Clara Kent believes if she can make it in Pittsburgh, she can make it anywhere.<\/p>\n
The city\u2019s music fans can be tough, opinionated and not always open-minded, says the musician, artist and WYEP (91.3 FM) radio host. She\u2019s determined to win them over.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have to have strength in your presence to get attention from a Pittsburgher,\u201d Kent says. \u201cYou better be good. But I like a challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n
Besides recording and performing her own music,<\/a> Kent champions emerging local artists through her WYEP radio show, \u201cMore Bounce,\u201d and newer series, \u201cElevate the Underground.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cRadio isn\u2019t dying. Its role is just changing,\u201d Kent told me. \u201cIt\u2019s still a powerful way to connect music with people. I want to bring musicians and active music fans together, introduce listeners to new artists alongside the music I grew up with and make it feel like a fun house party.\u201d<\/p>\n A sound of her own<\/p>\n Kent grew up in Homewood surrounded by music.<\/p>\n Her mother, Trayce Reed, kept a record collection that ranged from soul and jazz One singer left a lasting impression: Sade. Watching music videos and listening to Sade\u2019s songs, Kent began imagining herself as a performer.<\/p>\n She sang in a choir as a child and dealt with stage fright, waiting until high school to take on solo performances. Even now, nerves can creep in before a live performance. I found this surprising, given Kent\u2019s confidence and ease of our conversation.<\/p>\n Still, she combats performance anxiety by arriving at venues early, settling in onstage with a cup of tea, chatting with staff and warming up until the venue feels like home.<\/p>\n The trick seems to work.<\/p>\n Kent can command a room well beyond Pittsburgh\u2019s club circuit.<\/p>\n In 2023, she received a call about opening for musician Thundercat<\/a> at Stage AE \u2014 just 24 hours before the show. Organizers were looking for a woman performer with a particular sound. Kent fit the bill.<\/p>\n She describes her sound as \u201cfloaty.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI can sing, I can rap, I can do soulful, musical, floaty stuff,\u201d she says. \u201cI can bounce around.\u201d<\/p>\n The packed venue left her more nervous than she\u2019d ever been before a performance. But when she hit the stage, adrenaline took over. She felt the nerves melt away.<\/p>\n Meeting Thundercat afterward was a thrill.<\/p>\n \u201cHe got off the tour bus to talk to me,\u201d she says. \u201cAnd it turns out that we\u2019re both anime nerds.\u201d<\/p>\n The experience was a milestone. Kent has also opened for Cautious Clay at WYEP\u2019s Summerfest and Wyclef Jean at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas. Jean, she recalls, described her voice as \u201crough butter\u201d \u2014 a mix of soul and smoothness.<\/p>\n Starting out<\/p>\n Kent, 38, graduated from Penn Hills High School and studied vocal jazz at Columbia College Chicago, where she enrolled in 2007. She pursued radio broadcasting and music business before returning to Pittsburgh in 2010 when her mother became ill.<\/p>\n After her mother died in 2011, Kent threw herself into developing her voice and songwriting, determined to take her music even more seriously.<\/p>\n She adopted the stage name Clara Kent in 2013, inspired by a scene in \u201cKill Bill: Volume 2\u201d in which characters discussed Superman and his use of Clark Kent as a human disguise.<\/p>\n Eventually, she found her style: soul music that borrows from other genres.<\/p>\n WYEP hired Kent, whose real name is Alexandria Reed, in 2022, and she launched the \u201cMore<\/a> Bounce<\/a>\u201d show in 2023. The show broadcasts from 6 to 8 p.m. Fridays.<\/p>\n \u201cAye, it\u2019s the weekend,\u201d is generally how Kent kicks it off.<\/p>\n Then she takes listeners on a journey of new and old sounds and local performers. You might hear some Mary Jane Girls. You might hear Stevie Wonder. You might hear local artists Mani Bahia<\/a> or Dejah Monea<\/a>. All the while, Kent narrates and offers lessons about the music.<\/p>\n The show has worked its way into my weekly routine, and I was happy to share that with Kent.<\/p>\n We talked about how I generally start my summer weekends at the backyard grill with her show blaring from my solar radio. There\u2019s nothing better than the freedom of a Friday evening and some tunes.<\/p>\n
\nto country and soft rock. Her daily soundtrack came from groups like the Eagles, America and Bread along with The Isley Brothers and John Coltrane.<\/p>\n