Meet Ashley Orlando | Jazz Vocalist, Ukulele Artist and Charisma Coach

We had the good fortune of connecting with Ashley Orlando and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Ashley, how has your background shaped the person you are today?
I’m originally from a small town in Louisiana called Ponchatoula (about an hour north of New Orleans). I’ve been singing since before I can remember. My desire to communicate through music was definitely influenced in part by my environment and Louisiana’s deep musical roots. But although I discovered jazz at an early age, I wasn’t really exposed to it live as a kid except at Mardi Gras or on occasional trips to the French Quarter when we’d pass musicians busking in the street. These groups fascinated me, and I even did a social studies fair project on the history of jazz in 4th grade. How to play or sing jazz, however, still seemed very foreign and elusive (all my musical training was classical, and I didn’t actually know any female jazz musicians who I could look up to or learn from). I was too shy at that point in my life to take such a big leap out of my comfort zone.

In college and the years following, I kept music in my life but put it very much to the side. My new focus became public relations and communication. That connected me with Louisiana’s French history and language, which I had learned about as a kid but had not experienced first-hand. My quest to speak, live, and work in French eventually gave me the opportunity to explore Wales, Nova Scotia, Wisconsin, France, and even more of Louisiana.

When my husband and I were transferred to Texas for his work five years ago, I honestly didn’t know what to do with myself at first. That’s when music (and an unexpected instrument—the ukulele) came back into my life. Moving away to a new state where we knew no one gave me carte blanche to finally start experimenting with jazz without any self-imposed pressure to be “good at it.” I connected to the uke and jazz communities in Houston and started having fun/going through the “messy middle” part of learning something new. I started exploring the Great American Songbook through the tones of the ukulele and singing jazz on a regular basis.

Now that my husband and I have moved back to Louisiana as of this summer, what a thrill it has been to dive head-first into the music scenes here. I feel like a fascinated anthropologist finally connecting with not only New Orleans traditional jazz but also Cajun French music, Western Swing (which I initially discovered in Texas), and even early R&B/rock n’roll. I finally understand how I fit into jazz as a musician and how that connects very well with Louisiana’s French heritage. All the detours I took and mental roadblocks I navigated to get here suddenly make perfect sense and make me the musician and coach I am today. That’s another important reason why I’m passionate about helping others—especially high-achieving women facing self-doubt and imposter syndrome—to find their voice, whether that’s musical, spoken or creative. We really can accomplish anything when we know how to speak up and start asking for what we want/need in a clear, concise, and charismatic way. It makes life much more fun, too!

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
Having recently returned to Louisiana and starting to steep myself again in the music here, I can tell that my sound is at a crossroads. A lot of people sing the Great American Songbook, French chanson, Western Swing, etc., but fewer people have the vocal ability to do it all and to connect to the French language in Louisiana. I’ve worked hard over the years to harness that in my own voice. Now getting a solid taste of traditional jazz music, Louisiana Creole songs, as well as Hapa Haole songs from 1940s Hawaii, I’m starting to experiment and blend some of those wonderful flavors into my music as well.

I also love reimagining simple songs, like nursery rhymes, and turning them into jazz. Once you learn the building blocks of music, it becomes a fun creative outlet to change things up every now and then. I try to remind people that making music (and especially jazz) can be a fun, inclusive experience, and it’s important to not take ourselves so seriously that we remove the joy of trying new or hard things knowing they might not work out. And a lot of people have never heard these songs on an ukulele, so I love when someone hears my music and says, “Wow, I didn’t know you could play jazz like that on a uke.”

There have been many challenges along the way for me, but most of them stemmed from my own fixed mindset, thinking there was a permanent cap on my musical abilities: that my voice was “pretty but could never be powerful,” that music theory was “too hard,” or that it was “too late” for me to learn a secondary instrument. The funny thing is that I had far fewer internal hang-ups about learning French—even though I started that as an adult—because unlike music, I was never considered “gifted” in it. I knew from the get-go that I was starting from the bottom and that it would be a lot of work to get to where I wanted to be. But I did it. Now I’m repeating that process with music.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Helping people explore Louisiana is one of my favorite pastimes!

Imagining she’d be flying in to New Orleans, we’d probably start there with coffee and beignets in City Park and maybe a visit to Mardi Gras World to see all the colorful floats being created. I always love riding the streetcar down St. Charles Avenue, so we could do that and then head to Frenchman Street to catch some traditional New Orleans jazz bands.

For Day 2, we’d cross Lake Pontchartrain to visit downtown Covington and Old Mandeville on the Northshore. Watch the sunset at the lakefront and grab a bite to eat at one of the quaint restaurants nearby. Maybe even take in an outdoor concert at the Dew Drop Jazz & Social Hall.

On Day 3 we’d head west to Baton Rouge for a stroll around LSU’s beautiful campus, eat lunch at Capitol Grocery in Spanish Town, and visit the Old State Capitol and the top of the new State Capitol (with a birds-eye view of the Mississippi River).

Then for Day 4, we’d go further west to Breaux Bridge for paddling on the cypress-filled Lake Martin, grab some shrimp po-boys at Olde Tyme Grocery in Lafayette and stop at Hideaway on Lee for a dose dancing and Cajun French music.

If we had time for Day 5, we’d drive up to Arnaudville for some French fun and art at NUNU Arts & Culture Collective and Bayou Teche Brewing and eat dinner at The Little Big Cup. Then back to New Orleans to head out.

As you probably noticed, music, culture, language and outdoor adventures are the stars of any trip I’m in charge of!

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I wouldn’t have found the courage to take half the leaps of faith I’ve made over the last decade without my husband, Adam. He truly is a rock for me and one of my biggest supporters. We’re complete opposites in many ways, which makes me laugh sometimes, but it’s also wonderful because he is strong in areas where I am weak, and he reminds me to have fun when I’m stressed about things beyond my control. We lift each other up and balance each other out!

Website: https://www.ashleyorlando.com/

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