Kris Schultz performs at Kirby’s Beer Store on Wednesday as part of a quick trip through her former home state.
She’ll also perform at North Side Social in Lawrence on Friday, then open for Belles at the Green Guitar Folk House in Lenexa the next day, followed by a Sunday afternoon performance at Sisters of Sound in Manhattan.
The number of dates Shultz has booked in area is remarkable. While growing up in Topeka, she didn’t have her sights set on a musical career. Over several years, she worked for bands, made friends with musicians and had a passion for songs but didn’t consider writing or performing.
Then, sometime after moving to Austin, Texas, she sat down, wrote her first tune, and was soon well on her way to establishing herself as a recording and touring artist.
She recently discussed the beginnings of her musical career and more with KMUW.
The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.
You started your musical career after you’d moved to Austin. You’d worked around music and musicians but weren’t a writer or performer yourself. What changed?
It was a weird thing. I joke that it’s sort of like when your phone gets an update in software? It sort of was like that. “Your software has now been updated and now supports singing and songwriting.” [Laughs.] Really, I don’t know. I was so close to it for so long. I absolutely loved music. I worked for bands, I worked for musicians. Then I took a break from it. I did a bunch of other stuff and then I went through a breakup which, you know, always sparks something.
I had also been doing these urban adventure races, clue-solving urban adventure races, those stopped happening. A friend who I’d worked for for years started this songwriting/performing consultation business. I thought, “I want to support her and her business.” I had gotten this cheap guitar and I joked to her, “Maybe I’ll be a client of yours.”
She said, “Can you sing? I’ve never heard you sing.”
I said, “I really don’t know.” [Laughs.]
[Laughs.]
I thought, “I could be tone deaf. I really don’t know.” I was always around people doing it, why would I do it?
I was listening to these great songwriters and singers and they’re randomly singing around the dinner table. I’m not going to join in. I’m just going to listen, right? [Laughs.]
My friend showed up one day and said, “OK, sing something for me.” I sang something and she said, “You can sing!”
I’d written poetry all my life and so I gave it a shot and here we are. I thought I’d write one song, get it out of my system and that’s not how it worked.
You thought, “OK, maybe it’s just one song.” What was it like when they kept coming?
It was crazy. I started getting up two hours early for work just so that I could see what would happen. It was so exciting and I couldn’t wait to get up and see what would happen. It was the weirdest period of time, where I went from looking at my friends and going, “Oh, that’s so cool. They’re walking around with songs inside them.” I’d just be in awe of that. Then I had that realization of, “Oh wait. I do too! What’s going on here?”
It was the strangest thing, and I kept it to myself for a long time, other than that friend and a few other people I was close to. I just thought I’d be writing songs in my living room. About five months in, I got my first gig and had to do an hour of all original songs. I thought, “If I talk for a while between these two songs, I’ve got an hour.” [Laughs.]
It was a very weird time. Songwriting is such a huge part of my life now. It’s what I do. It still amazes me. Every once in a while, I’ll be sitting there and will say, “Wow, I do this.”
I guess that’s testament to just trying something. If you write a song and it’s not any good or another one never arrives, at least you did it.
Exactly. That’s the thing with songwriting. Every day, you think, “I might not write another one,” and every day you’re surprised.
Then you started releasing music, which suggests that you were looking for a slightly larger audience.
That’s a tricky thing for everybody, especially right now when there’s so much music out there. If left to my own devices most of my social media would be puppies and sunflowers. But I have to do the whole, “Hey! Hi! It’s me!” That’s a tough thing as a person for a person who just wants to sit in their living room and write songs. But it’s necessary and I try to make it fun for myself and try to incorporate all the things that I love into that.
Having worked on the business side of music, behind the scenes, did that help when you started thinking about booking shows and selling merch?
I think it did. As far as booking gigs, I had watched people go through it and knew that you could send 100 emails and maybe get one response. I think working on that side of things and seeing how all that worked, I tend to take things less personally. That and little bits of information that were said when we were driving down the road in a van years ago, things that I overheard and just stuck with me for whatever reason. That and just knowing that by the time a booker or talent buyer gets to my email, they’ve already read a bunch of emails and don’t want to hear my whole life story right off the bat. They just want me to say, “Here’s some links!” [Laughs.]
When you left Kansas you weren’t a songwriter or performer and then, at some point, you came back and had a hometown show in Topeka. What was that like, that first show, when all of a sudden people you knew from school or the neighborhood are coming into the room to see you for the first time?
It was crazy. It was really crazy. You send out the invite, you do the event on social media and I had no idea what to expect. People kept showing up. “OK, wow! This is really happening.” Then I get up there and I see a kindergarten classmate. A high school teacher. Cousins. Kid who lived around the corner from me when I was growing up. I’m going, “Uh, OK. This is really happening.” And then it hits me: I failed public speaking twice in college! [Laughs.]
I thought, “What in the world is happening? I’m standing up here in front of people I’ve known in all different parts of my life, in different parts of my world. They’re all here and they’re all looking at me! I guess I gotta do this thing!”
