Life & Work with Jaime Cope

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jaime Cope.

Hi Jaime, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
Thank you so much for this opportunity to share my story. I’ve been singing and writing songs ever since I can remember, I have journals that go back to when I was 4 or 5. I’ve always expressed myself through art and writing. My first performance was in the 1st grade and I sang “America The Beautiful” at my school talent show. I wasn’t nervous, and it just felt like it was right for me to be on stage. (I was actually planning on singing “Big Girls Don’t Cry” by Fergie but my parents figured it was a bit mature for a 1st grader, lol.) Around that same time, I was also in a production of Peter Pan and I just had so much fun performing. I didn’t even have a big role, but it didn’t really matter. (I was only a lil salty about it…)

In elementary school, I spent a lot of my lunchtimes at up on a hill writing songs. This was 2009, so a lot of my influences at the time were Taylor Swift, Miley Cyrus, Pink, THE BLACK EYED PEAS. Vibe unmatched. I remember writing a song with a friend called “Diamonds and Topaz” because those were our birthstones. When I was home alone, I’d pretend to be on tour. I’d dress up and do my makeup, then sing and dance until I couldn’t. It was my self expression.

I started moving a lot and couldn’t always participate in the things I wanted to. It was really hard on me because I didn’t have much control over the circumstances. But everything happens for a reason.

My whole life, I dreamed about moving to LA. I’ve always felt the pull to get here. When we would drive through, I’d scream “HOLLYWOOD’ every time I saw it on an exit. So whenever I saw the actual SIGN, I’d lose my shit. I was just so excited, I knew I wanted to be a part of it.

Throughout junior high, I started posting singing videos and I was involved in music through my school. I was in a show choir in the 8th grade made up of 14 girls and 14 boys. We mainly did songs from the Broadway world. It was fast paced, there were a lot of rehearsals but it gave me purpose and kept me on my path towards making music.

My sophomore year, I moved to the Bay Area, and this is where magic really started to happen. I consider that home. Even though I’d lived in many places, I was born there and moving there was a fresh start to my life. A new beginning that I so desperately needed. I met my best friend Nina, who is such a free spirit, and something just clicked within me. True friends bring out the most beautiful parts of you that have been buried. I started remembering who I was after losing myself for what felt like forever. I began going to open mics, singing covers acapella.

The open mic I went to was all about expressing individuality which pushed me to sing original music. I started writing my own songs again and every single Wednesday, I went to open mic night. It became my second home. I practically lived at this bookstore, everybody knew each other and it truly was a family. I met a lot of people because of this place, including my mentor Jaylon, as well as the first people that I ever created music with. Here, I learned that everything is in Divine order. If one thing had gone ever so slightly different in my life, I may have never met the people or had the experiences that shaped me into who I am now.

One day, late December 2017, I was the only one in the bookstore when I found the tiniest book that changed my life. It was called 5 Wishes by Gay Hendricks. It basically asked the question, “Imagine you are on your deathbed, what would you regret not doing? Do you want to have regrets or do you want to believe in yourself and go for it?”

And that’s when I realized that I could do this like it wasn’t just a dream. It could really be my reality. They say that if you can see it in your mind, you can hold it in your hands.

My junior and senior years of high school were completely consumed by music. I’d wake up, go to school, go to work, and then go to the studio, go to sleep, repeat. It became my life and I loved that. I only wanted to create.

When I put out my EP ‘Soulitude’, it all began to fall into place because people from all over the world started listening to my music and I felt that I was in alignment with my purpose. People started telling me how much my music has helped them. I used to think I wanted to be a therapist, but music IS therapy. And I’d decided that college definitely wasn’t for me.

Fast forward to January 2020, I had just impulsively moved to San Francisco and was living in this apartment in Lower Pacific Heights. It was beautiful, VERY cold, and I don’t know how, but a part of me knew it was going to be temporary. Later that month, I took a five days trip down to Los Angeles and made a bunch of demos with some friends. I started to realize that this was really where I should be. On my plane ride back, I wrote out a list of goals of how I could move to LA by March. I had no plan, no logical way of making this happen. Just dreams. It was a manifestation.

I had a show on January 30th in Oakland. I was promoting it like crazy and got a message from a girl that I was mutuals with on Instagram. She tells me that her friend and her want to drive up to Oakland from LA to see me perform. Mind you, I only had a 20 minute set. But she insisted, saying it didn’t matter that it was a short set. Then they actually showed up. After the show, they needed a place to crash and I offered to have them for the night. I started to talk about how I wanted to move down to LA but didn’t know how I could do it. I was on my own, I didn’t have a car, and had just turned 19. Not really the definition of ‘stable’.

But then, they said they would help me, that they would drive back up to SF in a month and take me back down to LA with them. I remember that moment so vividly because I had only a day to tell my landlord (30 days notice) as it was the end of the month. But I had nothing to lose, so I did it. In a month, I got rid of almost everything. I ended up selling my bed and my bike the day before they came. Everything I owned had to fit in the car, and we filled it to the brim. Looking back, I was taking a risk, as these were practically complete strangers. But I got here in one piece on February 24th, 2020. (Almost a whole year ago as I’m writing this on February 20th, 2021) I secured my apartment the next day. Everything worked out almost too perfectly.

And then… Boom. 2 weeks later, pandemic. Yeah…. I wasn’t expecting that. At all. I won’t lie, It’s been difficult for everyone really. This past year hasn’t been the “LA experience” that I’d envisioned.

That being said, I wouldn’t change a thing. I’m very grateful for the people I have met here in LA. It’s a small handful of people, but they know who they are and I’m very lucky to know them. Out of all the people that I could have crossed paths with, I was blessed with the most genuine and supportive ones.

In this time, I have learned so much about myself. I had the chance to reevaluate what matters to me. I have grown into a completely different person than I was before.

2020 taught me how to love myself and others unconditionally. It taught me that solitude, as lonely as it may be at times, is essential to growth. Sometimes you really gotta fall back to see the path clearly.

For a while, I thought I had to always be working on something related to my career. Yes, it’s important to stay focused, but I felt like I was getting nowhere for a while.

That’s when I realized that my work is only truly productive and effective if I am aligned with myself. Focus is important, but direct that focus to how you are feeling inside as well. Do things for you. Life doesn’t flow when you aren’t living for yourself and loving yourself. Follow your heart and the magic of life will reveal itself to you.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It hasn’t been easy at all. Since I graduated high school, I’ve been all on my own. Being thrown into the real world when you have only concepts of it is very jarring. Simply learning how to be a human being and take care of yourself alone is difficult, but then add a music career with no clear path of how things will work out… Yeah. A lot of mental roadblocks, insecurity, wanting to give up but knowing that isn’t an option. I’ve pushed through a lot of shows where I had anxiety attacks beforehand and horrible migraines throughout the entire night, but nobody knew. I didn’t realize how stressed I was and how it was affecting me.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I just love music. I love recording it, performing it, writing it, producing it, The whole process. I’m learning more everyday. I write from my experiences in hopes of guiding other people through their own. That’s what music has always been for me. When I had nobody, music was there.

Are there any books, apps, podcasts or blogs that help you do your best?
The 4 Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz is one of my favorite books. It’s one that you can read over and over again throughout the years and continue to gain something from it.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jaimecope/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/jaimecope_
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtcHVEVWwL7Fj4-oXX-ztFg
• SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/jaimecope
• Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/74NHGPjDif9KNh36oGp7th

Image Credits:
Michelle Castillo, Pete Hopkins and Jade Meily