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It's W E H M All Access with Harry Waring as we're getting together with all the different artists at this year's Sag Harbor American Music Festival to chance to get to know them and learn all about uh the great talent that has uh or will take the stage for the Sag Harbor Music Festival this year.
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Kicks off Thursday, September 24th, runs through Sunday the 27th, and on that Thursday night at 7 at 7 o'clock is Riley Rose, and Riley joining us in the virtual studio now.
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Riley, how are you?
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I'm good.
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I'm very glad to be here, and I'm very impressed by your radio speak.
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You're so fast.
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Well, we try well we try, thank you very much.
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And I'm impressed by your music and what you've been building.
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I was listening online to a recent EP, and I have to say, uh very impressed.
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You've been how long have you been singing?
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Oh, I've been singing since I was very little, um, you know, in the way that kids do, like out in the yard by myself, thinking somebody might pop out from a tree and sign me to a label.
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Um and I performed, I did a lot of theater, musical theater throughout high school at the very um, you know, the very one and only Pearson high school.
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Um, and yeah, that was sort of the beginning of my love for performance and music, but I've started doing this artist project probably for the last two years.
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Um and I started performing live and then I released my EP earlier this year.
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So I'm excited to be in the world of releasing music and music videos and all of that.
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Do you remember like the first or uh when you were really young and what kind of got you into music?
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The the the one of the first artists that you you listened to and said, Hey, I um I wanted to try this.
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Well, actually, one of one of my grandma's favorite stories, this is the classic story that grandma tells everyone in the whole world because she's because she's so glad that I'm doing the thing.
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Um, but I was at a restaurant and I saw somebody setting up her guitar to perform.
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Um, and I tugged at her at her shirt and I said, Grandma, grandma, I'm gonna do that.
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Um she was like, Okay, oh sure, sure, sure.
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And then years later, of course, um, you know, I never did shake that bug.
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But I would say the the first artist who really inspired me and still does is I see her right behind you.
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I don't know if that's planted, the Regina Spectre.
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Yes, wow.
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That's what's uh that that meant to be.
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That's great.
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No, she's she's terrific.
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Wow, so you really uh that was one of the first artists that inspired you.
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Yeah, it was something my mom always played in the car, and so it's just songs I knew growing up, and then as I started to, you know, develop my sound as an artist, I was like, wait, this girl's got something good going on.
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Now you were pretty young, you learned the piano first, if I'm not mistaken, right?
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I read that about you, that you were really starting kind of was it age seven?
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Yeah, it was age seven, and I wish I could say I was a a prodigy at the time.
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Um, but yeah, I took lessons with Christine Glennon in Southampton, and she was a wonderful teacher, but she definitely started me with all of the you know formal training and the in the classic uh classical music.
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So um yeah, I've been playing since I was seven, and then as I got older into high school, you know, everybody has that moment of I don't want to do piano anymore, mom, let me quit.
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And I'm so glad my mom didn't let me quit.
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Um and I and I stuck through, and then of course, you know, I sort of shifted genres and now play more in the indie pop world.
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Now, when did when did you start writing music or songs?
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Had you always kind of wanted to write poetry or lend itself to songs, or when did that kind of begin for you?
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Well, I remember writing my first song when I was maybe 10.
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Like I was always making up songs.
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I I still have I have um, you know, the iCloud, of course.
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So I have every video I've ever taken since I was in middle school, and I still to this day will be scrolling through and I'll find a video of me in middle school, like making up a song about friendship or something.
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So so the songwriting has always been a part of what I love to do, but my process as it has evolved is very much rooted in lyric writing, and po I it does start as poetry to begin, or like I'll have kind of a couplet in my head for a few days, and I'm like, where will this go?
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What are these percussive consonants and what sound will they make when I put them over piano?
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So the lyrics are first and then you work on the music and kind of the the the melody?
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Yeah, I would say pretty much every time.
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That's how I how I get into it.
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Now uh you're performing, you're opening up uh then Thursday, September 24th, 7 o'clock at 7.
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Uh what's it like to perform in front of an audience?
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Have you always been comfortable in in front of in performing in front of others?
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I don't know.
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I I just love entertaining people and I also do a bit of comedy as well, and I think that comes into my live performances.
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I do a little like stand-up banter with the crowd and trust try to keep things very lighthearted and fun.
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So I mean, I I think also that something newer in my journey is not being as overwhelmed or nervous about performing, but um, I've always loved it.
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No, that that that's great.
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And then you're of course part of the Sand Harbor Music Festival.
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Have you done this festival before, or is this one of your first times?
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I did it last year.
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Last year I was performing at Kids Squid and it was so much fun.
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It was so wonderful.
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No, this is gonna be great.
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There's so many uh so much talent uh performing in the village over that weekend.
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It's just kind of fun to walk around and catch it.
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And you're at Sen uh that Thursday night we we talked about.
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Uh tell me about the EP you put out earlier in the year.
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Uh, how long did that take to put together and kind of create those songs?
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And really it seems like you created a theme with it too.
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The I actually do have a little special guest, and it's um Riley Rose from the EP cover, who's really made of clay.
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Uh, I had a wonderful artist named Emma, and she made a diorama that's the first one.
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Oh my goodness.
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Wow, that that's awesome.
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Everyone wants one of those.
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Everybody wants a little version of themselves.
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Um, so the EP actually it was a long time coming.
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These were songs, so I had started performing live rather than recording and releasing music first.
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So I had so many songs that, you know, my people who had been coming to shows and my friends and everybody knew, and people were like, when are you gonna put it out?
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Um, so it took a bit of time to record it.
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It was my first experience, you know, being in the studio working with a producer and and other arranging the musical parts for other instruments.
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So I guess it took it took a bit uh like over a year.
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But um, but again, these songs were some of my first real substantial songs that I I really felt proud of and I felt like represented my sound.
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And yeah, all of that each of them have a very special place in my heart, and I I guess I try to encapsulate sort of that girl against the cold hard world, you know, as Regina Specter would say, hero of my story, sort of where where did the title come from for the EP?
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Missal's Mothers and Missions is a line in the song If you were a Subway.
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And I just felt that that I guess as an artist, like, should I tell everyone what everything means or shall it remain a mystery?
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Um, in my in my own way about it all, it sort of I think represents just like the vastness of being alive and the and and all the things of the world all at once that go on.
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Now you mentioned a lot of those songs have been around for a bit.
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Is this now a way to kind of start fresh and the next chapter, so to speak, of Riley Rose?
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Yes, I'm very excited about everything that's coming up.
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I'm working on an album right now, and so I have about eight songs that are in demo form and ready to sort of polish up and get ready to release.
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Um, so I'm very excited about that.
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However, there still are many, many songs that are like waiting in the ring in the wings uh to be recorded.
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So I have many others that I've been performing live that are arranged, that are ready to go, that I just have to get down to recording.
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So I think that's sort of my mission, if you will, my missile mother and mission for this year is to get recording all of these songs, even after this album comes out.
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What did you learn uh working with that imaginable producer for the first time for the EP?
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What did you learn during that experience that you kind of transition and using for this album?
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Actually, one of my biggest lessons was I think trusting my gut in the way that I form a song, I think so much I didn't realize until I started producing my songs how much of the production shapes the sound of the song.
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I mean, it seems obvious, but I was sort of like, wow, it can sound so many different ways.
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And you know, when you're working with a producer, they'll be like, Well, do you want to do this, that, the other thing?
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And there's so it's overwhelming how many directions your your piece can go in creatively.
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So something I've been doing for this next album is coming back to to the smaller scale creation before I take it to a producer.
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So I've been producing all of my songs in garage band on my own and arranging all different instrumental parts with MIDI or with electronic instruments, and then I have a wonderful producer named Theo Hofstrom, and so I take the songs to Theo and I'm like, here's what I've got.
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What is your initial impression?
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What do we need to brush up?
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And so often, like what our our main plan is to re-record vocals, re-record live drums, live piano, live bass, but then all the other little elements remain quirky and a bit uh maybe unjust slightly off of what is traditional, and I think that's part of the charm that it's almost imperfect, especially in the age of AI.
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Um, I think imperfection is becoming more and more important.
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How what's it like to be a young artist where you're you're just kind of starting and it's not just about the music anymore, it's about the marketing for it.
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And and I feel like sometimes I've spoken to a lot of artists where they either have one or the other in Hawaii and they're kind of afraid of the marketing of it and the getting away of the artistic side of it a little bit.
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How do you approach that now?
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Especially when you put out the EP earlier this year and you're thinking about the record, how do you approach marketing it?
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I think you have to trick your brain.
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I've tricked my brain into thinking how can this be fun?
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Because at the end of the day, there's such a high volume of content these days, and marketing is everywhere, and I think people are kind of tired of it.
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There's like a lethargy about being sold something, and I think the same goes with content.
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I find that I watch content when the person, when whatever's happening in front of me is genuinely fun and exciting and full of joy.
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So my philosophy on that is to have fun with it and to make things that excite me because that's what's going to appeal to other people.
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I studied film in college, so I have a ton of wonderful friends and collaborators who are interested in film and um this outfit that I'm in making was designed by my friend Fiona, who uh is a wonderful designer.
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It also has a little custom look at that uh uh custom design on the back.
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So there's just these really incredible
people I'm surrounded with.
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So working, you know, we just like chat, chat, chat and get to making things.
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And I also have uh a wonderful friend Veronica Hine who directs all of my music videos and my comedy videos, and so we sort of just hang out and we're like, what would be really funny to do?
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No, where did you go to school?
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I went to NYU with Lola Lama.
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Lola Llama and I were both Sacker girls who ended up at NYU, which was so much fun.
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That that's great.
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So and you grew up out here on the East End.
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Uh was it Segaponic or right in that area?
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Well, so you just Sagaponic girl, um, one room schoolhouse.
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Well, I'm curious, what is it like to grow up out here?
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Uh, because obviously you've been to the city, but it is a it's quieter.
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There's there's so much uh there's such a disparity between the seasons.
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Um what was that like for someone growing out on the East End?
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I had a wonderful experience.
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I think partially because I was so invested in the theatrical arts community, and I think that's something that's actually in my in my living there year-round experience, the main differentiator from any other small town other than the obvious, which is the tourist, you know, fabulous world of the Hamptons.
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I think the arts access is something that makes it a really, really unique place, even in the off-season, because you have so many performers and creatives and opportunities for for young students, even when it's not the madness of summer.
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So I was involved in a lot of the community's wonderful programming, the Guild Hall Teen Arts Council.
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I did a lot of masterclasses at Bay Street Theater, and every summer my, you know, I would I would work at their theater camp.
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So there's just uh it was wonderful to be able to have access to that world, but also not be thrown into the madness of the city.
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I liked having that a little bit of that nature-y experience growing up.
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Are there Long Island artists that you grew up with um that you learned and kind of considered as mentors?
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Yes, I I think honestly, a lot of my mentorship when I was out east like growing up, a lot of them were theatrical mentors.
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Um Paula Brannon was the director of all of the musicals at Pearson High School, and Keith Holden uh the plays, and so I think that sense of theatricality comes through my music a lot, and even just the discipline of being somebody in in musical theater, like it's a very it can be a very intense world.
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So I think it has helped me organize my world around music.
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Um, and of course, there are so many wonderful performers like Lola Lama and uh Dylan Hewitt, who uh plays upright bass, um, both in my band and in Lola's band, who we were in high school together, and then years later we come together and find each other as peers in the industry, and you know, there's there's a lot of exciting moments where you realize, oh wait, you're doing this professionally, and we should work together, and names pop up that you haven't, you know, people you haven't seen since high school, and they're doing wonderful things.
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Well, it sounds like you're having a lot of fun with it, and I think that's the key to to all of this.
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Uh Riley Rose coming to SEN to open up the Sag Harbor American Music Festival.
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It's uh 7 p.m.
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Thursday, September 24th.
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And uh make sure we uh we see you live there performing.
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That'll be a lot of fun, and we'll tag you and all the socials and then get this out and your episode.
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It's been a lot of fun getting to know you, and I can't wait to see you perform live, Riley.
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Thank you so much for your time.
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Thank you so much, Harry.