Making a musical life

BY SARA KEDDY

Kings County Register

Jason Chetwynd knew he’d made it in the world of music promotion when he added nightclub janitor to the juggling he was doing with two other jobs.

“I got a chance to feel what the place was like after hours - I was up on the stage thinking, maybe I could start holding shows.”

The Kingston native has come a long way from West Kings - “not the most motivated student, I’ll be honest,” he says.

After almost 10 years living, working, studying and doing everything he could to work his way into the music business in Alberta and British Columbia, he’s back in the Valley.

“I’m looking to light a fire under the local music scene, and get people out there to support bands,” he says.

“I’m 100 per cent sure there are enough people here to go to shows. I’m not so confident they know they want to go. They need some prompting.”

He should know about prompting. While buddies in high school were looking at futures at university, with the military or out west, he knew he’d be doing something with music.

“All my life, the way I associate a time is not by the year but by the music.”

After high school, he worked here as a gas jockey, delivering pizza and on farms. In 1998, he picked up for Banff, Alberta.

“I said when I left, I’d not move back for a decade, and it would be for the benefit of the community, youth and me.”

In Banff, he partied and worked - as a tour guide, waiter, gabrage man - you name it. Waiting for weekends, he travelled to Calgary, checking out shows and eventually getting chances to work security.

“It’s just sticking your nose in the right places, and it worked for me.”

He applied for a year-long music business program at a Vancouver school, realizing his career “was not going to happen in Banff.” The program wasn’t what he’d hoped, but he used it to make contacts and get behind the scenes wherever he could.

His job as a cafe manager gave him his first chance to be a music promoter.

“There was no stage and no sound - but there was the availability for music.”

He talked the cafe owners into letting him book local bands, vetting their CDS or watching them jam before letting them perform. Eventually, one of the bands he lined up cemented its own talent and determination to make a go of it, and he became their manager.

The cafe neighbourhood became more artistic, and bigger musicians would start dropping in. Chetwynd figures he worked with a hundred different bands and DJs.

“Venues started closing - people were reluctant to spend $10 or $15 on a live band, but they’d jump at $40 to hear a DJ play CDs - go figure.”

Chetwynd got a chance to intern at MTV.

“I was a little old for the demographic, but they were asking me to provide information on the bands coming in.”

After years reading, watching and living for the music business, it was a great opportunity.

“I even got some on-air time with Slash (guitarist for Guns ’n Roses).

“It was scary - I was nervous, obviously star-struck, but I tried to contain it.”

He ended up telling Slash he was the reason Chetwynd got kicked out of school in Grade 6: for wearing a Guns’n Roses T-shirt.

“Slash said when he was in Grade 6, he went into his school and spray painted on the gym floor ‘Slayer f---ing rules.’ He got kicked out, too.”

He’s had the chance to host Tony Bennet for a day, taking him swimming and shopping. He’s met Amy Grant and sat in on the rehearsal for The Police’s Vancouver reunion show.

Still looking for a chance, Chetwynd was asked at his cellphone selling job by a bar owner to come work for him.

“I was bussing, but there was live music every night. I started really observing: the audience reactions, the set times, the set-up.”

He got another chance to intern with promoters coming into the club.

“I impressed them - a 30-year-old who hadn’t given up.”

With his last job as club janitor, he saw the chance to line up local bands on off nights for his own promotions.

“Five hundred people showed up - the bands, their friends and family, all my contacts. They loved it.”

He ran similar shows every few months from then until now, when it happened his girlfriend was accepted into Acadia University’s education program - and his own 10-year limit away from the Valley was coming to an end.

“It’s closer to my mom, and I want to come home and make a difference here.”

In his first week home, he called local bar owners and music venues, event campgrounds and local and regional promoters. He’s bringing in Cuban Assissins from Halifax as the headliners, plus three other bands, for a “Ghouls Gone Wild” Halloween party at Dooly’s in Greenwood October 26. He’s established his business: Smokin’ Entertainment.

“I’m looking for bands - my heart and soul is in rock ’n roll, but I want gospel, folk, magicians for kids’ parties, monster trucks.

“I worked my butt off the last two years to have this window - just getting by, making connections. Making money now is not my priority.”

Chetwynd is counting on his reputation out west treating bands honestly and “like royalty” - even local bands - to help him get started here. Bands he worked with in B.C. do travel as far east as Montreal: “Now they have a reason to come here. If I find bands here, I can get them on bills out west.

“If I made it in a city of two million, the possibilities here are endless. The only thing I can be is confident. I have all the drive and ambition.”

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