My whole career began because I was always putting my music on the Internet. By the time I had my first tour, I had an audience everywhere I went, because people were listening online.
— Jason Mraz
What I'd love to do is work with kids in the U.S. to raise their awareness and encourage them to be global citizens. We're all connected these days; we can listen to the same music as kids all around the world and share our ideas.
Well, I've been happily supporting myself for ten years now on the hustle and trade of live entertainment. I guess my breakthrough moment was when I decided to go for it once and for all.
I listened to the radio, so I was influenced by everyone from Michael Jackson to Milli Vanilli. But thankfully my dad had a collection of Cat Stevens albums while my mom was listening to jazz.
I want to be surrounded by women, I want to be snuggled and cuddled and pampered.
It's easier to write from my own life, and it's also more fun. I always write about relationships, for instance, whether they're romantic relationships, friendships, encounters... there's always a lesson to be learned from them.
As an American citizen, one has to vote. If we don't vote, we're not doing our part. We'll become some sort of oligarchy.
In my relationship, I was giving myself away to make the relationship better, but in actuality, wasn't doing better by doing that. I became less of a man.
Music is a weapon in the war against unhappiness.
But that guitar is the perfect companion to the human voice. You rest it against your gut, against your heart, and when you strum it the vibrations go outwards for all to hear, but the vibration also hits you on your body.
I call it sacred geometry. When everything's just right and it feels really balanced, so that when it unfolds to the next part, you feel totally familiar and at ease within the song.
I'm actually no longer a strict vegan. I don't hang out in the cheese section - I don't even eat cheese. I don't drink milk. But every once in a while I'll have an egg. I'm going to eat eggs that come out of my next-door neighbor's farm, that's just the way it is.
Songs always get better after you start playing them live.
Traveling has a major impact on what I do, cause all over the world I'm meeting all kinds of people. And relationships is the second major impact that I have. I just enjoy the variety that the world has to offer.
Sometimes you forget where the heck you are but when you get on stage, you know by the look on the people's faces and the accent in their voices where you might be.
My goal is to show everyone that they, too, can do what they love to do.
I'm trying to be more of a gentleman.
I recently read that it's the left brain that does all that calculating, and the right brain that does the poetry. Somehow I've veered way towards the left. I've been doing it for years. Maybe I do art to balance it out.
Well, my view before was a Western view, and I certainly understand marriage equality and civil rights, equal rights for all, but having visited developing nations and some of the poorest nations in the world, I realize how deep it goes and how much work really needs to be done to create equality for all.
Genre-spanning is the effort to make the live show interesting. It's also a great way to challenge yourself as a writer.
New York City has the most beautiful women.
You come to realize that only one person can tell you what's expected of you, and that's you.
I do feel most at home playing live, but the feeling of getting into the studio to see the new songs take shape was really incredible.
I didn't know if I had the music for it or if I could pull off the larger concert experience. Then I realized if I can just continue to be myself, I'll be all right.
When I sit down to write a song, I really want the message of healing to thrive and transcend all ages.
Everything in life influences my music. I've always used songwriting as a means to share what I think is profound.
Well, for me, what I've learned at the very end of this, love is sharing, and I think that really is, for me, the best place to go to experience love, is sharing.
You know, there's still a lot of great songwriters out there who hand in songs. And there's a lot of brilliant singers and performers out there who sing other people's words. I enjoy doing both.
And if you're singing to someone, or if they're singing along, and suddenly you're in harmony, then it's actually making a huge difference on a subatomic level that is actually transforming the world.
When I was in high school, The Dave Matthews Band was a local band, and that was the first time I was starting to connect with a live band that was something that wasn't on the radio or TV.
The easiest songs to write are pure fiction. There is no limit to how you can tell the story. I find it difficult when I'm replaying an event through a song.
Our shows are packed with laughter and light-hearted songs to lift the listener from their everyday life. We encourage the audience to participate in any way.
It was a very bizarre experience for me, to get the songs together, go in there, and try to deliver them as I would perhaps in a live setting. But I realized that I couldn't take on that coffeehouse style that I came from and go in there and burn it up.
I'm totally into new age and self-help books. I used to work in a bookstore and that's the section they gave me, and I got way into it. I just loved the power of positive thinking, letting yourself go.
When you sing a song of love, you're actually giving something to yourself, too. You're singing and casting these affirmations of love out into the universe. It resonates in your body in a way that feels extraordinary.
A rescue mission doesn't involve going in and just taking a child and leaving. You can't just choose any child at random. Every kid has a case that is based on that child's original family. So, we made it over to a village, found the child; we were interacting with the child.
Music was always the distraction, so it was the obvious choice to pursue. My dad always said to find a job I love to do, that way it wouldn't feel like a job. So I did that.
If I'm in a relationship, that girl gets showered with letters from the road. I pour my heart into it.
I always think of the live show first, where the song is gonna go in the show. That's why they aren't sad songs. When I play, I want to make people happy, not sad. It's such a pleasure for me to do what I do, and I want other people to feel some form of that pleasure, too.
A lot of those ideal towns are all starting to look the same, the specifics are starting to disappear. So we need to retain a love for life, a love for one's family, a love for where one's really from.
If you have nothing but love for your avocados, and you take joy in turning them into guacamole, all you need is someone to share it with.
Musicians are so well covered in the press, it would be great to see more outspoken practitioners of green life.
My parents were always very supportive and accepting. They even shared my curiosity for life, or perhaps I theirs.
I'm not a virtuoso on an instrument. You know, I'm not always singing in pitch. I laugh sometimes my way through the shows, but I'm an honest songwriter who's always tried to bring the audience with me on my journey in hopes that they see their own lives reflected in the work.
But my strength was in singing and songwriting, which was a new discovery for me when I was 18. And I decided if I pursued songwriting, which is what was closest to my heart, then there would be no competition. I would just live my life being myself and living my dream.
There's a certain feeling of giving, a certain feeling of generosity in love songs. When you sing a song of love, you're actually giving something to yourself, too. You're singing and casting these affirmations of love out into the universe.
We want people to see us live before we continue on and call ourselves recording artists.
Surrender to life itself and you'll just be rewarded with so many things. And I've been rewarded so many times, in so many mysterious ways. So I have no reason to be disappointed with anything.
My parents dreaded the fact that I was changing my life to do this, but I just kept doing it.
In the words of Michael Jackson: I'm a lover, not a fighter.
