Busking in the New York Subway

Cris Cohen: When I was doing research on you, I found out that a lot of your vocal education came from busking in the subways of New York City. What did you learn from that experience?

Jason Adamo: How to project my voice. Before I started singing and busking in the subways, I was a lot lighter of a singer, more breathy. I just hadn’t found my voice yet.

And then I was like, “I’ve got to get to these people.” It was awesome playing down there, because there was a new crowd every five minutes. But every five minutes I had to try to get that crowd to turn around, listen to me, and throw a couple of dollars in my guitar case.

So I learned with this nonstop rattling of train cars going by. You figure out how to project based on that, based on trying to stand out amongst the noise of the people and the trains and stuff.

And then also listening to Martin Sexton, the way that guy sang. The same time that I was playing in the subways, my cousin gave me a CD of Martin Sexton’s greatest hits. I was listening to that in my Discman back in the day and trying to sing along. So at the same time of projecting over the noise of the subway, I was also trying to basically mimic the way that this guy was singing.

And he’s a guy who can really project his voice. I couldn’t sing like Martin. So I had to find my own voice.