Once I started getting mainstream people to my shows, I realized we were taking too many solos, and they were too long. I started gauging when people were going on their iPhones.
I do feel a responsibility because most people like me that are my age or younger, they don't quite make it over to the jazz side. They flirt with it, but they don't quite marry it.
I grew up in church. That's how most young African American musicians learn how to perform. You could be six years old and playing organ or drums in front of thousands or hundreds of people.
Sometimes I'll write a song first and then I'm like, "Oh this person will be great on this song." But there are some artists I know what want, like off the top I knew I wanted Brandy and Faith Evans. Their music is like the soundtrack to my life, so it was a personal thing for me. So once they said yes, I wrote songs specifically for them.
It's funny, now that we have Twitter and Facebook and stuff, you can really see how you affect fans. Before all that, fans couldn't tell you exactly how they feel, unless they came up after a show, and even then you can't stand there and talk to everybody in the audience. So it's nice to see people tweet me and say, "Your music has changed my life," or "I had my baby to your music," or "I got married to your music." I've heard so many things, and it's amazing to hear people's stories and how you affect their life.
If I was a singer who won those Grammys, I'd be gracing all the magazine covers... I barely got asked to do an interview.
Everybody's not going to like jazz, let's just be honest about it. Everybody doesn't like everything. There's a disconnect in generations and some people just aren't going to feel that music.
My fan base is extremely random. It's the 14-year-old white kid sitting next to your auntie from St. Luke's Baptist Church, to the 20-year-old Black girl who probably would go to a Rihanna concert, but she's coming to my show.
