Today we’d like to introduce you to Dylan Soto.
Hi Dylan, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
Music is in my blood. My Dad is a guitarist and recording engineer, so there was always music around me as I was growing up. I have been surrounded by music my entire life. However, my personal journey in discovering my own musical voice began when I started studying the saxophone at the age of 12. I remember very vividly the day that my teacher played a recording of John Coltrane for me for the first time. I experienced a fundamental shift in the way that I viewed music, and I was inspired in a way that I had never felt before. From that day on, I knew that my passion lay 100% in jazz music.
Immediately thereafter, I became obsessed with jazz. I began to spend every day in my bedroom listening to jazz incessantly, I obsessively read everything I could that documented the history of the music, and I simply fell more in love with the art form with each passing day. By the time I was 14, I began to perform publicly with several local bands. These were great experiences, but it wasn’t until The Soto Six was born in 2017 that things truly began to take off for me.
In the last four years, The Soto Six has achieved more than I ever dreamed it would. None of this is because of me however. I think the key to the band’s success can be attributed to my musical partners. Different people come in and out of the band depending on what the given “gig situation” entails, but everyone who plays with the group has several core beliefs in common: a kind-hearted spirit, a willingness to be open-hearted through the music we make, and a deep passion for the music. As a result, I believe that this has given the band a unique musical identity that only comes from everyone riding the same wavelength of musical passion and spirit. I feel so blessed for all of the gigs and opportunities that the band has received, and I do not take any of it for granted. Every time the band performs, I take the weight of what we are doing very seriously. Jazz is something that individuals have suffered, bled, and shed tears for, and as jazz musicians it is important that we never forget how privileged we are to carry forward this tradition and share it with others. Every opportunity to share our music is a blessing, and I am forever grateful to be living my passion.
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?
As much as I try to focus on the positive, it is not fair of me to say it’s all been easy. I hate to say it, but it’s fairly clear to most people that jazz and improvised music aren’t always an easy sell to audiences in the modern era. This is particularly true in North County San Diego, and unfortunately many people have preconceived biases against the music due to one reason or another.
I remember during the band’s early years, attempting to bend over backwards to cater to non-jazz audiences was something that weighed heavily on my mind. As a result, we ended up performing a lot of material that I wasn’t passionate about in nearly-empty rooms. Very quickly I felt burnt out, so after talking it over with a couple of my musical partners, we decided collectively to not pay any mind to attempting to cater to the masses. Instead, we decided to play music that we were passionate about regardless of what the consequences were.
I’ll never forget that at our first gig playing material that was far from mainstream, we had a full “standing room-only” crowd for the first time ever. I asked the audience to raise their hands if they recognized any of the tunes that we were playing. Nobody raised their hands, yet everyone was completely engaged as if they had known and loved this music their entire lives.
I was in awe of the fact that by trying to be successful for years by being something we were not, we were a failure. But it truly was not until we were unapologetically ourselves that we began to receive success and recognition. If this isn’t an appropriate life lesson, then I don’t know what is.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
My primary musical outlet is serving as bandleader and performing with The Soto Six. Based out of Oceanside, California, we are blessed to be one of the only regularly working jazz combos based in San Diego’s North County. In 2019, The Soto Six founded Oceanside’s only live jazz series with the establishment of our monthly residency at Brown Cup Café in the heart of Oceanside’s coastal downtown. The residency grew very quickly, and we routinely were playing to “standing room only” crowds and drawing the attention of such institutions as San Diego’s Jazz 88.3FM, the San Diego Reader magazine, and more.
The Brown Cup residency opened countless doors for us, the first of which came during the Summer of 2019 when I became host of the biweekly jazz jam session located at Vista, California’s Aztec Brewing Co. What I love most about hosting the jam is that a diverse range of jazz musicians are given an opportunity to create music and share in melody with one another completely in the moment. In fact, I love the jam sessions so much that I’ve recently also accepted hosting duties for a brand new monthly session at Frankie’s in downtown Oceanside.
Aside from these regular gigs, I am blessed to be able to perform with the band at numerous other wonderful venues throughout the county. Every time the band performs, we place an emphasis on connecting musically with each other as musicians as well as with the audience. Time is the one investment in this world that you can never get back, so I take it very seriously when people give us their time by attending one of our shows. I always want people to walk away from a show feeling like they have been moved musically and that they have enjoyed themselves.
I am most proud of the fact that the band has consistently over the last few years been dedicated to being unapologetically ourselves and standing as firm supporters of jazz in an area that used to have little-to-no representation for the genre. Whenever people who previously thought they didn’t like jazz walk up to us and say that they have become inspired to begin to listen to jazz as a result of seeing our show, I feel that we have achieved a wonderful accomplishment. Ultimately, I want nothing more than for others to feel the beauty and fulfillment that I do when I listen to jazz. And it is an honor to be able to bring the music and all the wonderful feelings that come from it to others.
Alright so before we go can you talk to us a bit about how people can work with you, collaborate with you or support you?
People can best support by following The Soto Six on Instagram and Facebook (@thesotosix). I regularly keep both pages updated with all of the band’s events. People can also check out our official website (www.thesotosix.com) for performance information, recordings, and more. And if people want to get in touch with me directly for any reason, they can email me at thesotosix@gmail.com.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.thesotosix.com
- Email: thesotosix@gmail.com
- Instagram: instagram.com/thesotosix
- Facebook: facebook.com/thesotosix
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFecYnvG4AgjqrSrQi6RXEw
Image Credits
Tristan Faulk-Webster Andrew Troxell Olivia Valdes
