My name is Evan McKeel, and I am a music maker from Richmond, VA! As a kid, I grew up on heartfelt, emotionial music from artists like Carole King, James Taylor, Stevie Wonder, John Mayer, and many more, and began making my own when I started playing guitar around age 12! After honing my craft for many years, and gaining performance experience in my hometown, I was asked to be a contestant on NBC's The Voice.
At my blind audition I turned all 4 coach's chairs around, choosing Pharrell Williams to be my coach. We had an awesome bond and relationship, eventually reaching the finals together! The show was an unimaginable time of growth for me, and I got to learn so much about music, performing, and the music industry.
Since the show ended I have been traveling a lot, spending most of my summer in the Music City, Nashville! My greatest desire since I finished up on The Voice has been to make new music; to make an album!
There have been some crazy twists and turns, and I have had some opportunities come quickly, and get taken away quickly, but God has really lead me to the people I needed to meet and places I needed to be. I've made a great friend here named Evan Sieling, who is a very successful and gifted producer. Evan and I have been able to spend a good amount of time getting to know one another, and playing music, and we both feel very strongly that God has placed us in one another's paths to make music together. We want to shut ourselves in for a week, and immerse ourselves physically, and emotionally into making this record.
These are all songs I have written with a great amount of honesty, some happy and hopeful, and some very painful. I'm putting a part of myself into this record forever! It's going to be a taxing process, as all creating is, but we are going to challenge ourselves, and I know it's going to be a very special week in both of our lives that we will look back on forever.
We will need around $3,500 to make this record, which is about as inexpensively as you can record these days.
The majority of that sum will go to paying my producer Evan for his work on the record, while $400-500 will go to paying another musician or two to come in and play additional parts.
We are recording this album starting on September 12th, so we will need to raise these funds in the next couple of weeks !
Making this record means the world to me right now. These songs are a piece of my heart, put into music about the things in my life that have moved me.
This is going to be one of the most important things I look back on in this stage of my life, and it's going to make such a difference as I pursue bigger opportunities in music!
I will be so grateful for your support. When I look back on this process, I will always be able to remember the amazing people that helped me make it possible!
You only make your first album once!
Thank you for being a part of my life and a part of my music!!
Evan McKeel
(Skinny-E)