Aaron Persinger Bio

A Musical History

I began studying music formally when I was four years old, studying the Suzuki method on violin. At age 10, I began studying drums and percussion. I started playing guitar and writing songs at age 13. I played everything from heavy metal to big band jazz on drum kit, hand percussion, and mallet instruments. I also studied piano, trumpet, clarinet, alto saxophone, and flute during my early studies.

I was so blessed to have grown up in southern Indiana where I had access to so many world-class musicians. I’ve studied with Dane Clark, Becky Kite, Jack Gilfoy, Kay Stonefelt ,and Kenny Aronoff.

I continued my formal music training and studied business at Indiana University. IU has been a regular on USA Today’s list of top Business Schools in the country and has a long history of being one of the best music schools in the world. At IU I studied performance on guitar and drum kit, took many of the great music history classes offered at IU with instructors like David Baker, Jack Gilfoy, and Glenn Gass. I also took several audio technology classes and interned for a year in a local recording studio, Music House. I received degrees in business and sociology with focuses on music performance, legal studies, musicology, and folklore.

In 2000, My experiences and education combined to give me the opportunity to intern with the artist development department at RCA Label Group in Nashville, TN under the direction of Joe Gilante and Sam Ramage. I then assisted publisher Whitney Daane with her song catalogs at Notation and Wrensong Music Publishing.

The end of the CD boom was hitting music Row hard in 2000. Most consumers had repurchased their vinyl and cassette collections on CD and many were now downloading music from websites like Napster. Jobs were becoming scarce in the music industry, and the writing on the wall was pretty clear . . . During one hot summer, I was able to watch the industry take one of its biggest declines on record. Big music industry has never really recovered.

I knew then that I wasn’t in a position with enough support, inner strength, and health to attempt to push my way through the traditional avenues for a singer/songwriter in Nashville. So I returned to Indiana, started up The Aaron Persinger Band and began to build myself musically, emotionally, and spiritually. I needed to mature, get healthy, and find my inner strength.

During the past several years I've been working in my community. I received the Mayor’s Award for Civic Engagement in 2004 for my work with at-risk families, children with autistic disorders, and contributions through music to different therapy programs and civic causes over the years.

I’ then spent two years working at a local mental health facility assisting individuals with severe mental illnesses, clients with developmental disabilities , and later for those experiencing homelessness. I also developed a weekly music program through the partial hospitalization program helping individuals develop coping skills through music performance.

Today, I’ve found my strength. I’ve gained a very important perspective. I have a solid foundation of self, incredible support from friends and family, and I’ve fine-tuned my craft of writing songs and performing.
At this time I’m putting together a "Dream Team" of world class musicians that wil be available for worldwide distribution through itunes, aaronpersinger.com, and many other download venues.

I continue to shop around for small labels, management companies, publishers, private investors and live music venues searching for more opportunities and larger audiences.

I also have a live band that has been playing out for the past year that is made up of Sam Pierce on drums and Brian Peterson on bass, supporting my vocals, guitar, and harmonica. I’m performing as a solo singer/songwriter and participating in many writers’ nights in Nashville, TN and in Bloomington, IN. You can also check me out with support from The Hazelwood String Band or drumming with Leon Chance and The Long Shots.

A History of Aaron

1975-1980

My mom says:

"They thought you were a tumor. I had a partial hysterectomy, or so I thought, and they thought it was impossible that you were a baby. They thought you were a tumor. I was studying music at Ball State to finish my masters and be a music teacher. I was studying percussion, guitar, and voice. The three things you have focused on. Funny, how that works."

All I know is that I can't remember not singing and playing instruments.


		I began studying violin at age four, and started performing at age five. I saw a performance of the Nutcracker at Indiana University and met one of the violinists in the orchestra pit. I was hooked. I still have this little, bitty violin, somewhere. My first performance was for my kindergarten class. Today, I can remember how to hold it and that's about it. I'm sure it helped lay down some framework for my future musical journeys. I had already begun singing and making up songs by this age. The first song I remember singing was "Home on the Range". Somewhat appropriate considering, years later I would end up in Wyoming




1980-1990

I was also a painter for a while. I studied oil painting from age six through age ten. These two paintings are the only ones I still have. I painted the tiger in second grade and the sunset in the third. I was still playing a lot of music. I put on lots of performances at both home and school. At age ten, I had to make a choice between taking art or music. I chose band. I wanted to play saxophone. I could only afford drumsticks, so I learned to play the drums and have enjoyed playing for the past twenty years. I have, however, always wanted to go back to painting.

My first paying job was a part in the John Sayles film, "Eight Men Out" an independent historical drama about the 1919 Chicago White Sox that threw the World Series. I answered a casting call and ended up getting two roles as a bat boy and a peanut vender. My acting career was short lived, and most of my work ended up on the cutting room floor. At this point, I had been playing drums for a little over a year and was still another year or two away from starting on guitar and writing songs. I was still doing a lot of drawing and writing.

At age ten I began studying drums with several of the top drummers and percussionists in the world. At age thirteen, I began playing guitar and writing songs. My father has been a singer/songwriter since the late 60's and I just followed his lead. I've always approached my songwriting as it comes — anytime I can write a song I say let it come and I don't prescribe to any certain ritual. I also approach my style that way, I guess. It is difficult for most people if you don't call yourself something, so I'll say my style is Americana.

At age 13, I started working on a produce farm, twelve hours a day, seven days a week planting, cultivating, and harvesting tomatoes, corn, peppers, watermelon, cantaloupe, and cucumbers. I spent the rest of my time practicing drums, guitar, and writing songs. I wrote my first song at age sixteen "Paper Hearts and Matches". I started performing for family and friends. I performed with a few local bands around Jackson County.

1990-2000

By my senior year of high school I had received top honors at state music contest on drum set, snare drum, and marimba; and had began performing at a coffee shop, The Coffee Zon, in Indianapolis, Indiana, as a singer/songwriter. During my first year of college I became a favorite a local parties in rural southeastern Kentucky. These parties would usually be in the middle of nowhere with bootlegged alcohol. One year was enough and I headed out west.

I moved to Wyoming when I was 19. I got a gig playing three nights a week in a bar called Humphrey's in Gillette. It was the summer of 1994. I was making good money, playing to cowboys, truck drivers, bikers, coal miners, ranchers, and everyday hard working, hard drinking, music lovin' people. It was the first time that I really focused on just singing and playin' guitar for people. I still didn't lay down drums completely. I began playing in a four piece jazz combo on the side. It was a great time and I was able to expand my song catalog, develop a stage presence, and continue to fine tune my songwriting.
		Back home, my mother answered a flyer for me from a band looking for a drummer. I returned to Bloomington, IN, and joined the band, Quiver. Our first show was a house party with two other bands, Vellow Deluxe and El Niño, where I first met my current drummer and friend, Paul Karaffa, Quiver consisted of singer/songwriter, Olenka; guitarist, Kent Bell; bassist, Casey Mahaffey; and me on drums. We played mostly local Bloomington bars, like The Bluebird and Second Story. We recorded a four song demo and a live show at the Bluebird in Bloomington, IN. After about six months of performing, we broke up in the spring of 1995.

After a summer of work as a commercial salmon fisherman in Kodiak, Alaska, I joined back up with Kent Bell in a band called Automatic Earth with new additions singer/songwriter, Shannon Ferry; bassists, Joel Machiela, followed by Aaron Bollinger. We played shows around the mid-west and even made it to The CBGB in New York. We recorded around 50 songs in a demo session, and later released songs from this recording on cd titled Liquid Confidence. We lasted from 1995 to 1998 and then went our separate ways.

2000-2005

My next steady gig was with the band Joint Session. This seven piece, rock, blues, funk, and reggae band, consisted of seven singer/songwriters. Scott McNew and Matt Davis on guitars and vocals, Honey Roy Carter on Hammond organ, Rhodes piano, harmonica, and vocals, F.A. on bass and vocals, Denise Sherman on hand percussion and vocals, Darien Mack on Latin percussion and vocals, and myself on drums and vocals. We played around the Midwest and had a lot of fun collaborating for about a year or so. They released ‘Calling of the Road’ during that time, but unfortunate for me, I had joined shortly after that recording was made. We did, however, record several live shows. Joint Session disbanded in late 2000, and I decided to focus on my own music.

I developed my own recording company, Happy 2B Heard Music, to begin recording and cataloging my songs. My first goal was to bring all my musician friends together to play and record my songs. I gave each person three tapes with nearly twenty songs on each and asked them to pick their favorites. In April of 2000 I brought everyone together at Farm Fresh Studios in Bloomington to perform and record sixteen songs that would become Aaron Persinger and Friends, The Popcorn Guy.

		The tape for the session was donated by a friend at Quantegy; all the musicians were my friends, helping me out of the kindness of their hearts and the deal that they would receive twenty copies when the final retail ready cd was completed. We had rehearsed in small groups, but the studio was where it was all heard and recorded for the first and only time. The CD has been compared to John Prine, Neil Young, Steve Earl, and Johnny Cash. This is just a small sample of several hundreds songs I've written, in quite a few different styles, over the past couple of decades.



No one had heard the full orchestration. Most of the musicians had never performed together. Everything that made it on the album is first takes. I think we may have done two takes on a couple of songs, but used the first. It was an almost nonexistent budget of less than a thousand dollars, but it was a magical experience that I'll never forget. The album worked out to be a history of American music from early blues, folk, bluegrass, rockabilly, and old school country and roots rock—a time capsule to remember the talent of friends.

		During The Popcorn Guy sessions I brought in my father, Joe Persinger, and I also contributed production and percussion credits for twelve of his songs which combined to make the album, "Someone like you". Many of the musicians on The Popcorn Guy contributed to "Someone like you". It was a joy to hear songs that I had listened to growing up orchestrated and recorded. It was an even greater joy to have the opportunity to perform with my dad. His album is similar, in some ways, to The Popcorn Guy, but I have heard comparisons to Don Mclean, Roy Orbison, and Jerry Lee Lewis's country songs.

Later in 2000, after completing an internship with BMG Entertainment's RCA Label Group as an assistant to the Artist Development staff in Nashville, TN, I then worked for Wrensong and Notation music publishers. I returned late in 2000 and put together The Aaron Persinger Band to perform some live shows and work on developing my songs and writing. I enlisted Paul Karaffa on drums, Brian Leaver on banjo, guitars, and mandolin, and Bill Anderson on bass. We recorded The Aaron Persinger Band - Single "You Ought to Know by Now", with former Joint Session band mate Honey Roy Carter on organ and Honey Roy Sr. on Saxophone. We also contributed production and performance credits for Honey Roy's "Back in Action" project in the summer of 2002.

A series of personal tragedies led me to retreat to Kodiak, Alaska, one more time to work as a commercial salmon and crab fisherman in 2003. On October 17^th, 2003, I returned to Bloomington, IN, and put my music to good work with children with autistic disorders and then through the local community mental health center. The work I was able to do and my ability to combine my music into positive thereapy for people in my community easily became the most rewarding work I have experienced.

Since the summer of 07 I have been performing steadily as a singer/songwriter and drummer. I perform as a solo act, with my three piece band and usual suspects of instramentalist, I am supported by The Hazelwood String Band from time to time, I also am playing drums with"Honky Tonkers" Leon Chance and the Long Shots.

Currently I'm working on a new studio recording with my Bloomington "Dream Team" with a 5 song cd set to be available by the end of 08 and a full length cd by mid 09.