Today we’d like to introduce you to Joel McCullough: bandleader, composer, and pianist for the funk band Starsign.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
Starsign started as a COVID project. I wrote, arranged, and released six songs for a seven-person arrangement. When lockdown started loosening up in Fall of 2021, I decided that it was a perfect time to get together a group to start playing all the music live.
The original purpose of the band, Starsign, was just to play that set of six songs, but pretty much immediately, people began contributing their own material, and being around such creative musicians kicked my own creativity into overdrive. When we played our first show a few months later, we already had several brand new pieces of music to debut.
Starsign’s continued growing and growing since then. We released our debut album, Ichiban (Japanese for “first”), in October of 2023, and we’re currently over halfway done recording our second album. Starsign also continued to grow in a more literal sense– I mentioned that we originally started as a group of seven, but we’re all the way up to thirteen now. We have a six-person horn section, a string section, and an auxiliary percussionist on top of everything else. We’ve had the privilege to open up for multiple Grammy-winning bands, headline some cool festivals, and so much more in the three and a half years we’ve been playing together, and we’re excited to continue to grow.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
The truth is, it has been relatively smooth. Smooth doesn’t mean easy, though– we’ve had to play a lot of shows–many to very small crowds. For a lot of shows, the number of people on the stage has been larger than the number of people in the audience! But every band has this experience become better known.
Running a band takes a lot of time, money, and attention, and I have approach it with the seriousness of a full-time job–even though I have another actual full-time job. Writing for a band, organizing rehearsals, learning new music, setting up performance opportunities, and publicity all take huge amounts of time and attention. But we work really well together and everybody helps. Cooperation, hard work, and a love for music are what have enabled us to get so far so quickly.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I’m most proud of our live performances. Most people hear the term “jazz band” and they think of high school assemblies and out-of-tune trumpet players. What they don’t realize is that modern jazz borrows from every genre under the sun– reggae, rock, electronica, world music, etc. and we bring all those influences to the stage when we play live. We love watching the joy and surprise of people hearing us for the first time.
There might be other 13-piece jazz-rock fusion bands with a burning rhythm section, six horn players, a violinist and a cellist in San Diego, but none come to mind!
Can you talk to us a bit about the role of luck?
Luck means a lot. You never know who’s going to stumble into a show or happen upon your music on Spotify and then reach out to offer you your next big opportunity. But chance favors the prepared, as they say. We’ve written, practiced, and rehearsed our music until we can play it in our sleep so whenever a new opportunity arises, whether it’s a dog’s birthday party or a regional jazz festival, we’re ready.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.starsign.band/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/realstarsign/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/starsignjazz/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@realstarsign
- Other: https://li.sten.to/starsignichiban
Image Credits
JR Galindez
