Life & Work with Tessa Karrys

Today we’d like to introduce you to Tessa Karrys.

Hi Tessa, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
Hi! My name is Tessa Karrys and I’m a singer-songwriter and performer in the Phoenix area. I grew up with a love of music that began with childhood piano lessons, a lot of creative free play and being a daughter in a long line of artists. While I was always a lover of music, I stopped playing music completely for several years after moving from outside of Chicago, IL to rural Arizona in middle school. I didn’t know quite how much I missed it until I was able to borrow my brother’s guitar and start taking lessons when I was 16. It felt like a dream come true. Immediately, songwriting became synonymous with learning how to play guitar.

I was able to share and process feelings and experiences through songs that I hadn’t been able to in any other way.

Sharing these early, personal songs with my close circle of friends and family was both scary and exciting. I’m so grateful for this support circle who encouraged me to keep writing and playing and sharing. I don’t think I realized until many years later how important that kind of support was early on. Without it, I’m not sure if I would’ve had the courage at that time to share my music with larger audiences.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Music has been so deeply intertwined in my life since I was a teenager that many of the challenges I’ve faced in music are directly connected with the lessons and the growing pains of life. When writer’s block appears, it’s not just in songwriting but often goes hand in hand with feeling blocked emotionally or creatively in other aspects of my life.

Times when my heart isn’t fully in performing usually stem from periods where my self-esteem or self-worth are more fragile making it difficult to put myself out there authentically in front of many people. Looking back, I can’t say it’s been a smooth process but that’s mainly because life hasn’t been smooth. The music itself has been a bright spot in my life and a way to create something meaningful and beautiful from the challenges and hardships.

I think we all need those things in life that are more important to us than being right or being comfortable. My love and commitment to music have time and time again pushed me out of my comfort zone or pushed me to do inner work that was standing in the way of being the authentic artist/person I want to be.  The world doesn’t need more people who sound pretty; it needs more people who are honest and authentic and share their hearts. That’s what I want to bring to the world through music.

A fellow professional musician once shared his wisdom with me that creating music and songwriting are precious gifts that need to be cherished and protected. He talked about the highs and lows of life both being important parts of the process for the life of an artist or musician. Some of my favorite songs stem from my most challenging times in life and similarly, these songs helped me process and heal those times more than anything else.

In the summer of 2020, I lost my mom to cancer and gave birth to my second child just a few weeks apart. I’ve written many songs since then, yet still haven’t shared them with an audience outside my husband and immediate family. I am reminded of the words of this musician who spoke of this art as being a gift that needs to be cherished and protected. Maybe these songs are still too vulnerable and personal for me to bring out further into the world and I need to protect this part of myself a little longer.

Sharing songs with as many people as I can is always important to me, but for now, these songs serve the purpose of helping me put a voice to my grief and sort through my own feelings. However, I do look forward to sharing this part of myself and these new songs with audiences and listeners in the coming year.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
Aside from writing and performing, I’m also involved in two other exciting music-related projects. The first is the start of a children’s story time and music class in Downtown Mesa at a wonderful local shop, Inspire Farms. As a parent, I want my children to have the full experience of growing up in a family with music, art, and creativity while also teaching them to incorporate these into their own lives. Starting a kid’s music class seemed like a great way to share my love of music and art with my own kids as well as other kids in the community. This naturally fell into place when I spoke with Tiffiny, the owner of Inspire Farms, about starting a class at the store. Tiffiny was looking for someone to bring back a free community storytime class to the store and I was looking for somewhere to hold a kid’s music class. I now teach both of these classes back to back every Thursday and the first Saturday of the month for children 7 years old and under.  They’re drop-in friendly classes and parents can reserve a spot in advance at inspirefarms.com. Teaching these classes has been more fun and rewarding than I even imagined and I love being able to help foster a love of music and art in the children in my community.

The second project that I’m excited and grateful to be a part of is The Lullaby Project, a project of Carnegie Hall’s Weill Music Institute that partnered up locally with 4th Trimester Arizona. The Lullaby Project pairs new and expecting parents and caregivers with professional artists to write and sing personal lullabies for their babies, supporting maternal health, aiding childhood development, and strengthening the bond between parent and child. I was beyond excited to be presented with the opportunity to be a part of this. The things I am most passionate about in life include music, social work, creative expression and healing, and postpartum and motherhood. This felt like the dream job that I didn’t even know existed. I am honored to be able to work with local moms and their babies in this special way and hopefully help grow The Lullaby Project to reach even more parents in Arizona in the future.

Can you talk to us a bit about happiness and what makes you happy?
This most recent phase of life has felt like returning to myself in a way and therefore rediscovering what makes me happy. Between the all-encompassing nature of early motherhood, grief, and of course the pandemic, finding happiness over the last couple of years has felt a bit like following breadcrumbs. Life feels nonstop most days with two young kids but they also are incredible (for better or for worse) at keeping me in the present moment and making me so much more aware of things I didn’t notice before. I now take note of the moments that I feel completely at peace in order to create more of those moments in my life. This is often when I’m outdoors, especially when I’m with my husband and kids playing and laughing. I notice when I feel energized and excited thinking about a project or idea in order to pursue opportunities that are built from that feeling.

If I’m planning a class that doesn’t excite me, then chances are I’m not going to be able to get the kids excited about it either! I’m aware of what makes my cup feel full or overflowing, like after a fun gig or spending an evening with my sisters and closest friends. Then I return home, feeling like I have so much more of myself to share with my family. I even notice what makes my mind quiet down (which can be rare for me), and these days that is often simple arts and crafts that I do with my kids or prepping for my weekly classes. By taking note of these small moments, I recognize the simple things that bring me the most happiness: family, music, nature, art, and connection. And when in doubt (or stress), I can always return to these.

Pricing:

• Available for hire for events – contact Tessa for availability and pricing.
• Children’s Music Hour Class every Thursday and the first Saturday of the month at Inspire Farms in.Downtown Mesa – $15 for one child / $25 for two
  (Tessa also teaches a weekly free story time class for kids immediately preceding Music Hour).
• RSVP at https://www.inspirefarms.com/collections/classes/products/music-hour

Contact Info:

• Website: http://www.tessakarrys.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tkarrys/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tessakarrys/

Image Credits
Tiffany Haynes, Bill Goodman, and Mike Roessmann