Compass Music Group

Creating and innovating in the music industry comes with the challenge to collaborate with others whilst showing your value, Edie Wyse shows how this is done with his work at Project Feel. Edie discusses his growth over the years, his connection to Project Feel & el3ment, and the value of working with fellow artist. 

Photographer - Christine Arquero | IG @christine.com_

 ● Edie on finding Project Feel & getting involved with the company:

“I remember when I first went to a Project Feel event, a Latino owned production company out of Brooklyn, New York. And they started with just doing events. I remember going to one, and they just had the most incredible DJ, they had pre-rolls at the event. Everybody there was dancing, they had affordable drinks, it was in the heart of Brooklyn and a really dope area. It was the second part of a two part event where the first part was an art gallery in Manhattan and then the second part was an after party and this was all low key, this was all funding from the pockets of the people doing the event. There's no sponsors, there was no big names showing up, there was nothing like that, there was no big production company behind it, it was just these three people that really had a dream and really wanted to platform artists and do events and to see the whole thing ran by maybe four or five people. And it was incredibly successful. Everybody was so happy leaving there and I just remember being there that night and thinking like, no, I need to be a part of whatever this is. And from there it was, me, Franco and Jo, we all experienced the same thing and understood that, what we had going on with our videography, and the music Franco was making at the time. And what I was trying to do and what Jo was trying to do with film, we all knew that our talents would be so well used and would be appreciated within Project Feel and from then on, it's been history, we've been taking projects."

● His thoughts on el3ment:

“Jess & Leslie were the people, the two women that founded the company. It's an app dedicated to connecting artists from different countries to collaborate within their music and the language of music. They don't just talk and get the big exec to tell them who's the hardest in the city and go to them, they really go to the ground level. They go to the shows, they go to the events, all those. We went to an event space called Safe and sounds, which is a recording studio in Brooklyn, but they do community events as well. So el3ment approached us, Project Feel and were like, we want to film a documentary about a writing camp, we want to do a full writing camp with artists in New York that we find on the application and the artists that Project Feel bring to the table. We want to do a weekend where we create a full album, and document the experience, to then release that documentary at film festivals. And that's how that relationship started. And now, we're pretty tight, and I love what they're doing. I will always back them, the application is incredible.”

● What about your individual goals? Like how does that look for 2023? What's up and coming?

“I think everybody has something slated for the beginning of this year. I have a song released with Ryan J. Garcia & Gloom’s Garcia, both Orlando-raised artists. And then Fran , who is also an artist with Project Feel also from Orlando, they're also releasing their first full project in March. I'm going to be releasing singles throughout the year. But we got some big, big things coming up for people within Project Feel. I want my first project to be pretty well funded. So I gotta build that up and make sure that it's the best project it can be but definitely I have like three or four singles right now that are getting ready to be released in the next few months.”

● We dove into Edie's past on how he fell in love with music:

 "I was raised in church and I remember always singing all these gospel songs and all these church hymns and I remember singing a lot, my family, everybody sang in the church so I just remember always loving it, but I was a pretty reserved guy and if you knew me in high school, like I was pretty laid back, I didn't really talk to anyone, pretty shy. I joined theater, musical theatre and I fell in love with it and I honestly fell in love with music, the idea of music and dancing to music on stage and performing music and structuring things around music and that's where the trajectory of my life changed pretty drastically. I got really heavy into acting. And then I got some opportunities, came out to New York for one of those big opportunities with Franco and Jo and then we fell in love with the city of Brooklyn. We fell in love with New York and we came out here to pursue acting actually. But Franco started making music, because it felt like he wanted to express himself in that way. He started with a little bit of hip hop, and then it turned into him being a full fledged musical genius after a few months and I just started doing videography for him. I always had music in the back of my head. Music was always the centerpiece. And then eventually I decided to try my hand at writing. And it seemed to flow naturally for me. I remember getting the opportunity to write with some friends for the first time. Jason Channel, Chris Scalco, and Cvrrent music. All Orlando based. We had them come out to our crib and we went to Franco’s studio in the crib and we stayed there for a few days. We set out a plan to just make music the whole time we were there. To sit in the studio and write some words and everybody loved it. There's a music video with all five of us.”

● When it comes to like inspiration on the music, and on the creative side, who is that for you? Or what is that for you?

"Not going to lie, Franco. My best friend is heavily inspiring. I love J. Cole. A Lot of people love J. Cole. So he's one of my favorites. When I first got into secular music, J. Cole was one of the first artists that I started listening to. Ne-Yo was actually the first secular artist. When J. Cole released Forest Hill Drive, ‘Apparently' was one of my favorite songs that he released."

● Edie's creative process:

" I will be 100% honest with you, too, on this, like, I'm still figuring that out. Honest to God. A lot of the time, it's just figuring it out. I don't know what I'm doing half the time. Like it really does take commitment to it, day in and day out and dedication to it and understanding that creativity comes from everything and one of the biggest parts of creativity is living your life. So as you're doing your part time or your full time job, understanding that life is a beautiful thing. And that's where we get all our creativity and inspiration from and being willing to fully live that life, no matter what situation you're in, that's my creative focus is just living life. And I think that everybody at Project Feel also understands that and that's why we gel, so well, like, no matter what we're going through as a company, no matter what we're going through as family at the end of the day, all of it is for the creativity, and we're doing it for the same reasons."

● Edie's advice to future artists:

" Live life, like you have to be present, you have to be here, on the ground, in your communities, in your circles, you have to be willing to be there and influence those circles. That's how you move forward in life. You have to live your life and that's the most important thing."

● We ask Edie his choice between Loyalty or Respect:

 " I think there's a deeper lesson within that question. There are so many potential pitfalls that you go down with having one or the other. Doesn't matter how loyal they are, at the end of the day, there's still someone that can do harm and if you have all the respect in the world, all you have is a bunch of Yes men around you, there's no loyalty to it. It's all just respect. You can't really have one without the other but if I had to pick, I'd probably pick loyalty. I want to stick with you, no matter what and I'll stick with you through the trenches. And even if you shame me, or you stab me in the back, I want to make sure that I can say that I did everything that I could for you and that's what it means for me to remain loyal."