{"id":12549,"date":"2014-03-10T15:00:47","date_gmt":"2014-03-10T20:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/?p=12549"},"modified":"2014-03-10T15:21:42","modified_gmt":"2014-03-10T20:21:42","slug":"delta-dynamite-local-musician-keith-sanders-full-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/delta-dynamite-local-musician-keith-sanders-full-interview\/","title":{"rendered":"Delta Dynamite: Local Musician Keith Sanders (Full Interview)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"DeltaDynamiteHeader\"<\/a>by Suanne Strider and Nature Humphries – photos by Newt Rayburn<\/h3>\n

–<\/p>\n

\"IMG_6233_pshopfilter\"<\/a>Twenty six year old Keith Sanders<\/strong> has been making waves recently for his appearance on American Idol<\/em> last month, he was voted \u201cOxford\u2019s Favorite Vocalist\u201d this year, and is keeping busy with gigs around Oxford and the Delta with his band The Gutter Daisies<\/strong>. Keith is also involved in a new project called Mississippi Po\u2019 Folk, a folk-rap collaboration with Demetrios Brown<\/strong> and Zechariah Lloyd<\/strong>. <\/span><\/p>\n

TLV<\/em> decided to grab a beer with Keith and pick his brain about instant fame, growing up in the Delta, and his big plans for the future.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

–<\/span><\/p>\n

How old are you, Keith?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nFourteen years old in a 26-year-old\u2019s body.<\/span><\/p>\n

Where are you from?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nOriginally I was born in Albany, Georgia. I moved from Georgia when I was about 10 years old. I moved here for two years; my dad came here to get his doctorate in music.<\/span><\/p>\n

Who is your dad?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nDr. Alphonso Sanders<\/strong>, he teaches at Mississippi Valley State University. He\u2019s the chairman of the Fine Arts Dept. there. He also runs the B.B. King Recording Studio. We ventured from there to Cleveland, Mississippi, where my world was kind of changed. Culture shock set in. The Delta definitely had so much culture and history behind it that was hidden, like most people didn\u2019t respect it. My father, being the person that he is, showed me every piece of it. I\u2019ve got a lot of respect for the Delta and the musicians that live there. That influenced me a lot when it came to what kind of music I wanted to play.<\/span><\/p>\n

How long have you been in Oxford?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\n\"KSanders1\"<\/a>I\u2019ve been in Oxford for almost four years. I ended up moving here when I was 23, and me and my buddy Shane [King]<\/strong> decided we needed to get out of the Delta. We were stuck and we needed to make some moves. We met a couple of people down here because Shane\u2019s brother Scott King<\/strong> lived here, and we\u2019d come up and visit him every so often. We met some really cool influential people in music. They heard us play and they were like, \u201cMan ya\u2019ll should come play down here!\u201d And the rest is history. The next thing I know, we were packing up our houses and moving. It took us a day and a half to decide. My mom was a little upset, but other than that it turned out all right.<\/span><\/p>\n

What are your early music experiences? When did you start getting interested in music?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nMusic was a weird thing for me, growing up. When it finally became my dream, when it finally turned for me, I ended up not being able to play basketball in college, which sucked, but I still had to find a way to pay for college. So I ended up joining the show choir at Mississippi Delta Community College. I did it because I had to, and then it started turning into something that I wanted to do. I did the dancing and things just because, but learning how to sing was a big step for me. I had some really good teachers in Show Choir, one of them being Ms. Beverly Terrell<\/strong>, and the other was Ms. Mona Strawberry<\/strong>. She was director of the group. They helped mold my voice a little bit. After I left there I kept singing, and it was just about fun at first. Then it started to become life, once I started playing at bars and at parties, and once it became a business for me it turned. That\u2019s when it stopped me being a kid running around on a stage and it turned into a business for me. This is going to be your life. So, I guess when I moved up here, that\u2019s when it became real. That\u2019s when I decided that\u2019s what I was gonna do.<\/span><\/p>\n

In your very young life were you playing music?\u00a0 When did you start playing guitar?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nI started playing guitar about five and a half years ago.\u00a0 But, I started playing the trumpet at the age of six. My dad had one lying around his office at the time and I picked it up and starting trying to figure out what was going on.\u00a0 He taught me a little bit, and the next thing I know I was making sounds, and just kept playing. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So were you playing in the band in high school?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nI did. I played trumpet, and in high school, that\u2019s a different instrument. High school\u2019s a different thing. I wanted to play sports really bad, so my dad made a pact with me and said, \u201cJust stay in band through high school.\u201d And I loved band, I really did. But like I said, high school is kind of a different thing and I wasn\u2019t really confident, and I like basketball, too, so I played basketball, ran track, tried football. I did as many sports as I possibly could in high school\u2014at Cleveland High.\u00a0 So [the music] kind of fell to the side\u2014it disappeared for a while when sports came along.<\/span><\/p>\n

What bands have you played with in Oxford?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nWe formed the Gutter Daisies<\/strong> about a year ago, with myself, Shane King<\/strong>, Josh Blackburn<\/strong>, and Richard Zepeda<\/strong>. Before that, it was just me and Shane doing the acoustic thing. I got loaned out to a couple of bands singing, like Silas Reed N\u2019 da Books<\/strong>. I played with Adrian Dickey<\/strong> for a long time. I actually recorded on his album, Bless The Soul<\/em>, which is one of my favorite memories of this place. I played guitar and did backup vocals. That wasn\u2019t of my first time recording, but it was one of the first times I was involved with the whole process from beginning to end. That was recorded at [Andrew Ratcliffe<\/strong>\u2019s] Tweed Studios. Ratcliffe did a really good job. He helped me out too, because you really never know what your voice is doing until it\u2019s recorded and you hear it back, and you have somebody else listening to it telling you, \u201cYou gotta change these things.\u201d He kind-of guided my path.<\/span>
\nI just recently started a new project with Demetrios Brown<\/strong> and Zechariah Lloyd<\/strong> called Mississippi Po\u2019 Folk<\/strong>. It\u2019s like a rap-folk group. I don\u2019t think many people have done that. It\u2019s something new we wanted to try\u2026just kind-of telling the struggles of people growing up in Mississippi, you know, the things we have to deal with here in Mississippi. So it\u2019s going to be a fun thing, but a serious thing at the same time. And I will be guest starring with FadeToBlack<\/strong> some, which should be fun.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

\"KSanders2\"<\/a>What kind of covers are you doing with Mississippi Po\u2019 Folk?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nIt\u2019s a mixture of today\u2019s pop, but we change things up. We mash up a couple of songs from the old school and the new school. So it\u2019s a nice little mixture.<\/span><\/p>\n

I was at the recent Gutter Daisies show at Proud Larry\u2019s when Jo Jo Herman [piano player for Widespread Panic] pulled his chair up to the front of the stage to watch you guys. I heard he was quite enthralled with the show. How does that make you feel?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nSeeing Jo Jo<\/strong> down there made me feel warm at heart. At first, I didn\u2019t know who he was, so I was thinking, \u201cOk, there\u2019s someone sitting here looking at us really intensely.\u201d So I was just putting on a show and it wasn\u2019t until afterwards, I got down [off the stage] and Chico [Harris]<\/strong> said, \u201cHey man, I want you to meet a friend of mine. This is Jo Jo.\u201d I had hear that Jo Jo was playing at the Ford Center earlier [that night], and I was like, \u201cWow! Did he really come to our show? <\/span>
\nHe could have gone home, he could have done anything but he decided, I\u2019m gonna go to Proud Larry\u2019s and check out the band. I was so happy that it was our band that he got to see. Him telling me that he dug our sound was a life changer. You know, having someone tell you something like that\u2014someone that you grew up listening to.<\/span><\/p>\n

Do you think growing up in the Delta helped you to become the musician that you are?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nI would say that growing up in the Delta definitely influenced my sound. I definitely have some blues roots in my sound, and I have some jazz roots in my sound. There\u2019s a little bit of soul there, a little bit of Americana. My father being who he is, growing up I got a chance to meet some of the greatest blues musicians out there. I got to work at the B.B. King Museum for a while, where I ended up meeting so many people that changed my world. I met Robert Cray<\/strong>, I met Keb Mo<\/strong>, Kenny Wayne Shepard<\/strong>, Bobby \u201cBlue\u201d Bland<\/strong>, I met B.B. King<\/strong>. I got a chance to meet some of the greatest blues musicians out there, and I got a chance to sit down and talk to a bunch of them. All of them couldn\u2019t stick around and talk to me, but the ones that could\u2014I would talk to them, and of course it shaped my music. My voice is little bit different from blues singers, but I\u2019ve learned to shape it into the music that I\u2019m writing now. <\/span>
\nBeing around the culture in the Delta, that\u2019s a chance of a lifetime. Most people don\u2019t get that chance, and if they do, they don\u2019t respect that chance. I didn\u2019t at first. It took me a long time. But once I decided that music was what I wanted to do I started snatching it up, and I was kind of upset with myself that I had not done that earlier. I had been around it, I had seen it, I had talked to those people, but I wasn\u2019t using it<\/span><\/p>\n

\"KeithSandersAMIdol\"<\/a>So did those musicians help with how you deal with the fame American Idol<\/em> has brought?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nYes, in a way it does. It shapes you\u2026prepares you\u2026because you see how they deal with it. And most of them are really levelheaded. They haven\u2019t changed much since they started the whole \u201cfame\u201d thing. They were decent people\u2014they were just like us. If fame ever happened to me, I would hope that I could keep a level head\u2014enough to know\u2014you\u2019re still Keith Sanders. Just because people enjoy your music doesn\u2019t mean you are better than anyone else.<\/span><\/p>\n

What surprised you the most about your American Idol<\/em> experience?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nThe biggest surprise was going to Utah. You can\u2019t breathe up there. The elevation was ridiculous!<\/span><\/p>\n

Did it affect your singing?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nIt affects your breathing! But you get used to it. We were there a week, so by the end of it I kind of got used to it. <\/span>
\nWhen I first got there I remember climbing up some stairs to get to the ballroom and I got of breath, and I was like, \u201cWhat is wrong with me? Why is this happening?\u201d (laughs)\u00a0 One of the guys from Maryville, Tennessee\u2014where\u2019s there\u2019s mountains\u2014said, \u201cAw man, it\u2019s just the elevation. You\u2019ll get used to it.\u201d And he pats me on the back and runs off.\u00a0 Coming from the Delta didn\u2019t help out at all, because it\u2019s straight, flat land there below sea level, and I was like a thousand feet above sea level almost. So yeah, that was the weirdest experience throughout this whole thing from beginning to end was not being able to breathe. The rest of it was like clockwork. You get nervous\u2014any human would. For me, when I got onstage to sing for the judges, it was like any other gig for me. At first I\u2019m nervous, I\u2019m kinda shaking a little bit, but once that first note comes out, once you start playing, the nerves stop shaking, that\u2019s starts to go away and you get comfortable in your singing. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

So your performing in Oxford helped prepare you for Idol<\/em>?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nIt helps you become a performer. Everything disappears when you hit the stage. No matter if it\u2019s personal, private, or public issues, I feel like, for me\u2014once I hit the stage\u2014I don\u2019t think. That\u2019s the hardest part\u2014if you start thinking too much, and get inside your own head, you can destroy yourself. And I try not to. Yeah, the training for getting up in front of the judges was just playing onstage. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Would you try out again?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nOh, yeah. I definitely would. Unfortunately, this round, I had to drop out. I had some things I had to deal with, but they want me to come back. I will be going back. The competitive side of me wants to see how far I can go. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Are there any restrictions on trying out more than once?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nNo. They actually had two or three people that had tried out this season. There are age restrictions\u2014the limit is 28. I\u2019m 26, so this will be my last time trying out. I actually wasn\u2019t going to try out for it at first. They brought the bus tour through here and my friend Holley Peel<\/strong> was like, \u201cI\u2019m gonna try out tomorrow. Are you?\u201d I was like, \u201cMmmm\u2026I don\u2019t really want to.\u201d Believe it or not, I have some confidence issues sometimes when it comes to music. I didn\u2019t want to go be judged. I didn\u2019t want someone to tell me I wasn\u2019t good enough to do this. But I\u2019m really glad that I did because I needed this experience. <\/span><\/p>\n

Is there anything you would do different the next time?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nYes. I would probably sing songs that are more comfortable for me. When I went in front of the judges, I sang songs that were comfortable for me, and it turned out well, so that\u2019s what I want to do. I want to be able to do an original, because I am a songwriter, and I didn\u2019t think to do an original the first time I was on there because I didn\u2019t know how it was going to go over. Now, I\u2019m pretty sure that my originals will go over really well. So, that\u2019s the one thing I want to do. That would be the thing I would want to change most. I want to play an original song now. I\u2019m fixing to start recording my own solo project, which is a scary thing for me. I mean, I\u2019ve recorded with other people, I\u2019ve done certain things, but I\u2019ve never anything for myself. This goes back to that little \u201clack of confidence thing\u201d for a minute. But now, my Dad has told me, \u201cIt\u2019s time.\u00a0 You\u2019re capable of doing it, so do it.\u201d And he\u2019s right. So, I am going to do it independently with my father.<\/span><\/p>\n

Your father is going to record it at the B. B. King Recording Studio at MVSU?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nYes ma\u2019am. It\u2019s going to be fun. I am actually looking forward to it; really, it\u2019s just like you know when you get that butterfly feeling in your stomach\u2014the butterfly effect\u2014so I am just anxious to see what I will sound like locked down on a CD. I am extremely excited to be playing my own music.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"KSanders3\"<\/a>Will you have a full band behind you, and whom do you think you might take into the studio with you?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nThere are a couple of different songs that are going to be more low-key, but yeah, there\u2019s going to be a full band behind it. My dad\u2019s got some musicians in mind that he wants to use and I am going to do one song with my full band the Gutter Daisies. I wrote the song for us, but I wanted to put it on my solo album. So I talked to them and they are okay with it. I\u2019ve thought about the musicians that I want to bring in and I definitely want to bring in some of the Oxford people that I\u2019ve met because they are a bunch of talented people. I\u2019ve had the pleasure of playing with some of Oxford\u2019s finest musicians, and in a short time. You know, most people can\u2019t move here and then in a couple of years be playing with folks that have been playing their whole life. I\u2019ve been privileged to play with a lot of great musicians around and I want to utilize that.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anyone in particular that you would like to name?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nIt will probably be Tommy Turan<\/strong>, who is a really great bass player. I will definitely bring in Eric Carlton<\/strong>, because he is one of my favorite keyboardists in this town. I know I\u2019m going to bring Shane. Shane and I have been together since day one, so I\u2019m not going to leave him out of this thing, man.<\/span><\/p>\n

You call yourselves brothers, don\u2019t you?\u00a0 How long have you been brothers?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nYeah, we\u2019ve been brothers since he was eighteen, I know that, so I was nineteen, twenty, when we first got to be really close enough to be called brothers. It only got stronger once I started playing the guitar and then he picked up the guitar again once I started playing it, and that\u2019s when it kind of jettisoned for us and we decided that this is what we want to do.<\/span><\/p>\n

So you both came into your own with this music thing at a later age, as adults.<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nWell, we played music at a young age. He played drums and got a bass, and then he switched over to guitar in the tenth grade.<\/span><\/p>\n

Was he always singing?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nNo, I actually talked him into singing. He would not sing to save his life. He was always like, \u201cI don\u2019t want to sing.\u201d It was a combination of me and his father [that] talked him into singing.\u00a0 I told him that singing is, I mean, some people are blessed with a natural talent, but most people have to work for it\u2014it\u2019s an instrument. Even the ones that are blessed with a natural talent, if they don\u2019t work at it, they are not going to be good singers. There\u2019s a lot that goes into singing that I didn\u2019t know, and this experience with American Idol definitely opened my eyes to what I was doing wrong as far as singing because I had to work with coaches, which was pretty cool. I told [Shane], it\u2019s an instrument like any other. You\u2019ve started playing the guitar, now, what are you gonna do if that doesn\u2019t work out? You are going to practice. You are going to form it into something that works. The voice is the same way. Am I going to promise you that you will be the most beautiful singer in the world? No. But do I promise you that you that you will be able to sing, that you\u2019ll be able to carry a tune, able to put your words out there? Yes. That\u2019s when he started singing. He is also starting his own project now, which I am really proud of. I can\u2019t wait for him to finish up and get a band behind him so I can hear what it is. The Gutter Daisies are playing this Friday at Rooster\u2019s, and he\u2019s opening up for us. We\u2019re trying to give him some more stage time. We are going to get up there and play a couple of songs behind him so he gets to know what it feels like to have that band behind you, to have that presence. It changes a lot of things. It puts a lot of energy behind you when you\u2019ve got a band back there helping to carry the weight. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What advice do you have for aspiring musicians?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nDon\u2019t waste time, man. If you think you\u2019re capable of doing something, do it. Go straight in there and do it. The more time you waste, the older you get, the more you will regret it. Go after your dream. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What\u2019s the first concert you ever saw?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nI was always kind-of claustrophobic, so I didn\u2019t go to very many concerts. I don\u2019t like the whole crowded thing. I\u2019ve never been a fan of it. So, I\u2019ve gone to different concerts, usually there with my dad, but it was jazz musicians. I think it was Branford Marsalis<\/strong> that was the first concert I went to see, and that was really cool. I think I was thirteen or fourteen.<\/span><\/p>\n

What\u2019s your favorite album of all time?<\/span><\/strong><\/span>
\nOh, I can\u2019t think of the name of it right now.\u00a0 It\u2019s Bill Withers<\/strong>\u2014anything by Bill Withers. <\/span><\/p>\n

–<\/p>\n

A shorter version of this interview was originally printed in The Local Voice<\/em> #198 (published February 20, 2014). To download a PDF of this issue, click HERE<\/a>.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Keith Sanders was also featured on the cover of TLV #198 – here it is:<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"TLV-Cover-198-650\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Suanne Strider and Nature Humphries – photos by Newt Rayburn – Twenty six year old Keith Sanders<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":238,"featured_media":12553,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[307,52],"tags":[2990,937,2994,2750,2993,2992,3008,3025,3011,2929,2642,1315,2928,822,3024,2996,3023,3016,2995,2991,1313,2282,2280,1763,3003,3004,3018,1713,2815,1695,3017,1712,3010,2927,2986,3020,2988,1096,2999,986,5,3006,3001,3005,704,1982,4,3002,53,3014,1983,3012,3019,62,958,2989,2987,747,3007,2985,2984,3009,3000,3021,3022,3015,2998,2997,3013],"class_list":["post-12549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-people","category-music-shows","tag-adrian","tag-alphonso-sanders","tag-american-idol","tag-andrew","tag-b-b-king","tag-bb-king","tag-beverly","tag-bill-withers","tag-blackburn","tag-bland","tag-bless-the-soul","tag-blue","tag-bobby","tag-books","tag-branford-marsalis","tag-brown","tag-carlton","tag-chico-harris","tag-demetrios","tag-dickey","tag-eric","tag-fade2black","tag-fadetoblack","tag-folk","tag-gutter-daisies","tag-gutter-daisys","tag-herman","tag-hermann","tag-holley","tag-humphries","tag-jo-jo","tag-jojo","tag-josh","tag-keb-mo","tag-keith","tag-kenny-wayne-shepard","tag-king","tag-lafayette","tag-lloyd","tag-miss","tag-mississippi","tag-mona","tag-mpf","tag-mvsu","tag-nature","tag-newt","tag-oxford","tag-po","tag-proud-larrys","tag-ratcliffe","tag-rayburn","tag-richard","tag-robert-cray","tag-roosters","tag-sanders","tag-scott","tag-shane","tag-silas-reed","tag-strawberry","tag-strider","tag-suanne","tag-terrell","tag-tillotson","tag-tommy","tag-turan","tag-tweed-studios","tag-zach","tag-zechariah","tag-zepeda"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/KeithSandersFeat.jpg?fit=1600%2C1067&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12549","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/238"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12549"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12549\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12553"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}