We recently had the chance to connect with Joe Kendrick and have shared our conversation below.
Joe, so good to connect and we’re excited to share your story and insights with our audience. There’s a ton to learn from your story, but let’s start with a warm up before we get into the heart of the interview. What are you being called to do now, that you may have been afraid of before?
For years, I have created as a musician and a filmmaker, and I’ve pursued musical storytelling through a lot of different outlets. I’ve composed for my soundtracks, I’ve played piano, and I’ve written short films using music in a lot of different ways, but this year, I’ve finally taken larger steps into the musical theatre space. I’ve always been interested in writing musicals, and I’ve written and produced a couple of short films already in the musical format, but this has been my first time pursuing writing full length musical shows specifically for the stage. It’s been really rewarding to take my perspective I’ve already developed as a musician and composer, and combine my storytelling experience as a filmmaker. I feel like I’ve unified my skills in a new way that previous creative pursuits haven’t quite been able to do, and that’s been exciting!
To tell you a bit about one of the projects – I’ve written a musical called “Camp Creator,” and I’ve spent this year producing an album version of the show, arranging the instrumentation and bringing vocalists on board. It’s been a lengthy process, but very rewarding. You can use music to tell stories all on its own. Different instruments can carry different dramatic weight, and motifs can be developed and recontextualized with new narrative power. Exploring that through a piece in a new way has been really interesting, and it’s been for a story that’s important to me.
“Camp Creator” is a musical all about young people discovering how they can express themselves creatively. The story revolves around a teenager named Melody who is accepted into a summer arts camp where she is empowered to write and sing her own songs, meeting other creative kids who she can collaborate and share notes with. From that, she finds out how hard it can be to make something you’re satisfied with. You have to balance perfectionism with logistics, and sometimes personalities can clash throughout the creative process, too. It can be tough to find that all out as a young person, working on your first project, and so it’s quite an intense experience for Melody, and through the medium of a musical, we join her for the emotional rollercoaster that it is.
Stay tuned for more updates as I work on the album version of “Camp Creator” and work on getting the show onstage, too! While I’ve been interested in musical storytelling for a while, I feel like this project is my first real bite from the musical bug, and hopefully there’ll be many shows after this that you’ll get to see from Joe Kendrick onstage!
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
To back it up, my name is Joe Kendrick. I’m a filmmaker and musician based in Nashville, Tennessee. Music has taken me a lot of places. I’m a pianist, composer, and as I mentioned as of now, a musical theatre writer too!
As a pianist, I have played in bands and with artists across the country, touring and playing festivals, and recording with them along the way. As of this interview, we actually just recently released a new song with one of the bands I’m a part of, Chase Stetson & The Ramblers, called “Two Heart Collision.” It was really cool to play on the track and to get to record at the legendary Kent Wells Studio, and you can hear the song in person if you catch us at our next show! Chase stays busy and it’s been fun to join him on all kinds of cool stages.
Now, I learned to really play the piano when I was younger by playing jazz, and it’s been rewarding this year to help launch one of Nashville’s newest venues, the Marquee at the Woolworth Theatre, as a jazz pianist there, too! Music will take you to some cool places, and it’s been crazy seeing the marketing team run with the band and seeing my photo on all the brochures. It still feels a little surreal.
Being in Nashville, music keeps me busy, but I am also a storyteller, and my portfolio as a filmmaker has led me to festivals across the Southeast and even netted me a couple of awards, as strange as that is to say. My real passion is in my creativity, and I love telling stories. Exploring what for me is a new medium through musical theatre has really ignited that passion in a new way, too, and I’m excited to see what opportunities keep coming out of that pursuit. Stay tuned!
Appreciate your sharing that. Let’s talk about your life, growing up and some of topics and learnings around that. What was your earliest memory of feeling powerful?
There’s a couple of different ways I could approach this question. As a young teenager, there were a couple of talent shows and performances that were meaningful to me when I’d gotten to play live music for the first time and find my stage presence. Sometimes I was covering a song, sometimes I was performing my own original music, but either way – those moments definitely helped encourage me or push me to improve.
But I think what was more impactful in the long run to me was a couple of years later, in High School, when I’d gotten into making short films for the first time. I wasn’t just expressing myself, but as I made my short films, I was a director. My friends that acted in them respected my creative leadership, and trusted that I had a vision. I think because those projects were more collaborative, I felt more of a responsibility to take ownership of what I was creating so that I could bring other people on board.
The empowerment that I felt as a young person discovering what it meant to express myself and share that creative process with other people was very important to my growth, and as I mentioned before, inspired the story behind my newest musical, “Camp Creator.” That story is all about what it means for young creatives to feel powerful for the first time, and I hope that it resonates with people when they can finally see it.
If you could say one kind thing to your younger self, what would it be?
If I could go back in time, whether it was to a 16 year old version of myself or even to a 22 year old version of myself figuring out how they could start seriously pursuing their creative ambitions, I would tell them: “Stay the course. Keep creating and putting projects out there into the world, and trust that you have something specific to express. Follow what you’re passionate about, find your voice, and stay honest. Collaborate often, and try new things, even if they’re not the kinds of projects you initially envisioned yourself being a part of.” There’s a lot of other things I could say, too, but I think that kind of encouragement would be the heart of it, and I feel lucky that at different points in my journey, I was able to hear that kind of advice from others. I’m incredibly thankful to those who were able to tell me that when I needed to hear it.
Next, maybe we can discuss some of your foundational philosophies and views? What do you believe is true but cannot prove?
I try to be mostly pretty reasonable about my beliefs, but when it comes to things I can’t prove, there are a couple of things. I am spiritual, for instance – I identify as a Christian, and it’s because I see God in a couple of different places.
The world is chaotic and full of evil, but there’s also beauty and innate goodness at the same time self-evident through creation. I can sit at the piano, for instance, and something can inspire me, creating music out of nothing. That inspiration, and that spark of potential goodness within all of humanity, only feels like it can come from a holy spirit in my opinion. And then there’s the teachings of Jesus himself. I’ll never know for sure, but my feelings are that if God were to come to earth as a human being, the things they would preach about would be in line with the primary message of Jesus of Nazareth.
That’s just my suspicion, at least.
Okay, so let’s keep going with one more question that means a lot to us: If immortality were real, what would you build?
There are so many things. I feel like a bit of a “jack of all trades” with an interest in a wide variety of different kinds of projects. If I could live forever, not only would I keep making music, films, and musicals, but I’d write novels, plays, and symphonies. I’d get into stop-motion animation. I’d study architecture, history, and read every story ever written. I feel a love for so many different mediums, and if I had more time, I’d try them all.
I’ve really cherished the fact that different projects have given me a reason to dive into different disciplines. Filmmaking has made me a better editor, and I’ve dived into VFX and 3D animation through it. Composing music has encouraged me to learn about the different instruments that make up an orchestra and their strengths and limitations. Script writing has encouraged me to study story structure and made me better at analyzing writing, too. At the end of the day, every story I tell is about a new topic, too, and by telling new stories, I’m given a new reason to pursue different interests. I think there’s a lot of beauty in that.
But I won’t live forever. I can only do so much with the time I have, and I’ll try to use this time to platform what I have to express and encourage others to express themselves, too – But more important than that, all we can do is to try and show love where we can. That’s the real meaning of life, and I can try and do that whether I live forever or not.
Contact Info:
- Website: http://joekendrick.weebly.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/joek.media/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@cupajoe99
- Other: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/71aLR8NktRgzPlLqLPIGnq?si=5cQmG7ANQg6w7km42xKXYw
