Jared Ellsworth

I started playing music as a kid. My dad showed me some chords on the organ. I always enjoyed tinkering on that organ, but I was never serious. I later received my first real synthesizer for Christmas. It was a Sequential Circuits MAX. The sound was incredible! It inspired me to teach myself how to play by ear. Eventually I was good enough that I would often perform at weddings for relatives.

Years later in high school, I started up a rock band, with my buddies. Hit ‘n Run taught me how difficult it is to organize a group and showed us that being in a band is more than just jamming out tunes. Unfortunately everyone went their separate ways after graduation.

Some time after I was married in 1994, my dad started up an oldies rock and roll group called EXIT 254. He asked me to come play in his band, and I accepted. After all, I owed him for getting me started with music, and I was itchin’ to play live again. We played for a few church dances and city events, but EXIT 254 was struggling to keep it together, and I left.

During this period I had come up with the idea to return to my roots, and I started promoting myself as a wedding player/singer. I recorded a demo of popular contemporary hits and that led me to be hired for a couple of weddings for some folks in my area. While this brought in a little extra money, I soon realized that my life as a wedding jukebox was not the path I wanted to take. After much frustration I decided to call it quits once and for all.

A few months later, the drummer from Exit 254 called and said he was in a country band, and he asked me if I wanted to try out. The band was called River Ranch. Though I had never been really fond of country music, I decided to check it out. And I’m glad I did. The River Ranch Band was the most serious and well-organized group I had ever run across in my life as a musician. I couldn’t pass up this opportunity and I joined up with them. The time I was with RR was incredible, and I will never forget being a part of my first REAL band. Unfortunately after 3 years, things did not end up the way I had hoped. Creative differences led the band to restructure at the end of 2002.

After a few musical experiments, I met up with the guys from Crossroads. It was great to return to rock after so many years, so I decided to stick around.