Playing music has been a revolving process for Jaron Lowenstein.
It started when he and his twin brother began playing gigs and making records as Evan and Jaron, and continued with Jaron’s band The Long Road to Love.
When my brother and I started playing music, we bridged the gap between being fans of music to being musicians,” Lowenstein said during a telephone interview from Northern California. “That kind of made me think that I may be able to make music for a living. We started playing together, and that kept me on the road.”
After his brother decided to settle down to raise a family, Lowenstein continued making music as a solo artist and leader of The Long Road to Love, and, in 2009, he released the song “Pray For You,” which peaked as the No. 1 country song on iTunes and was the lead single off the album “Getting Dressed in the Dark,” which debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard Country Albums chart.
“I’d like to think there were goals, but I can’t remember if there any specific ones, but I know the way it was planned was never the way it went,” Lowenstein said with a laugh. “I knew I was heading in a certain direction. I knew where I wanted to go, but how I got there was totally different, because if you’re in the arts, you can never really know where the road will take you.”
The uncertain path reacquainted Lowenstein with singer/songwriter Joe Firstman, the former band leader for the TV show “The Last Call With Carson Daly,” and current bandmate in Lowenstein’s new project The Cordovas.
“Joe is a friend of mine and he’s a very talented singer/songwriter,” Lowenstein said. “We came up together in the Los-Angeles scene in the early 2000s, but my music career took me in one direction and his took him in another.”
Firstman contacted Lowenstein last February.
“He was on tour and saw my name up on a marquee, opening for Toby Keith and thought, ‘There cannot be two Jarons playing music,'” Lowenstein said with a laugh. “He reached out and got my number through a mutual friend and contacted me in Nashville.
We started having conversations and playing music and showing each other what we had been doing the past 10 years.”
The jam sessions evolved into listening sessions where the two would study and play covers by Neil Young, Bob Dylan and the Grateful Dead.
“Our goal was to write our own songs that would take on the same feel of those songs,” Lowenstein said. “We wanted to write our own songs, that would hopefully show those influences.”
The two enjoyed the experiment, which was a totally new experience for Lowenstein.
“I’m devoted and passionate about making music,” he said. “I get impatient with myself as an artist and a creator. Once I do something, I sit back and look at the canvas and admire it, but I don’t want to create something on that canvas the same way. So I push myself to find a new way to do it and that led me to the band with Joe.”
The two began rehearsing their own songs and had Jon Lloyd, who has performed with Chris Baron of the Spin Doctors and Gavin DeGraw, come and play piano.
“We decided to add him to our lineup because he was so good,” Lowenstein said. “I loved what I did with Evan and Jaron and I love what I’m doing with The Long Road to Love, but the way this music hit me with Joe and Jon was incredible. There was nothing to think about. Fate brought us together and I chose to embrace what was happening and put all my resources behind it.”
While Lowenstein, Firstman and Lloyd all have the ability to sing and write songs, they chose Firstman to be the band’s music director.
“We picked Joe because he is best-suited to be the bands’ co-producer for the new CD,” Lowenstein said. “Meanwhile, while we’re on tour, we’re going to call ourselves Jaron and the Long Road to Love with Joe Firstman, because no one knows who The Cordovas are, yet.”
The Cordovas’ self-titled CD is nearly completed.
“We’re working on getting it out as soon as we can,” Lowenstein said. “We’re planning to release it digitally and then sell it physically later on.”
Still, Lowenstein isn’t concerned about money. In fact, he said the band is not opposed to distributing the album for free.
“We’ll make it available online on iTunes and Amazon.com, but if people aren’t comfortable with using those sites, or they can’t afford it, then we’ll make it available for free on www.cordovas.com ,” he said. “They’ll be able to download it, not just stream it, for free, and if the album lives for them and they still like it months later and want to buy it for somebody else, then they can do that. We want everyone to hear the music, and not be kept away because of the price.”
Jaron and the Long Road to Love with Joe Firstman, also known as The Cordovas, will perform at Downstairs, 625 Main St., on Friday, Sept. 16, at 8 p.m. Tickets are $5 and available at www.ticketcake.com.