Eli Lev, an emerging singer-songwriter, is connecting the world through his music, one song at a time. Lev composes lyrics and melodies that aim to provide realization in everyday life. His songs appeal to listeners due to their heartfelt and down-to-earth nature, as well as the wisdom he gathered from extensive travel and self-exploration.
Lev will be performing in Calgary, Alberta on July 5, 2024. The show will take place at The Attic Bar & Stage, starting at 8:30 p.m.
I spoke with Lev about the wide range of emotions experienced by both society as a whole and individuals.
Can you share the moment or experience that first ignited your passion for music and songwriting?
I started writing silly songs in middle school and I played one for my middle school talent show and they enjoyed it. Everybody laughed and gave me a big round of applause. So it started very early on.
Your music often reflects themes of enlightenment and self-discovery. How have your own journeys and experiences shaped your approach to creating music?
My songs really come from personal experiences and travels and adventures that I’ve had in Maryland, Indiana, Arizona, Israel, Andorra Australia, New Zealand, all over the world. So all of those experiences inform my songs and they come from a very personal place.
The title of your latest EP is Walk, Talk, Dance, Sing and it is quite expressive. Can you tell us more about the inspiration behind it and how the pandemic influenced its creation?
It was kind of like a mixtape. My tour in 2020 was cancelled so I had to go online and create connections and community there. So Walk, Talk, Dance, Sing is kind of like an introspective journey, thinking about you know where I’ve come in my life and also how much joy music is and how much joy it can bring to people.
Your songs are described as heartfelt and earthy, how do you stay authentic and grounded in your songwriting process amidst the ever-changing music industry?
This might sound selfish, but it’s not, I write songs for myself and not necessarily for them to be popular. I’m not really thinking about the audience in mind and what happens is the more that I can write songs from an authentic place from a place of truth and realness for me the more I find people can relate to that. Because they can hear that and they have similar experiences. So I found that the more that I write from my own truth the more others actually connect with the songs.
The Four Directions project is known for connecting spheres and generations, so what was your vision behind this project?
The idea came from when I was an eighth-grade middle school teacher in Northern Arizona on the Navajo Indian reservation and when I was starting my career as an independent musician, I was really thinking about what could guide me there. And the Four Directions came to mind because that was big on the Navajo Nation. I released four EPs over five years and that gave me a really good signpost, guideposts along the way on how to release music and having it in a comprehensive story that made sense to me.
Your music draws comparisons to the Abbott brothers and the Lumineers. Who are your musical influences and in what ways have they shaped your sounds?
I started with the singer-songwriter crew back in the John Denver, Bob Dylan, Cat Stevens and Joni Mitchell days. Then I actually grew up in the ’90s, so I was like a grunge rocker. So Nirvana, Stone Temple Pilots and Pearl Jam were big influences on me. Nowadays I like modern songwriters like Noah Kahan and Boy Genius, incredible songwriters that I enjoy. So it’s a pretty diverse influence base.
The concept of making the world a smaller place through music is a powerful one. Can you expand on this idea and how you aim to achieve it through your songs?
Yeah, I think music has a special way of kind of breaking down the barriers that we put between ourselves. A lot of them are not real. And when people are at a show and they’re all kind of like singing along or having fun, it just kind of shows that the space between us is a lot smaller than we think it is. So I really see that music is a powerful tool to share that experience and to let people feel good around their neighbours and look to their left and right and be like, “Oh yeah, they’re enjoying the same things that I am.”
How do you approach the songwriting process?
I call them seeds. Songwriting seeds. They’re like little ideas, maybe it’s a title, maybe it’s a line, or maybe it’s a theme. And then I see which one of those seeds grows a little bit, and I kind of develop a chorus, verse, and bridge. Then I see which one of those feels good, and then I bring it into a full song. And then I listen to all those songs, and I figure out which ones are my favourites, and I bring those into the studio to record.
For aspiring musicians and songwriters who look up to you, what advice would you give them on navigating the challenges and if they want to pursue a music career?
I would say authenticity is key so like going into yourself finding what your truth is really spending time on that and only then sharing that with the world and people responding to truth. So I would just say keep it real and you know see what’s in your heart not necessarily what you see or hear others doing.
