Leesburg Native Hits DC's ShamrockFest

What does a full-time musician do in his spare time?

Sleep? Eat? Pick up a new hobby, maybe?

That's what Justin Trawick, 29, is still trying to figure out. After holding a 9-to-5 job for much of his adult life, the Loudoun native whose made a name for himself in the D.C. area for his "urban folk rock" is now trying something different: devoting 100 percent of his time to his music. Well, at least 90 percent. That other 10 percent is still being worked out.

Until now, Trawick says music had been the break from everyday life that kept him going. As a kid, he filled up stacks of black and white composition notebooks with lyrics, strumming away at the guitar he discovered in his parent's pre-Civil War home in Leesburg. As an adult, he found himself stealing precious minutes from the workday to type out some thoughts or scribble down an idea.

"I always wrote when I wasn’t supposed to be writing," Trawick says. "It was a distraction. It was a way to get away from whatever I was supposed to be doing like studying ... or doing work."

All of that changed when Trawick decided to make his "distraction" his career. So far, it seems to be suiting him well.

On March 12, Trawick and three bandmates (Jean Finstad on upright bass and vocals, Josh Himmelsbach on mandolin and vocals and Peter Daniels on fiddle) will perform at . It will be the band's second time performing at the celebration of Irish heritage and beer drinking. And while the group will not be performing celtic tunes, Trawick says their performance promises to be a bluegrass twist on the band's catchy, funky songs like "Life," off the debut album "How to Build a Life with a Lemonade Stand," released in 2007.

"If you hear that song recorded ... it’s a G-Love kind of funk, almost rap song, but when we do that song at ShamrockFest it will be turned into a bluegrass song," says Trawick, of one of his musical inspirations, blues/hip hop band G. Love & Special Sauce. (Trawick also counts among his favorite musicians Jason Mraz, Ryan Adams and Austin, Texas, folk rocker Bob Schneider.) "It’s fun for the audience and it’s also fun for us because it gives us the ability to change it up and not play the same song every time we play."

Changing it up has become a regular thing for Trawick, who often asks rappers like Flex Matthews to share the stage with him on songs, such as "Brick by Brick," which also features the saxophone and fiddle and  on occasion a freestyle 90s hip hop medley. Sound crazy? It is, says Trawick, but in a good way.

In fact, one of his favorite musical tricks is to take a song that's been recorded and turn it on its head for a live audience. A good example is the track "Kool Kids," which, like a lot of Trawick's acoustic solo recordings, is very lyric-driven. Listening to the recorded version, it's easy to understand what the song's about: being young and making a go at life. ("We're cool kids standing in the corner, smoking, toking on life / And we'll never get it right / But we'll always die trying / What's the point in living if there ain't nothing that you're giving?") In the live version, though, it's hard to make out the lyrics -- and that's OK, Trawick says.

"What I really like about music ... is the fact that I’m extremely marketable," he says. "Because I can do the solo singer-songwriter thing and ... take those same songs and put them with the band and it can be fun and upbeat and people will be dancing."

But behind his spunky live performances, Trawick is a compassionate writer at heart. Now that he's doing music full time, he's writing a lot more. He's claimed the Starbucks near his apartment in Arlington as a second home. But he hasn't let the work become a chore. Even after he's done writing songs, he's blogging about his life and the sometimes trivial but interesting milestones that come with getting older, like ordering your first cup of decaf coffee, coping with living alone and saying goodbye to a relationship before you're ready.

Many of those experiences also play out in his latest album, "After All is Said and Done," released in September. It's an emotional album full of first-person accounts of heartache and new beginnings. Next, Trawick says he'd like to do another live album, which would be his second, after "Live at Iota," recorded at the Iota Club & Cafe in Arlington.

But in the meantime, he says he'll continue doing what he loves most: writing and peforming. ShamrockFest will be the first of many outdoor performances for Trawick this spring. Look for him to continue his reign as "the hardest working musician in D.C." with plenty of performances in the area.

Tickets to ShamrockFest start at $24.99 for general admission. Prices go up on March 3. Visit www.shamrockfest.com to buy tickets online. For more on Trawick or to listen to some of his music, visit www.justintrawick.com.