BUILT FOR WHAT MATTERS: GUTS & GLORY

Kodiak: Take us back to the beginning. How did music come into your life?

Chris Borelli: It started when I was 11, when I was placed into the custody of social services and was put into foster care, and there was a piano in the house. No one pushed me. No one tried to talk me into it. It was just there and I started to play—and a whole world opened up in front of my eyes.

Kodiak: An instant connection?

Chris: Exactly. Music was a relief and an outlet. A way of expressing myself. It was very pure, very honest.

Kodiak: Your foster parents taught you to play?

Chris: Well, they became my adopted parents—they adopted me. They’re my parents now. But I’m mostly self-taught. I’d hear music and then try to re-create it by memory. Eventually I was able to start improvising. Just seeing what worked, what felt right.

Kodiak: That’s amazing. Your music still has a very improvisational feel.

Chris: Thank you, yeah, that’s still how I work. I could sit down and play for weeks—experimenting with chord structures. It came out as very gospel, soulful type music. I’d put three notes together and think, “Okay, that sounds pretty good.” And I’d experiment. For years I’d just experiment.

Kodiak: How did that evolve into rap?

Chris: Singing was the piece that connects them. I sang all through middle school and high school. Ballads, mostly. I was like the John Legend kid [laughs]. I was in choirs, a lot of choirs. And I gave a jazz band a try, but learned that playing in a band wasn’t my thing. It was all stepping stones. But when I got to college, my roommate was a rapper and he became a mentor to me. Still one of my best friends.

Kodiak: Did you take it right to the stage?

Chris: Not right away. We’d meet up in the basement of academic buildings—some people with drums, some with guitars—and we’d just make music and rap. It made me hungry for exploring it and taking it as far as I could and bringing something new to it.