The Tribeca Film Festival has begun and this year John Legend and Sara Bareilles made an appearance in “Tribeca Talks: Storytellers” where Sara interviewed/discussed with John about his life and career. Starting off Sara asked John about how music came into his life as a child. John started learning to play the piano when he was five and was actively involved in music at church. It wasn’t till he was older that he began to listen to genres other than Gospel and Contemporary Christian music because that was all that was played in his house. His parents divorced when he was young and from there he was able to rebel a bit and start listening to other genres.
As a high school student, John was in the ensemble of Charlie Brown, Fiddler on the Roof, and Big River and a member of the show choir. Once he went off to the University of Pennsylvania he joined the schools acapella team. Although he played gigs while in school, he was recruited to a management consultant and moved to Boston after graduation.
For three years he worked as a management consultant and ended up moving to New York City. When he moved to New York he began playing gigs around the city and going to sessions at night. He would invite people to come to his gigs and once he met people in the music industry, he would invite them as well. His ultimate connection came when a friend of his introduced John to his cousin. Luckily for John Legend, this cousin was Kanye West when he was just strictly a music producer. They began to work together, Kanye making beats for John’s demo and John singing hooks for Kanye. In 2004 John signed a record deal with Columbia Records and released his first album, Get Lifted, the same year. He said it took him six years to officially get a deal.
Today John’s career has been centered around his role in Jesus Christ Superstar Live!, a Television program that premiered in April of this year. He played the role of Jesus alongside Sara Bareilles, who played Mary Magdalene, and many other talented people. Sara told the audience about how John seemed very relaxed throughout the whole process and he explained that he was more excited than nervous. John has also starred in The Jitney on Broadway and won a Tony Award. He has won several Grammys and an Oscar for his original song “Glory” on the movie Selma. He has done what many people like to call a “GOT”, a Grammy, Oscar, and Tony. Sarah asked is John ever feels overworked, but he says he makes time for what is important to him, his family and music.
Sarah and John also discussed his role in politics and activism. He has a campaign called “Free America” that fights for criminal justice reform efforts. John spoke about how it can be a risk to advocate for these reforms, but he cares more about making a difference than losing followers and fans.
At the end of the talk, John and Sara took questions from the audience. Someone in the audience asked John about writing songs alone more often, referencing a specific favorite of his that John wrote solo. John explained that he likes bouncing ideas off people because it creates a more diverse album. However he did state after that the song the guest mentioned was also a favorite of his, and he may have to consider writing more songs solo. Let’s hope this next album is one for the books!
Watch the entire talk here
-Chelsea Young