Singer, songwriter Kezia Ayers brings message of hope back home
Published on 3/3/2009
By Patricia Harvey
March 02, 2009
(Colorado Springs, CO)- Kezia Ayers is one of those unique Renaissance women whose interests and abilities could take her just about anywhere. Thus far, they’ve taken the ambitious 22 year-old into the world of fashion, the roots of her religion, and the heart and soul of music. Now they’re about to bring her back home.
Enraptured with the world of modeling and fashion from her pre-teen years, the 2003 Pine Creek High School graduate loved art, and had hopes of becoming a fashion designer.
“The artistic side of my brain just never let me go to a regular college,” she said, “so I ventured into the fashion capital – New York City.” Living in the heart of New York’s fashion district, Ayers studied at the prestigious Fashion Institute of Technology, where she earned a degree in fashion merchandising management.
Being immersed in the big city was a life-altering experience for a girl who, according to Ayers, grew up “in a sort of white suburbia.” She learned a lot just watching people. “There are so many different kinds of people (in New York), and the way they viewed life made me question my life and who I was as a person.”
Ayers believes that people can do things to make a difference. “One person’s voice can be heard. New Yorkers are active in protesting, and letting their voices be heard. It made me think beyond the bubble I was in. I learned that there, I am a woman of color, and you really experience that when you get out there.”
Following FIT, Ayers attended the Berean School of the Bible where she received a degree in Pastoral Ministries. Involved in Christian music for some time, Ayers was convinced Christian music was the path she should take. She’d picked up the guitar in New York, and had begun writing songs.
At the Gospel Music Association Competition in the Rockies, however, Ayers said her eyes were opened. “A lot of people have the perception that if you’re not doing Christian music it’s not positive.”
Not true, she says. “You can still be in the secular music industry and steer people’s hearts toward hope and toward light.”
Ayers did some soul searching and ultimately decided to write songs that reflected what she was experiencing in her own life. “It’s staying true to yourself as an artist,” she said, ”and what it is that makes you different, and trying to grasp that.”
Anxious to take a shot at secular music, Ayers went to Austin on the advice of a friend, moving in with her brother. “I didn’t know what I was expecting as far as the talent pool,” she said. “I really wanted to take my musicianship further.”
A new friend at church heard her music on MySpace and got her a gig at a pool party. “That’s Austin: they have live music everywhere you go. You come to Austin, and people find you.”
Carving out a career in her own backyard, though, is what Ayers wants to do now. Her parents are longtime Colorado Springs residents and her other brother, also lives in town.
Ayers admits she’s ambitious. But it’s not about the money, she said. Her primary goal is to be a more positive representative of her generation. “It’s really about getting a message out there.”
“We’ve become, like, ‘I might be killed by a terrorist tomorrow, so I might as well do what I want.’ I see it as hopelessness. When people come up to me, read MySpace, hear me on the radio, they’ll think, ‘here’s a person who’s not living her life that way.’”
