Small-town PA Girl Gets Big TV Break
by DARA RIEGAL

She sat at the café table, a collage of color: bright-purple hoodie, boldly patterned blue scarf, and the pink cheeks that the Twin Tiers’ chilly spring air requires everyone to wear in late March. The warm expression in her kind brown eyes belied the cold and welcomed me to her table. Singer/songwriter Jana Losey proved to be as engaging face-to-face as she is in her soulful music, as she shed light on her upcoming projects, including a new album, her own reality/variety show, and a new performance series held by her record company, Posey Tunes.

Having grown up in Lawrenceville, Pennsylvania, Losey understands what it is to be a small-town person with big dreams. She started exploring her musical talents when she was eight years old and continued to study seriously at Ithaca College. Leaving college early to join Squok Opera, an avant-garde troupe, Losey spent five years touring and ultimately went to Broadway.

Burned out and needing time for herself, she took a sabbatical from music and moved to California to work in wardrobe at the La Jolla Playhouse and later became a licensed masseuse with her own practice. During this time, Losey recovered some of her drive to create and “music started creep back in.”  She joined a cover band and started writing again with band mate, Melanie Peters. Now her business and life partner, Peters played an integral role in helping Losey rediscover her voice.

“That really restarted my joy in music,” says Losey. “Slowly Melanie and I started saving some of the songs we wrote for ourselves with the idea that we might sell them to other artists.” Fate had other plans, however, and soon her first album, Bittersweet, was given life. Peters used some forty hours of studio timed owed to her to record their songs. “Soon we were writing a song a week and then going in to record it,” says Losey with a hint of awe in her voice. “We still think of Bittersweet as a bit of a miracle; a kind of really wonderful mistake.”

From there, Losey decided to become a full-time musician, touring the country and getting airtime for some of her songs, including “London Holiday,” which was a local favorite on radio stations across the Twin Tiers in 2006. They moved to Losey’s childhood home, a Lawrenceville farm, and started touring, first with a band and then as a duo. “Right now, it’s basically me and Melanie touring in a little hybrid car and doing acoustic sets,” explained Losey.

This is one of the many things Losey speaks on when she visits area high school in hopes of raising awareness of her upcoming album, Blocks, her reality/variety show, The Song You Heard, and her desire to get kids involved and confident about their talents. “Being from a small area, I think some of the kids here have a general lack of confidence that they can do whatever they want in life,” said Losey. “City kids might have more exposure to theater and music but it’s so important for kids here to know that there’s no reason why they can’t do it just because they’re from here. I want to do everything I can to help them understand that.”

One way she hopes to get that through to kids is through The Song You Heard, which first aired in March  on Big Fox stations from Wellsboro to Rochester. Each monthly episode features Losey’s travels and the artists she meets along the way in cities big or small. The episodes will then run weekly until a new one airs.

“It’s cool for people to see familiar places and people on TV,” said Losey. “It might make performing seem more accessible to kids if they see their hometown or someone from it on a real TV show.” She also sees this opportunity as a way to bring more attention to some of the lesser-known artists she encounters along the way. Each show will show the highs and lows of touring, but will also showcase interviews of and performances by different artists, as well as live music by Losey.

Part of one of the upcoming episodes will be shot at Losey’s April 4 concerts/album-release parties at Elmira’s Clemens Center. At the schools she has visited, Losey made sure to offer all students half-price tickets to the shows, acknowledging the importance of getting teens involved with music, as well as her show. “It should be a nice tie-in,” said Losey. “This episode of show will include part of the concert, backstage shots, and some of the music from our new CD, Blocks.

More structured and thought-out than Bittersweet, Blocks was a “very fulfilling album to make,” with Losey and Peters taking the opportunity to set out to make a whole album, while paying attention to “the moods of each song” as they pertained to the whole. “To me, the whole album is much more important than making a few hit singles,” explained Losey. “I feel like people are getting tired of the whole ‘hits culture’ and are ready, as a society, to go back to more of a grass roots approach and really listen to each song.”

In that same vein, Losey hopes to invigorate the region’s interest in new talents through a concert series she will host at Corning’s Radisson Hotel. From May through October, 2008, Losey and Peter’s record company, Posey Tunes, will bring a new act to the Radisson each month, featuring artists from all over the country, including those from New York, Buffalo and California.

“We want to bring in artists who are on the cusp of great success, and introduce them to the region, in hopes of gaining them attention and bringing new sounds to the region,” said Losey. She is also hoping to bring a few teenage artists from other areas to both perform and visit the schools with her to further reinforce her point that “you don’t have to be from a big city to be a great artist.”

Big FOX TV: Check local listings for The Song You Heard

Clemens Center performances: 7 and 9 p.m. April 4; tickets $20 (half price with student ID; must call ahead)

Information: www.janalosey.com or (570 ) 504-5589. Search MTV’s Web site to vote for Losey’s music video

Dara Riegel is a frequent contributor to Mountain Home magazine.