BROOKLYN NIGHTS Written and performed by AJ Smith Produced by Scott Jacoby, AJ Smith, Lloyd Kikoler, and Milos Angelov Mastered by Emily Lazar With festival and performance experience ranging from SummerFest, MusikFest to playing New York University's Kimmel Center and more, award-winning songwriter and multi-instrumentalist AJ Smith is best known for writing and recording the #3 hit in Australia “Summertime”. He has opened for The Eagles, Lindsey Stirling, Andy Allo, and others in addition to performing in the award-winning musical “What’s It All About?” in New York City. A Songwriters Hall of Fame Scholar and Carole Bayer Sager Songwriting Scholar, AJ’s performances are a spectacle of showmanship blending together pop, rock, and folk into anthems fit for stadiums. From the artist: How did you get into music? I ran away from home when I was three. My parents freaked out, called 911, and I was found two doors down, sitting with my ear pressed against the window of my godmother’s basement studio, listening in on piano lessons. I was hungry to learn, and not only piano. After watching a Yanni concert in awe when I was five, I begged my parents to let me start playing violin. Knowing the lengths I would go in order to listen to the instrument again, they obliged. Years sped by and by the time I was 10, I was writing my own songs, recording back and forth between two tape recorders in my own primitive form of multi-tracking. I started fiddling in a bluegrass band, taught myself guitar by watching the banjo player (which is why I have such weird finger picking styles), picked up mandolin along the way, and headed off to NYU to study film scoring and concert composition. Two years into the program, I changed my tune in the professional pursuit of songwriting, studying under songwriting greats like Glenn Frey, Roseanne Cash, Phil Galdston, and more. Tell us about the new music you are releasing on January 15 and how it’s evolved from your previous work. In my last EP, I was still finding my voice as both a writer and an artist. In this upcoming release, I feel I’ve found it. Each song in the EP, which starts with “Brooklyn Nights,” centers around that journey of finding myself in the last year. It’s very emotional: falling desperately in love, hitting the road to escape the following heartbreak, and rekindling feelings with an old flame. Even apart from being recorded and mixed by a team that includes GRAMMY-winners and nominees, everything is on another level musically & lyrically and I’m counting down the days until the world can hear it. I’ve linked up to co-produce the record with GRAMMY-winner Scott Jacoby (John Legend, Vampire Weekend) and my bassist Lloyd Kikoler. The record is mastered by GRAMMY-nominee Emily Lazar (Sia, Coldplay).