Singer, songwriter and guitarist, Ross Hartmann has been playing the guitar since he was the young age of fourteen. Describing his music as a mix of Stevie Ray Vaughan with a dash of John Mayer. Hartmann's bluesy and pop tunes have won him a scholarship to the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston, MA. With the goal of writing a song a day, Hartmann recorded many of these songs, which can be heard on his new CD, “Never Where We Wanna Be,” a seven track EP.

You can find out more about Ross, listen to his music and see what else he has been up to at: www.rosshartmann.com.

Dig In Magazine: That was an awesome show! I just wanted to talk to you a little about your music. So, how would you describe your music?

Ross Hartmann: I describe it as if Stevie Ray Vaughan were the lead guitarist for the Beatles and then add a dash of John Mayer.

DIM: : That’s great!

RH: So it’s kind of bluesy, pop.

DIM: Who writes your music or do you write your own songs?

RH: I write my own songs. So, we played a couple covers tonight, but most of them were originals.

DIM: What inspires the kind of music that you make and write? And who are your musical influences?

RH: Okay, I can give you two answers. First of all, I’ve been thinking a lot about musical inspiration. Like when I went to Berklee College of Music last year…

DIM: Is that the one in Boston?

RH: Yeah, the one in Boston. I got a whole bunch of different views on that…on inspiration and what inspiration is, and if you even need inspiration. While I was at Berklee I started writing a song a day on the theory that you don’t need inspiration. You just have to start writing. So, that was a really interesting experiment and I got some good songs out of it. So, I kind of subscribe to the theory that you can create your own inspiration, instead of making it come to you. But then you can also have it come to you out of the blue, which is great too.

DIM: So what inspires you when you are in the zone?

RH: Other music, actually. Just listening to other music and other artists that I love. That really inspires me. The other artists that I love are The Beatles, Stevie Ray Vaughan, John Mayer, Radiohead, Regina Spektor, Rachael Yamagata. Those are the main ones.

DIM: What would you say are the main things in your songs…like what are your songs about?

RH: I’m still at that stage where 97 percent of my songs are love songs. Most of them are about that early puppy love type stuff.

DIM: You have a new CD out right?

RH: Yeah, it’s called “Never Where We Wanna Be”. It’s a seven track EP. And we have it on iTunes and everything. Just got new album artwork.

DIM: Cool. Is iTunes the main place where people can find your music?

RH: Yeah, you can find it on iTunes, CD Baby or you can go to rosshartmann.com and you can download some of the tracks there.

DIM: Great! So, just to get a little background on you, how long have you been making and playing music?

RH: I’ve been playing guitar since I was fourteen, eighth grade. And I started writing about sixteen…fifteen or sixteen and I’ve been writing since. I have some recordings of my first songs and they’re really, really bad.

DIM: So you started singing at a young age too as you were playing the guitar?

RH: Yeah, I would never…my instrument is not my vocals.

DIM: Well, your vocals are really good!

RH: Thank you, thank you! When I started singing I was like an octave and a half lower, maybe even now I write my melodies too high for my voice I think. But I used to sing really low with no energy and it was just really bad. But I guess it’s progressively gotten a lot better especially in the last two to three years once I started going to Berklee.

DIM: You mentioned going to Berklee, were you formally trained in music or initially did you start learning on your own?

RH: Initially, I started on my own and then I wanted to take guitar lessons, so I took them for about two to three months and then I decided that they weren’t for me. So, I stopped that and continued to teach myself for about five years and then I decided to go to Berklee…got in on a guitar scholarship.

DIM: That’s awesome!

RH: I learned so much at Berklee outside of the classroom, but I learned a lot inside…but not what I wanted to learn. I think it’s still because I was a first and second semester student and so I had to learn all the basic reading music and everything. I wasn’t any good at that. But I’m a guitarist, so that’s how it is.

DIM: Right on. So, do you play a lot by ear?

RH: Yeah, I do. I transcribed a lot of music…a lot of Stevie Ray Vaughan solos. So, that’s how I learned all my guitar stuff.

DIM: I heard that you played some gigs at The House of Blues and The Galaxy, where else have you played?

RH: Yeah, we played at Hogue Barmichael’s in Newport Beach, Alta Café in Newport Beach, It’s A Grind, Gypsy Den...

DIM: Shout out!

RH: Yeah, shout out to the Gypsy Den! We’re trying to play The Coach House next. We actually just started gigging the end of summer, because I’ve been recording the EP in my house all summer and then started gigging after that.

DIM: So, you kind of have an in-home studio where you record?

RH: Yeah, you could say that. My friend Orlando Viera helped me mix and master the music. It was really fun!

DIM: It seems like your music and your band is really takin’ off. Just wondering what we can expect from Ross Hartmann in the future.

RH: Ah, Carnegie Hall, Madison Square Garden, definitely the Verizon Amphitheatre [laugh] that’s one of my goals…hopefully playing South By Southwest.

DIM: Do you have any new music in the works? Any new songs or CDs comin’ out?

RH: I do have new songs in the works. They are in the oven. I have a bunch of songs that I wrote a long time ago that I’m going to put on the second album, I think. And so it’s going to be a mixture of old and new stuff. But lots of stuff in the works, yeah!

DIM: Okay, cool! Well, thanks so much for talking to Dig In Magazine! You guys did a great job tonight! Thanks so much!