Introducing Pop Sweetheart Sam DeRosa…

Since her performance on SONGLAND in late 2019, Sam DeRosa has been keeping busy through the pandemic, much like her peers in the music and entertainment industry. 2020 brought with it writing credits on one of the world’s biggest songs of the year (Dixie D’Amelio’s ‘Be Happy’) and the release of DeRosa’s debut EP. From playing small gigs to making her television debut, Sam DeRosa’s story speaks as a testament to her perseverance and resilience and inspires others dreaming to break into the industry to never quit.

Drawing inspiration from JP Saxe to Ariana Grande, DeRosa delivers authentic anthemic pop that tugs at the edges of our personal heartaches. Her 6-track EP, aptly named The Medicine, is an exploration of self-love, self-discovery, and self-healing. 

She frames each song as solace, “Hopefully someone will hear this and feel like I’m right there with them – whether we are stumbling home, dancing around the house, or crying it out on the bedroom floor.” Sam’s songs are written by her, for someone like you.

We got the chance to chat with Sam about quarantine, her self-care routine, and the first-ever song she wrote! Read on for more…

Hey Sam! Thanks so much for being here today. How’re you doing?

I’m doing well. Trying to stay healthy and happy these days, haha. how are YOU?!

I’m doing well, thanks! First off, congratulations on releasing your first EP (The Medicine) back in November! I can’t imagine that must’ve been an easy feat–especially in the middle of a pandemic. How did being in quarantine affect your creative process?

Thank you! Oof, let me tell you it was tough. I battled with wondering if I should be putting out music while so much was happening in the world, and battled the obvious stress of not being able to tour or promote it, mixed all in with needing to film visuals and content alone because we were in a pandemic … you get the point, it was wild! But then I remembered: music is what gets me through the hard stuff. I make music for this very reason. Whether it reaches a million people or a hundred people, it still can reach them. For that, I told myself “I’ve gotta put my all into it and get it out there.” So I did! 

I’m sure I can speak for everyone when I say I’m so glad you ended up releasing the EP! I know all of this alone time has definitely given everyone lots of time to think and reflect. What did that reflection process look like for you and how might’ve some of those self-reflections made it into the EP?

I wrote this EP before the pandemic, but that’s what’s so wild about it. It’s about healing. I lost my uncle to covid in April. I never said goodbye. It still feels weird that he doesn’t call me. After writing this breakup EP, the songs even took on a different meaning for myself. I hear and feel them differently these days. The EP is about closure. It’s about the unknown, open-endings of life, and needing to figure out how to write your own endings. I guess I’ve done that this year, so I’m thankful I had these songs to help me through. 

My condolences for your family… I’m glad you had music there to help you through the difficult time. Self-care and self-love, and of course reflection definitely seem to be at the forefront of your EP. I know that while writing it, you turned from conventional methods of self-care (self-help books, journaling lists, podcasts, etc.). Can you talk a bit about your own avenues of self-care and how you discovered them?

I am a big fan of self-help and self-improvement. When I first hit my lowest low, I became a bit of a self-help junkie and had to chill, haha. I was allllll over social media and the internet. I became overstimulated and oversaturated with all the ways I could be better or needed to change. There’s a balance in there for sure and they REALLY do help! But I realized quickly that I was so busy talking about “the work” that I wasn’t doing any of it. The song ‘Sad Faces’ came from that very emotion. These days, I’ve got a great balance. I have a morning routine, I listen to podcasts and audio books, and I know when to unplug and take a beat for myself. 

Absolutely! That’s so important right now. Authenticity and personal truths also seem to be at the center of this project. Has it been difficult to hone into that honesty?

Surprisingly, it wasn’t. I say “surprisingly” because, as a writer and a creator, I fall into a headspace sometimes where I think I need to BE or SOUND a certain way. With this chapter of realizing my own music, I only knew how to be myself. I wanted to wake up every day and remember who I said I was. That thought seemed exhausting. So I promised myself to be honest in my music and in the stories I told. I always will be. 

On the listener side, I feel like The Medicine really tells a story about finding your own closure. What was it like to go through that emotional journey from a songwriting perspective?

Thanks for listening to it! You are 100% right. I feel thankful to be a songwriter because I feel that, for every emotion I go through that I need to write about, someone somewhere is going through it too and they need music to help navigate those feelings. I knew I had to make this EP about my experience and even though, at times, it was tough to write through, it helped me heal and helped me find my closure on my own. 

Even before releasing this past project, you’ve already had a lot of experience in songwriting, boasting credits on lovelytheband’s “broken” and Dixie D’Amelio’s “Be Happy”. How does it feel to now be the one visibly telling your own story instead of staying behind-the-scenes, and to allow yourself to take up that space?

I’m beyond thankful for the artists and people I’ve been able to write with and for. It’s changed my life. It feels really cool to sing my own songs this time. These stories felt like I had to tell them, and I think I’ll always feel nervous or like I’m not cool enough to be at the forefront of the music, but I’m going to keep pushing through! 

No, you definitely are cool enough!! I know you come from a big family of siblings where everyone was super creative or musical. What was it like for you to discover and claim songwriting as ‘your own thing’, and to sort of discover yourself through the songs you wrote?

It was such an accident! My brain just kind of thought in rhymes as a kid. I loved writing poems, though they weren’t very good. But the poems became songs that just sort of poured out one night. It was my way to leave the loud rooms and have a moment to myself, or a way to stay up late and get the room with the piano to myself. Once it started, it never stopped. 

Can you remember the first time you wrote a song and you were like, ‘Oh my god, this is it–this is how I feel’?

The very first one! I wrote a song when I was 8 years old for my sister after we lost our grandma. I was so proud and thought I was going to record it and that it would all happen so fast. I was obviously so wrong, but that’s how happy I felt because I was SO proud of that song. 

I’m sure your parents and siblings must be overjoyed for you! How have they all reacted to your success?

I think my mom’s reactions are my favorite. When I was on the Kelly Clarkson show, my brother filmed her waving to me on the tv and yelling “HI SAM!” A bunch of times as if I could see her. She and my dad will also call me every once in a blue to remind me that “they made me” so I must’ve gotten the ideas from them. They crack me up, but hey they’re not wrong! My siblings are just as supportive. I feel incredibly lucky to have the family that I do. 

And of course, where do you see yourself going in the future? What’s next for Sam DeRosa!

More music! I promise! I mean, of course I’d love to say here that I’m appearing in tv shows or in a movie or something wild but, hey, pandemic. So maybe next year. But definitely more music!