Name: Ryan Jennings
Nationality: American
Occupation: Singer, songwriter
Recent release: Ryan Jennings teams up with Jack Quiggins for their new album as Teddy and the Rough Riders, Down Home, out via Appalachia.

If you enjoyed this Ryan Jennings interview and would like to stay up to date with his music, visit him on Instagram. Teddy and the Rough Riders are on Instagram, Facebook, and twitter.



When I listen to music, I see shapes, objects and colours. What happens in your body when you're listening? Do you listen with your eyes open or closed?

Wow you must have synesthesia to literally see objects and colors, that’s a rare condition!

I just hear normal music, and hearing so much of it every day in so many occasions it doesn’t affect me much. Until I sit down to purposefully listen to a given piece.

I close my eyes when I play music, sometimes, but that’s just to focus on singing.

How do listening with headphones and listening through a stereo system change your experience of sound and music?

I guess I increase volume more for stereo speakers at home, and headphones listening is more of a personal private experience.

Tell me about some of the albums or artists that you love specifically for their sound, please.

Older records like the first Bill Monroe and the bluegrass boys. Little Richard’s first records. These records you can tell only used one mic and they had to work around the limitations and plan the layout.

Of course I don’t ONLY like these records for the sound … I don’t listen to music like that, only for sonic reasons. I’m listening for melody, delivery, intent, context, songwriting, vibe, story.

Do you experience strong emotional responses towards certain sounds? If so, what kind of sounds are these and do you have an explanation about the reasons for these responses?

We write music to include the pedal steel guitar, which I think elicits emotion from the sliding, bending movement of the strings within chords.

The Sitar is similar, using bending and movement to evoke religious emotion.

There can be sounds which feel highly irritating to us and then there are others we could gladly listen to for hours. Do you have examples for either one or both of these?

Well Jack doesn’t like the accordion, which I love. Some people hate harmonica because it usually screeches volume wise over everything

Are there everyday places, spaces, or devices which intrigue you by the way they sound? Which are these?

Not really intriguing but I probably listen to the most music in the car.

Driving and traveling gives me a good sense of context for a piece. It can accompany the landscape in a great way.

Have you ever been in spaces with extreme sonic characteristics, such as anechoic chambers or caves? What was the experience like?

We’ve recorded in top professional mixing rooms that have been completely dead. And we’ve used echo chambers to re mic during the recording process.

I loved it, walking in an echo chamber sucks the sound in and amplifies it as well as creating a unique reverb echo.

What are among your favourite spaces to record and play your music?

To record I love to be at home, or at my friend/engineer Jake Davis’s house. That’s just away from mega million studio rent prices.

Playing my own music again it’s either at home or listening back in the car.

Do music and sound feel “material” to you? Does working with sound feel like you're sculpting or shaping something?

In a way I guess, it feels material when I am recording to tape at home. It’s a physical version of the music.

Or when I’m collecting and playing my records, the physical aspect of the art piece comes through way more than phone speakers or something.

How important is sound for our overall well-being and in how far do you feel the "acoustic health" of a society or environment is reflective of its overall health?

Well you could say the world is pretty unhealthy acoustically because music is such a commodity, in every ad, in every store, on every street, digitized and AI’d. To me it’s used as an attention grabber, by main stream music, it’s literally mixed to be played out of a phone speaker.

I think it’s rare for someone to have a stereo at home and intentionally listen to pieces of music as art. It’s more like party ambience and advertising ear catching

Sound, song, and rhythm are all around us, from animal noises to the waves of the ocean. What, if any, are some of the most moving experiences you've had with these non-human-made sounds?

That would have to be actual natural silence. Small bits of wind when you’re out on a mountain somewhere.

Silence brings out tiny environmental sounds. Nothing mega loud or anything

Many animals communicate through sound. Based either on experience or intuition, do you feel as though interspecies communication is possible and important? Is there a creative element to it, would you say?  

Well dogs and many animals understand human speech so it’s obviously both possible and important. And some animals definitely react to music.

Maybe I should make a concept album specifically for animals.

Tinnitus and developing hyperacusis are very real risks for anyone working with sound. Do you take precautions in this regard and if you're suffering from these or similar issues – how do you cope with them?

I haven’t experienced hearing loss yet but I do have some nice ear buds.

I like playing loud and also playing soft so there’s gonna be risks for that all the time. I just try to enjoy what time I have.

Seth S. Horowitz called hearing the “universal sense” and emphasised that it was more precise and faster than any of our other senses, including vision. How would our world be different if we paid less attention to looks and listened more instead?

Interesting, I love sound but I’d say vision is the most important sense of judgement, more than sound. For humans at least. They’re not sitting and calmly listening first and foremost, it’s a look and taking in the sight that comes first and creates the most judgment.

Of course people would communicate and understand each other more if we listened. But again, that’s not humans' first reaction.