Today we’d like to introduce you to Jason LeVasseur.
Hi Jason, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
My story starts in two places at once: a classroom and a stage.
At Wake Forest, I student taught 11th and 12th grade English, and I loved every minute of it. But music was pulling hard, so instead of taking a classroom job, I took the stage. I toured internationally as a drummer, guitarist, singer, and songwriter for more than 30 years, recording over 15 albums and sharing stages with artists like John Mayer, Train, The Roots, Ludacris, J. Cole, Dave Matthews Band, and Maroon 5.
The turn came almost by accident. After a show in Connecticut, I stayed to talk with the audience about what had just happened on stage, why it worked, what it meant. That debrief felt as alive as the performance itself. Then a friend named Sarah Rine connected my music agent to a speaking contract, and suddenly the two halves of my life snapped together. Teaching and performing were never separate things. They were the same thing.
That became The Rock Star Project®, the work I’ve now been doing for over two decades: keynotes, leadership training, and hosting events for corporations, associations, colleges, camps, and schools. Along the way I earned my CSP™ (a designation held by a small fraction of speakers worldwide), became a Certified Master Trainer™, and collected more than 25 national awards, including the NACA Campus Legend Award. Today I’m known as The Conference Connection Expert™, because my favorite thing to do is take a room full of strangers and turn them into a community.
Some of my favorite recent work has been right here at home in Tennessee. This spring I led a two-day in-service for about 350 members of the Tennessee Department of Health’s West Region team in Jackson, delivered a communication workshop for professionals at the Lodge at Paris Landing, and debuted Kickoff to Connect™ at the MPI Tennessee CONNECT Conference in Nashville, where every single attendee participated. There is something special about serving the people who serve this state.
And I’ve never stopped teaching in other forms. Every summer for 36 years I’ve returned to Camp Timanous in Maine, where I serve as Program Director and run the woodshop. During the school year, I’m home in East Nashville, where I also run Whole Home Co™, a small home services business for my neighbors.
People sometimes ask if I miss the classroom. I never left the classroom. I just found a bigger one.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Smooth? No. Interesting? Always.
The first struggle was choosing a road that didn’t have a map. When you student teach and then tell people you’re going on tour instead, you get a lot of raised eyebrows. A musician’s life is feast or famine: 30 years of touring means 30 years of vans, load-ins, empty rooms, packed rooms, and never being entirely sure what next year looks like.
The second struggle was reinvention. Moving from music into speaking meant starting over in a new industry where nobody knew my name. There’s no shortcut to credibility as a speaker. You earn it one room at a time, and some of those rooms are hard rooms.
And the third struggle is one I still live with: I run a business built entirely on me. When you’re the keynote speaker, the emcee, the facilitator, the salesperson, and the bookkeeper, there’s no one to hand the microphone to. Every yes has an opportunity cost, and learning to protect the value of my own time, kindly but firmly, took years.
But here’s what I’ve learned: the struggles were the training. Every empty room taught me how to fill one. Every hard conversation about money taught me what my work is worth. And every time I had to start over, I got better at helping other people begin.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
When the form asked me to pick a category, I clicked “other,” because I’ve never been just one thing.
I’m a community builder. Through The Rock Star Project®, I’ve spent over two decades helping conferences, companies, and campuses turn rooms full of strangers into rooms full of people who know each other. That’s the work I’m proudest of.
I’m a leadership trainer, teaching teams to connect, communicate, and collaborate, always without slides. The audience is the visual aid.
I’m a camp counselor. Every summer for 36 years I’ve returned to Camp Timanous in Maine, where I’m the Program Director and run the woodshop.
I’m a musician. Thirty years of international touring taught me how to read a room, and I bring a performer’s instincts to everything I do.
And I’m a father, a husband, and a neighbor in East Nashville, where I even run a small home services business for the people on my street.
Different hats, same head. Everything I do is the same job: bringing people together and helping them see what they’re capable of. That’s not “other.” That’s the whole point.
What’s next?
The big word for my future is closer. Closer to home, closer to community.
After thirty years of touring and two decades of flying to stages all over the country, I’m deliberately building more of my work right here in Tennessee. This past year I’ve had the privilege of working with state teams and Nashville-based conferences, and there’s something deeply satisfying about serving the people who serve the place where I live.
The project I’m most excited about is one I’m still building: a sponsorship model that would let businesses underwrite my programs for nonprofits, schools, and camps that could never afford them otherwise. The organizations that need connection and leadership training the most are often the ones with the smallest budgets. I want to fix that math. When it launches, a company’s sponsorship won’t just put their name on something. It will put a real program in front of kids, counselors, teachers, and volunteers who would otherwise go without.
Beyond that, the plan is simple: keep doing the work, keep getting better at it, and keep showing up. Summer 37 at Camp Timanous is already on the calendar. The woodshop isn’t going to run itself.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://therockstarproject.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/makeleadershipfun/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonlevasseur/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@JasonLeVasseur
