When you’re willing to be spontaneous, you never know what antics you’ll come up with along the way. For Connor Knight and Sam Tomaso, a mutual love for music made itself present during a midnight adventure through the streets of Italy while reminiscing on middle school stories. Fast forward a couple of months, and the two friends have decided to explore what the music world has to offer by combining their talents and allowing the music to carry them forward.
What artists have influenced your performance style?
Bands such as Dashboard Confessional, Avett Brothers, and Darlingside have been major inspirations for both of these guys. These bands have influenced not only the kind of music they play, but the way they choose to perform them. Whenever these artists perform on stage, they always choose to have a good time. Just like Connor and Sam, they don’t take themselves too seriously which allows them to enjoy what they are doing. This presents them with the ability to enjoy the music and connect with each other and their audience while performing.
What was the moment you realized that you wanted to take music and share it by performing live?
In high school, Connor loved to record music and upload his songs to MySpace. Throughout the process of sharing his music online, an agency in Houston contacted him to see if he was able to play at one of the music venues downtown. After slight hesitation, Connor took a leap of faith and decided to take the risk to play his music live. He hasn’t looked back since.
Sam was notorious for playing gigs in the coffeehouse scene. At one point, he played a two hour gig at Potbelly during lunch rush. By having to play for two hours, he learned how to gain confidence in his performance ability and gained the courage to begin performing for longer periods of time, much more often.
Fun Facts:
- Connor has the same name as Trevor Knight’s twin (Connor’s a triplet though, so it’s even better)
- Sam was the guy with the #12 shaved into his chest at the Tennessee game
- Both of them speak Italian
- They met while playing in the church choir at St. Mary’s Catholic Church
- Connor began playing the trumpet again, specifically for Coffeehouse
- They are musical engineers
