The stage at the Starling Bar will be the temporary home for Julia Rose on Friday, March 25. Rose performs as “Julia Rose Studios,” because she is not just a singer/songwriter with considerable talent, but also a graphic and video artist.
Rose hails from Vermont. Her college days found her studying math and physics, but music held a brighter light to follow. She began writing songs, singing them while playing her electric 5-string viola and her ukulele. When it was time to get serious, she took to the road.
But Rose did not take the road lightly. No Denny’s and Holiday Inns for this traveling troubadour. Home has had four wheels, sometimes even more. Rose has been driving from gig to gig in a full-sized truck pulling a 17-travel-trailer RV for seven months. For a short while, she was forced to down-size to just the truck. After the needed repairs to the trailer were made, Rose said, “I had been traveling in just my truck bed for the last few months, at this point the RV feels like a mansion.”
Rose is an adventurer. Between gigs, Rose said, “I’ve spent lots of time backpacking, living on the Appalachian trail…inspired by the lifestyle of living pared down. I’ve been traveling around trying to get my name out there.”
In addition to the road as a means of reaching out, Rose has an interesting take on the possibilities modern media allows. She has a new album out called “Time is Now.” Each of the songs on the record is paired a video to compliment the song. The songs and videos are all available on her webpage, juliarosestudios.com.
Rose said, “Each song on the album is paired with a music video…all sorts of adventures…skiing while playing, white water rafting while playing…I tried to merge the two passions of mine. It’s my way of branding myself.”
Rose is a fascinating musician to watch perform. A top-notch player, she runs her instruments through a looper, a device that lets her lay down vocal or instrumental layers underneath live vocals. She was a member of an a capella choir in her college, and has grown to love the harmonies that the looper allows her to discover.
Rose indicated that she prefers to play her original songs, but also is in tune enough with the audience to know when they need to hear something familiar. Look for Rose to bare her soul with her original songs, then serve up a blast from the past. Rose starts her two-hour set at 6 p.m.
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