12/22/2006

When dreams come true

Bear Lake grad's song scores attention

By AL PARKER

Special to the Record-Eagle

Special to the Record-Eagle
Jason Wilder Evans' song, "Come Home Soon," has attracted lots of attention on Neil Young's Web site.

TRAVERSE CITY — Jason Wilder Evans has a message for people who aren't content with their lives.

"Follow your dreams,” advised the Bear Lake High School grad who has carved out a busy entertainment career since moving to Providence in 2003. "That's what I did. I want people to realize that if they just follow their dreams, sometimes they come true.”

One of Evans' dreams was to write and sing a popular song. He's moving toward that goal with "Come Home Soon,” which has climbed as high as Number 115 on Neil Young's ''Living With War'' Web site dedicated to political tunes. The haunting song is a tribute to soldiers who are serving far from their families.

"It's sort of autobiographical,” said Evans. "My dad was in the service when his dad died and my brother was in Somalia when our mom died. I used that sadness and that topic in 'Come Home Soon.'”

After graduating from Bear Lake, Evans attended West Shore Community College and Grand Valley State University, where he was always involved in performing. After earning a B.S. in biology, he followed another dream and joined the Peace Corps.

"I always had it in my mind that I might want to join the Peace Corps,” said Evans. "I always wanted to travel and to help others.”

Evans spent almost two years in Lesotho, an enclave of South Africa that is slightly smaller than Maryland.

"My job title was environmental engineer, but I was working as a beekeeper,” explained Evans. "I also was involved in HIV education and teaching secondary school students, ages 12 to 18 or 20.”

Evans was in a remote area of Lesotho.

"Many times I was the only Westerner within an hour's drive,” he said. "But my time there really flew by.”

It was in Africa that his penchant for writing and singing really developed. His song "My Given Love” was featured in the independent film, "Trust Fall.” Evans' sometimes dark lyrics are not always in the stereotypical country music vein, which he attributes in part due to the physical isolation of his Peace Corps experience.

"During that time, my writing process was so introverted, the things that I saw and the life that I lived, not that different from Jack Kerouac or Ernest Hemingway,” he said. "I wrote from what I knew and looked inward for strength, ideas and turned them into somewhat autobiographical fiction.”

Upon returning stateside in 2002, Jason settled in Grand Rapids and made a whirlwind European tour in February 2003.

"GR was filled with talent … but I began to feel stagnant and the only things that breed in stagnancy are mosquitoes and malaria,” he said. "Creatively I wasn't where I needed to be and it was only a matter of time before a move to the East Coast changed all of that.”

To hear ''Come Home Soon,'' go to www.neilyoung.com/lwwtoday/lwwsongspage.html.