Jada is the latest iteration of the classic female vocal group marked by their winning combination of raw talent and powerhouse vocals with sophisticated harmonies that are an artful, edgy marriage of pop and soul. Though these young ladies are flirty and fun fashionistas, each bringing her own distinct, vocal gifts to the table, there is no question that developing their craft is admirably their highest priority. Working tirelessly six days a week, they juggle intensive voice and dance rehearsal and songwriting and recording sessions, along with headlining numerous local and national bills. From their ultra sassy first single, “American Cowboy,” (produced/written by RedOne/Akon) to their upcoming new single slotted for a July release, contemporary club anthem “This Party’s on Fire”, “JADA” is a bold mélange of pop, soul, dance, and R&B, steeped in their signature gospel-inspired harmonies.
The four members of Jada united serendipitously while studying at Boston’s Bristol Recording and Voice Studios, an Artist Development company and home to producer/engineer, Ric Poulin and his Bristol Voice Method. Each songstress came to Bristol already in possession of an extensive background in singing and performing, but it was Poulin’s patented pop/gospel technique which enabled them to belt to their utmost potential. With so many talented singers at hand, forming a group seemed inevitable. Jacyn Tremblay was the
initial member of Jada, followed soon thereafter by fellow Boston area native, Elle Wine, and the Yardley, Pennsylvania-based Lauren O’Keefe. The trio finally achieved perfection in August of 2004 with the addition of the fourth member, April Forrest. Though she had only been at Bristol a short while, the New Britain, Connecticut native brought an impressive background in dance and choreography to balance out the quartet.
Jada’s rise to the forefront has been imbued with experiences as creative and diverse as each of the girls. Their debut single, “American Cowboy” (produced by Akon/RedOne) is a Top 40 international hit single that was also featured on FOX’s House, Episode 22, and the music video for the song, directed by Ray Kay was released in the summer of ’09. In addition, singles “Model That” (produced by RedOne) and “I’m That Chick” (produced by JR Rotem) were featured respectively on an episode of MTV’s The City and in the Bring It On IV – In It to Win It soundtrack. Honored in 2008 as “Outstanding Pop R&B Act” at the Boston Music Awards, they have also toured as part of the annual Radio Disney Summer Concert Series, Simon Mall D’Tour Live, and a National Radio Concert Tour in the Spring/Summer of ’09. Jada has performed the National Anthem for the nationally-televised New England Patriots and Championship Boston Celtics Playoff games; HBO's World Boxing Championships at Madison Square Garden and shared the stage with the likes of Akon, The Black Eyed Peas, Flo Rida, Sean Kingston and Ciara among others. This summer sees the release of their newest music video for “This Party’s on Fire,” which was shot in the Boch Aviation airplane hangar and directed by Vassili Shields.
LM: So tell me what the group dynamic is between the four of you. The vibe seems to work. How does that happen when you have a group comprised of four standout voices?
JADA: Well we are quite a feisty bunch!! But while all four of us have our
own unique viewpoints and musical tastes, we also share many of the same attitudes as artists. We all put our two cents in on decisions and ideas and although we don't always 100% agree, we have a nice system of compromising and doing what's best for the group.
There hasn't been a female group comprised of four strong lead singers in a
long time, so we feel that makes us something different and interesting! We want JADA to represent that. We're happy to to share the spotlight with each other because we know that's what makes Jada unique-we all share the roll of lead singer. We make this work because we respect each other as artists.
The Jada vibe is fun and sassy for sure-we don't take ourselves too seriously! It's important that we always put forth our positive energy and excitement in our recordings and live on stage. We are fortunate that we get along well both as musicians, and as business partners and we work hard at keeping it that way. Good communication is key!
LM: You ladies aren’t just singers, you write a lot of your own songs. Describe what it’s like during one of your writing sessions? How do different ideas come about? How do you think each individual personality influences what’s created? How does this time creating your music bring you closer together as a group?
JADA: Writing is a really fun process for us, but it can get a little crazy with all of us writing at the same time! We usually split up to write our songs because it tends to move faster. How it works is that we bounce ideas off of each other while listening to a track we want to write to and literally start singing lines in the room that feel good to us. It's a very open and creative process and if an idea someone throws out doesn't feel or sound right we let each other know (nicely of course). If one of us feels a certain melody we create from there and it snowballs into a song! A lot of the ideas we have for songs comes from one of our personal experiences like one of us got into a huge fight with our boyfriend or that one of us is experiencing personal insecurities. We usually hear the person out and then say: "Write that down!! That would make a great song lyric." We all can have different takes on lyrics and melody because we are different people but it all gels in the end. April is great with slang and Jacyn is actually a great witty writer. Lauren tends to write poetic novels that need a lot of editing and Elle is great when there is a writers block. She just comes up with these great lines! All of us are great with melodies and work really well together on that. Writing is our favorite thing to do aside from performing. We literally love the idea of holing ourselves up in the studio for 8 hrs straight writing and recording. We won't finish until it's done even if it's 3am! Writing and recording is its own type of therapy. It makes us a lot closer as a group and as friends because we know everything about each other…seriously. We don't judge; we just listen, give advice and then write a song about it. Some people in our lives might wonder if a certain song is about them, but we don't kiss and tell…. haha. We write many of our songs with RIO a really amazing writer/producer from Boston. He wrote and produced our new single "This Party's on Fire" and a few of our other songs including "Mercy Killing" and "Goodbye". Our one song "Goodbye" was actually really hard to write because it was so personal to each one of us. It was one of those songs where we all had to dig deep into our past relationships and confront how hard it was to break up. Lauren has a hard time to this day listening to that song because it's that personal to someone that was really special to her. She tears up every time she hears it! Something about finding someone you really love and knowing it's just not the right time or the right circumstances for you two is really heartbreaking. We aren't "Sad Sally's" but sometimes songs just pluck a certain heart string, you know?
LM: I hear you just shot a new music video. Can you tell me about it? We're so psyched about our new video for our upcoming single "This Party's on Fire". The really talented Vassili Shields shot and directed the video and we all created the treatment for it. It was a lot of intense work but we had a blast creating it! It's launching to iTunes and Amazon in July! The song itself is all about living in an over the top larger than life world and we wanted the video to be larger than life as well. We had a bunch of shoot locations and props that we needed so we asked our good friend, Ernie Boch Jr (Boch enterprises extrodinaire and member of Ernie and the Automatics) to help us out! He was so gracious to lend us his Maserati/Ferrari dealership to shoot April's scene, and the Boch Aviation airplane hangar, and private jet for a full day shoot!
We are in the middle of planning our single and video release party in July in Boston. Think red carpet, amazing light show, signature "On Fire" cocktails, special performance by Jada of course and an exclusive pre-release viewing of the video. We're doing a video sneak preview at The Estate on June 18 if you can't wait til then. Check out our website for details: www.JadaMusic.com
LM: You’ve been hard at work on your career as a group for a few years now. What are the biggest challenges you face and what keeps the four of you collectively motivated in spite of these challenges?
JADA: One of the biggest challenges for us would be balancing our personal lives and career. Often times our schedules can be crazy with lots of traveling and shows. We tend to put a lot on our plate, but we have learned that if we want to make it big time we have to work big time. Don't get me wrong we love and really appreciate our down time. We take a week off every summer for vacation. Balancing both our career and our relationships with family and friends is so important because both are so vital to our sanity.
Making JADA a worldwide success takes a huge commitment, sacrifice and a unique work ethic, but we're "in it to win it"! We have had this goal to make Jada a house hold name for some time now and we don't want to quit. WE keep each other motivated a lot of the time because no one really knows what we are going through each and every day except each other! We have all felt
at one time or another that we can't make it or that this is so hard how does anyone make it in this business? We just go back to what made us want to succeed to begin with and that always re-lights our flame. At the very simplest core we love to perform and create music and that is what keeps us motivated. The creation aspect of it. People feel down when they aren't producing something they love. When we feel that way we say "Ok, let's stop what wer're doing, lets go sing". That immediately changes our mood. We also feel lucky to have families that really support us and that motivates us too. We spend a lot of time together, so it helps that we have good communication and a sense of humor no matter how hectic things can get! The four of us keep each other motivated because we all have the same goal and there's a power in numbers!
Recently there has been a lot going on in Jada land! Along with the release of our new single and music video, we are also launching a new website, and recording new songs! It's an exciting year so far! Accomplishing goals winds us up for the next round of goals. : )
LM: You’ve worked with several amazing producers and songwriters. How has working with others in the industry influenced your perspectives? Have any of them become mentors, and if so, in what way?
JADA: Working with a diverse roster of producers has been such an amazing experience! Each have their own way of creating, writing, and recording a song. Ric Poulin has become a major mentor for us! He has collaborated with us on many of our tracks and helped shape who Jada is vocally! We have spent the most time writing with him and the best thing he taught us was to really strive for perfection with vocals because back in the day they didn't have special recording techniques to make you sound better. The voices were real and the artists had to be a amazing! We strive for that too. The time we spent with Toby Gad ( Fergie, Beyonce, Jessie J) was awesome! The songs we wrote with him happened so fast. We would often write and record the song in the same day. Toby is this incredible musical prodigy that can write and record lighting fast. We recorded with him in his funky Times Square, NYC studio where everything is in the same room: the microphone, grand piano, writing table, recording equipment and even the kitchen sink! It was our favorite place to record because it was so intimate. We were all involved in the recording because we had to be-there was no where else to go! Toby knew exactly what he wanted and would make us sing a line over and over until he was satisfied. Even though we thought those lines all sounded the same he was very precise in what he wanted which is a great trait to have because we are very much the same when it comes to the quality of vocals. We vibed well together and when the vibe just is "there" it's a beautiful thing! Working with producer Danja Handz and the songwriting team "The Clutch" was memorable too! They have worked with everyone including Britney Spears, Kanye West, and Keri Hilson to name a few. Danja's productions are really unique and The Clutch have an incredible way of cutting vocals. When you hear a Danja track you just know it's a Danja track. One of his mentors is Timbaland and you can definitely hear that inspiration in Danja's tracks. He has a way of making a club song sound refreshing and new with how he mixes in percussions and other sounds. Every session and every producer brings something new to the table and we are like sponges sucking up all the great things we learn from these incredibly talented people. At the end of the day you are crafting art and it comes from your feelings, thoughts and experiences. It's something that's going to be shared with the world. It's both personal and public! Creating music is so rewarding. The long hours spent in the studio result in magic. We feel lucky that our job is to create something that makes you feel something!
LM: As artists who’ve really built themselves from scratch – and by that I mean that you didn’t get lucky or go on some show or get discovered on the Internet – you’ve worked and built this group from the bottom up, plugging away at gigs and at your craft. What is your advice for other young people who dream to be successful in this industry?
JADA: We have been fortunate to have a home base in Boston-Bristol Studios. We were essentially formed by our management and production team Ric and Laura Poulin, and have been cultivated as artists through their artist development/voice training programs. We were 4 girls from different backgrounds who were very precisely chosen to form a group. The chances of us staying together in this industry has definitely been equal parts luck and sheer determination! We have seen a lot together--that's the glue that keeps us going and gives us legitimacy as a real "group"! Ric and Laura have been our mentors, and extended family to us. They have helped us to grow over the past few years as artists and as women. I doubt that we would have such a chance to work intensively on becoming the JADA we are today had it not been for their support and care. Together in this group, we have learned the ropes of the crazy music industry by experiencing it first hand...the good the bad and the ugly....and we're just getting started! Our advice for up and coming artists would be to never give us on your dreams. Although it's a bit of a cliche, it's really resonated with us every day. Our producer Ric Poulin has a saying: "There's no such thing as failure. You just haven't tried hard enough". That might seem harsh but it's very true. Really hone in on your craft and whatever you're doing as an artist, master your skills to your full extent. That talent and skill will make you stand out from the crowd. And that's what you want, you need to attract attention! You need a really supportive team of people who can really help you develop your skills and progress your career in a real way. Continuously learning about the music business side of things is really recommended too, and just getting out there and performing a lot, and meeting a lot of people and networking. You will eventually find people who want to help you when you have talent they can see.
LM: I’ve seen you perform about a dozen times at this point, and one thing is always apparent to me: you each seem to be having the time of your life. Tell me then, are you really having THAT much fun? And if so, how do you keep that dynamic energy level all the time? More importantly, do you think that kind of magic can only manifest when the four of you perform together?
JADA: There's no greater high than being onstage in front of a crowd! The energy we exude is genuine and real! We wish we could bottle it up and save it for later. For us there's a real joy in creating music and sharing it with others..when you're up there on stage, you have the ability to make someone laugh, smile, or cry through your music. The best feeling is when you see your audience singing along to the songs YOU wrote! With all of that said we think that we have one of the best jobs in the world!
We are special in our own ways as individual artists, but something happens that is hard to put into words when we perform together-it's an energy that radiates. We've been singing so long together, artistically we're very in tune with each other. For example, we know "Oh Darlin" so well, it's practically become part of us, something we can do in our sleep, but it has a very vocally dynamic arrangement. Elle hits these high notes that are in the Mariah Carey stratosphere and the rest of us have very complex harmonies that create this awesome energy that the audience responds to every time. You just can't create effects like that on your own.
Individually, April, Lauren, Jacyn, and Elle are all blessed in their own right. They are sassy meets classy; they are pop meets soul; they are two stunning blondes, a striking strawberry goddess, and a vivacious brunette; they are coquettish, fresh, edgy, and heartbreakingly soulful; they are dedicated, humble, loyal, and ambitious. Together, they are Jada, and will prove to be a chart-topping force with which to be reckoned. Much like the foretelling graffiti they spied a few years ago under a bridge in NYC that portended, “Jada is comin", these elegant ladies have arrived, and they are about to conquer.