there almost 10 years what you've noticed as far as the climate in your area, because I certainly have noticed a change since the beginning of living here to now.

Unknown: 34:11

I don't know I guess this this this summer specifically. It was like crazy dry in the summer specifically, it was crazy dry. I don't know it's kind of crazy weather up here for sure. You know, like it's like crazy humid, but then the like first three years two years that we lived here Hurricane Irene like rips through here, right? Like literally like levels and stuff rips and bridges out so it's always been kind of a crazy climate here. Yeah. Crazy. Some winters are mild. Some are like totally not but this winter we had a crazy ice storm. Insane a storm we had and then this summer we went to California to visit my family and when we came back, I was like being like it Looks like California here. Like why is all the grass Brown? And everything like kind of brown and dry like this is not normal. Like I've never thought like, California here.

Alissa Hessler: 35:13

I feel like the drought is just consistent throughout I interviewed people in New Zealand for this season and I interviewed people kind of all over and they're like, there's been no rain whatsoever. That's pretty scary.

Unknown: 35:28

This area is a really water rich area. Yeah, it's pretty humid, rainy here, and the aquifers and reservoirs and all of that, and the streets and everything like it's a pretty water rich area. So like, when it even is a drought. Yes, the reservoirs lower. But it's still like pretty awful.

Alissa Hessler: 35:49

I just wanted to give an enormous thank you to all of you who have made contributions to offset the production costs of this podcast, it means so much to me that you find enough meaning and value to pledge your support to keep this going. If you haven't had a chance to contribute, we've made it really easy for you. Just click the support button on the top of urban Exodus website. You can also get access to bonus episodes, rapid fire interviews, and our new mini podcast, ditch the city by signing up for our apple podcast premium. Or you can become a member of the urban Exodus online community where you can access hundreds of photos, stories, interviews, tutorials, videos and more. Find out more by visiting the membership page on urban exodus.com. You both are artists, right? In multiple mediums, basically, Marco, what's your creative process for music from like creation to kind of finished piece? And Katie, it could be jewelry, it could be music, it could be screenprinting whatever one you want to talk about? Or maybe they're all the same?

Unknown: 36:57

Maybe they are? Oh, yeah. I mean, like, honestly, it's a little bit of an archaic idea. But like inspiration, just like strikes me rebury randomly, either with like, a jewelry piece. silkscreen idea, I actually been like, it's very much like this idea of the Muse like chasing this muse to like, give you give you some kind of inspiration, and lately have been like, where are you gonna go?

Alissa Hessler: 37:29

Have you ever paid attention to when it pops up? Are you hiking a lot? Are you gardening a lot? What are the activities that you're doing in your day where you feel like it hits you the most,

Unknown: 37:39

if we travel a lot, or I travel a lot, then I come home after not working on something for so long. That's when it'll strike. Sometimes for me, it's like on the flip side, where you're like, I get back from a family vacation, you know, for seven or 10 days or something, and I get back home and I'm like, the piano and my room, and the synthesizers, and this drum machine, the kids are in bed. Let's go. You know, like, sometimes it takes that, that moment of being gone for a while for you to just be like bone. And like three song ideas could be written in this sort of hour timeframe, where you're just just going to flow state, as you said earlier, where you're just like rolling.

Alissa Hessler: 38:23

So as someone that has had kind of a very long career as a professional touring musician, I think that a lot of musicians would aspire to be at that place of making music, their lifelong pursuit, what advice would you give to emerging musicians on ways to get their work noticed, and to reach a wider audience and like, cultivate a community that supports your work?

Unknown: 38:49

I think it's important to have, you know, to be out there touring and to be working, like people forget, like, you could, you could write a song, right? And put it out on Spotify, kind of, or put it out on a lot of platforms that no problem, right, but you have to, you gotta like, back it up, and you got to tour and you got to play or you got to follow up with something, at least as we're where I come from. If you want to be a touring musician, you want to play shows for, for people, and for more and more people as you are evolving and growing. I feel like it's important to do that. And it says it's also important to have somebody work help you you know, like having a manager you know, having a booking agent or preferably both. And then you get other people working for you and having them help you with the things that that they know more about the new you know, I feel like a lot of musicians try to do it all themselves and I still do a lot of things myself and stuff but you need help from other people. Even you know, advice to anybody starting a business or any company you it'd be smart to have somebody help you with some stuff, also publicity, you know, getting somebody to make sure your on certain websites, and you're getting interviewed by them, and you know, when you go to a website you like, like, see if you can get interviewed on that, let's you know, just simple things like that. Never give up, never give up. If you really love it, just keep on writing music, and hopefully somebody will listen to it or like it. And also I, you know, music is something that should be shared with people. So you have to collaborate with people, I think that's another good advice, you know, play with as many people in your talent as you can, or, you know, meet, meet all sorts of different folks in the music business that might be able to help you out. You know, there's, it can be done. It's just, you can't do it all yourself more advice, take as many gigs and do as many things as you possibly can. Because it's, you never know what might lead to the next thing. So don't rule out things that you think might be not worthwhile or like, or something I don't know, like, you never know what the heck is gonna happen?

Alissa Hessler: 40:58

At what point did you know that you felt comfortable bringing on a manager or finding a manager? Because I think that that's another thing that is tricky when you're like, kind of first starting out because being a musician is really like starting a business starting a jewelry business starting anything. It's like, when do I bring on help?

Unknown: 41:16

It was early on? It was early on Alissa where we were like, you know, we should we should get a manager, you know, this was like, when, when I was 2324. And I was playing in the city a lot. And we were starting to grow and started to get bigger gigs. And, you know, it was just the thing that like other bands did, they like had managers like it made made, you look like you kind of had together something, you know, and even if the manager kind of didn't know what was up, but still, he liked you, he wanted to support you. And then he could help you get a booking agent, and the booking agent books, all these other bands, and he can connect you with all these other bands that you could open up for whatever. It was something that I did early on, I gotta say early on.

Alissa Hessler: 42:04

That's tricky. You have to find people that you really, really trust because your job is so busy and so involved in such a different guild that to that it's tricky to do at all. And so I wondered about that. I also think it's interesting that, you know, there's kind of this narrative that people can't make a living using their creativity. You guys both kind of disprove that statement. I wonder if you have any thoughts on like, why we kind of scare people to believe that that isn't an option for them when, you know, there are so many opportunities, I think, to create a business for yourself.

Unknown: 42:41

I mean, maybe it's just because of the way the patriarchy has set up our capitalistic culture in the United States, and in the industrial revolution, and then all of that that came after. And so the narrative isn't there for that. But I think that, like, if you the whole time, our goal was talking and just talking about like, how do you what is your advice to musicians and I kept thinking about what my dad, what my dad is even said about his own career is it's like, it's like hard work. And talent, talent and hard work and love, like all of those things. But like, the hard work part is the part that's very easy to like, not do because you're like, This isn't going anywhere, oh, nothing's happening. But like, just keep on working on it. And, and I think that our culture also is shifting away from like this old sort of structure. And people are like looking for more local, local merchandise or local enterprises and things to be to support and that people that are actually people actually doing, making the music or making the art or making the clothes or making the food or making what like those things. Those craft things are like becoming more important to humanity as we've gotten so far away from it and seeing like what it has brought us. So I think that that it is a good time to invest yourself. If you are an artist into doing it and believing in it, and also like hustling, like the hard work part just it's a job. It's a hard it's work. And it's, it's worth doing. And also, I think you have to be a good person, too.

Alissa Hessler: 44:45

Looking back on your journey from city to country, you know, you're about 10 years out now. What are the main things that you've learned about yourself about immunity and just about the power of free connecting to nature.

Unknown: 45:02

I've learned that I definitely love living in the country, I still to this day I walk, I look outside our window, I'm like, I can't believe we live here. I love this. I love living here. I love being clean. I love going on walks around our pond, Katie loves going on hikes, we, we know the importance of, of nature and fresh air in our lives. And like we take advantage of it when we can hear. So I you know, I love that I am in here working and practicing and playing and recording. And then I'm just like, I gotta go outside. And it's the it's the best reset button ever. And when you go to the city, or I go to other people's places or whatever, and I I'm like where's the reset button, this is crazy. There's no, there's no moment, you can maybe go to the roof deck for a minute or some somewhere. But you know, it's just the just having nature around all the time is like just calming, soothing, I mean, I love I love being home, I hope that the studio helps me sort of be home a little more than then on the road. So I know the value of being home and being you know, around our own land and working on our property. I just I love it. So that's I've, um, changed in the way that I like, don't want to go anywhere. I just want to be here smiling, like, work on the garden and like hanging out with the animals or just mow the lawn? And my Yeah, I don't know if that's or grow plants and you know, all sorts of fun stuff. What do you What about you, baby? For me, I think like living in the city or surrounded by people, even though you don't have to, like know them or ever talk to them. But like something about that aspects of the city was comforting to me, because I was never alone. Like there were people upstairs or there were people through the wall, or there were people like there were just people around and here, I find found that I have made a lot of friends because I like to have people around. I also do enjoy, like the time where there's no people around. And it's an it's all, you know, like our pond or trees or hike up the mountain or whatever. But I do i It's like a funny, it's a funny balance for me, because I'm like, maybe it's because my husband leaves for weeks at a time. And I'm like, Why do I don't know. So I agree, like created a community of people. Whereas in the city, like I never felt like I needed that as much because there were just like, secondary people all around me all the time.

Alissa Hessler: 47:46

Yeah, I think that sometimes you can feel lonely or in a city, even though there are people everywhere, because you do feel just comforted that they're there even if you aren't connected to them. And then if you don't have any friends in a rural area, you really are so isolated. But then you could just really have nature be your friends, which is like you wanted to stay at your house all the time.

Unknown: 48:18

I do like trees and plants and mushrooms and screams and acorns and all the things.

Alissa Hessler: 48:26

Do you have anything that you'd like to share from a personal or business perspective? And how can people listen to your music, find your art and kind of follow your journey?

Unknown: 48:39

Go find my art and my journey. Kate's even amento on Instagram or Katie even amento.com is my website. And what was the first question?

Alissa Hessler: 48:50

Do you have anything exciting to share from a business or personal perspective? And then I guess the other thing was When is the concert that you throw the festival? Are you doing it again next year?

Unknown: 49:01

Definitely. It'll be again next year is will be Father's Day weekend, which is a great time what your dad loves to go see live music so you should bring him to the festival. And anything new and exciting coming. I mean, yes, there will be lots of new and exciting things coming up because the holiday season is coming up and you want to give your friends and your family and people you love really cool gifts. Like to give people stuff and you can buy that stuff on my website. I just put out a new record the record I made during the pandemic. It's me playing all the instruments. And it just came out a few months ago. So that was a that was a big one.

Alissa Hessler: 49:45

What's the name of the record? So everybody knows.

Unknown: 49:47

It's called Benevento. And yeah, that just felt right. Follow him at Marco Benevento. Yeah, Instagram. Yeah. 2022. You can find me anywhere just Just google me, baby. And yeah, so but yeah, I'm really happy about that new record because it's a weird one. You know, it was it was almost one of these records that I was like, why put this out? Like, this is kind of a strange like there's some weird instrumental I don't know, it's just a little weird and it's, it's me. My job in the studio

Alissa Hessler: 50:24

probably was like art therapy, like a bit of mental health processing of stuff. I think it's interesting to see the work created by artists during the pandemic, because it was such a intense time that we were all like responding and processing in different ways and how that manifests in people's are. It's really interesting.

Unknown: 50:44

Yeah, yeah, really good. And really good record. Yeah, upon listening back, like now that I'm like, we're about to gear up. I guess this is also some other news, we're gonna gear up and do a West Coast tour. So we're touring from San Diego to Seattle. We're doing about a two week tour. And I haven't done a two week tour since before the pandemic so excited about that, at least being on the road that long. I've done runs of shows, but never that long. I'm teaching my band all the music from the record. We're like, trying to figure it all out. And as I'm listening back to it, I'm like, Alright, I'm glad I put this out. This is authentic. This is cool. I like this stuff.

Alissa Hessler: 51:23

Thank you again, Marco and Katie for joining us on the show. Some of my key takeaways from this episode. To all of the makers out there. Don't be afraid to experiment with new techniques and mediums. Although Katy had spent her career making jewelry, the pandemic forced her to expand her offerings and try something new. Now she has diversified her customer base, increased her revenue, and brought some nice variety to her days. Second, music is an incredible connector. It brings people together to dance, laugh, cry and feel. The life of a professional musician is not easy. It requires a lot of sacrifice and time away from your family. Support musicians by attending their shows. Touring is one of the only ways that musicians can make a living and they took a massive hit during the pandemic. And lastly, community as a safety net and hard times. Being a member of a community means being there for people when they need you. And in turn, they are there for you. When people need your help. Say yes, as much as you are able. Boundaries are important to maintain your own health and balance, but contributing your time, energy and resources to your community will come back to you should you ever need a helping hand. Hi, friends, thank you so much for tuning into another episode of the urban Exodus podcast. This is a listener supported program that is only made possible through your continued support. And if you haven't already, we would really love it if you'd leave us a five star review on Apple podcasts or Spotify, or whatever service you listen on. And please recommend urban access to your friends. An enormous thank you to my incredible producer Simone Leon, and my amazing editor Johnny Sol, and my music man Benjamin Thoreau, and thanks to all of you for listening. I'm Alissa Hessler and this is the urban Exodus