Write a commentOswego native, Rusty J, the man behind the Education Connection jingle, prepares for a show in Nashville, Tenn. on the evening of July 19 as he drives to Centennial Park after finishing a shift at a Segway tour company.
Via phone interview, Rusty J, a.k.a. Jason Sheldon, excitedly reveals his journey to becoming an online musician, an author and a self-proclaimed "rolling stone."
When he was younger, his parents were in the Peace Corps.
"When I was a child we lived in Africa and Central America," he said. "But that was before I could even remember things."
His parents returned to Oswego, where Rusty J attended Hannibal High School and discovered his love for music.
"I was always singing in the Hannibal hallways with my friends," he said. "I had friends who would beat box and I would sign and rap down the hallways, like a mini celebrity."
Rusty J performed at dance contests at school dances.
"Every time there was a school dance, I was there. If there was ever a time to microphone it, I would," he said. He entered to perform a talent contest at Hannibal's annual Strawberry Festival, which he won.
"That was the first award I ever got that had anything to do with my talent," he said.
Rusty J graduated from Hannibal High School in 2000 and attended SUNY Oswego to earn his degree in business administration with a minor in marketing, "So I guess I'm an alumnus," he said with a laugh.
During his stay in Oswego, Rusty J played shows, eventually landing a record deal with Blendz Records, an independent record label based in Syracuse. After two years with Blendz Records, Rusty J parted with the record company and moved to Nashville to further pursue his career in music.
"I was mostly making pop music," he said. "I was mixing singing and rapping on the same track before I became popular."
He said he knocked on every door in Nashville and later packed his bags and moved to Los Angeles in 2008.
"It was really tough to find a job in L.A.," he said. "But I finally got a job at Starbucks and served coffee to some famous people like Slash, Pamela Anderson and Tim Allen."
He still tried to pursue his music career even though it was a tough economic time.
"At the time, I had a serious MySpace following," he said. In November of 2008, Rusty J's MySpace music jukebox page shows 290,000 play counts, 250,000 YouTube channel views and 50,000 MySpace messages from fans.
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While in L.A., Rusty J sold tickets to shows in Hollywood, L.A. and Beverly Hills. Within the first three months of playing shows in L.A., Rusty received three music management contracts. He finally signed with Spencer M. Clarke and Marla Sitten.
Rusty J then wrote the famous jingle for Education Connection alongside producer Anthony Falcone in 2009. The commercial would later air for four more years, collecting more than 1 million YouTube views.
"Around that time I got a call from my manager (Spencer) saying that he set up a meeting to do a duet with Taylor Swift in Nashville," he said, sounding nonchalant. "I think it was just an attempt from my manager to get me to move back."
The duet never happened.
He cut off ties with his management in September 2010 and decided to make a big move, except this time, he would move to the other side of the world: Australia.
"I lived in Australia for two years," he said.
While there, Rusty J began to write a record titled "Self Employed," which he wrote, produced and launched on his own.
"It took me about a year to complete it," he said. "I always worked with producers. I just wrote the songs, sang them and they added beats, mixed them, mastered them and made them sound amazing. So I had to learn how to do all of that before I released anything."
Rusty J says he wrote about 50 songs and later narrowed it down to about 20 songs that he was happy with.
"And then I just threw them out there and called it a day," he said. "I didn't do any promotion or anything."
At the same time, he was busy writing a book called "How I Became a Popular Online Musician on a Really Really Really Tight Budget, which he said "only sold 40 copies."
In 2011, an Italian record label called Dance & Love signs Rusty's club song "Dream Control," which hit the radio in late 2011 in Italy.
In June 2011, Rusty moved back to America and Italian record label Edinet signs another one of Rusty's club songs titled "It Feels Good," which was 
scheduled to hit the international airwaves in 2012.
Currently, Rusty has partnered with another musician named C. Richardson, who, according to Rusty, almost got drafted to the NFL.
"He's very talented," he said. "He's got a Memphis sound."
Rusty and Richardson are forming a group called The Beale Street Boys. He describes their sound to be, "laid back pop music with Memphis influences and Southern California influences. Really laid back stuff."
Rusty J has taken over the world, accomplishing his dream to play in the world's most famous venues, such as the legendary Whiskey A Go Go on Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood, Calif. The Whiskey A Go Go housed musical acts such as The Police, The Who, The Doors, Led Zeppelin, The Kinks, The Ramones, The Misfits and many more.
"Every rock n' roll star who ever did anything performed at the Go Go, so it was a real honor to play there," Rusty said.
On the evening of July 18, 2013, Rusty played at Earnestine & Hazel's in Memphis. The bar and grill is rumored to be haunted as it housed a brothel in the upstairs part of the venue.
"The Rolling Stones had been there," he said. "Their song Brown Sugar was said to be inspired by the happenings they saw in the brothel upstairs."
"Bob Dylan used to hang out there," he said. "It's not one of those venues everybody knows about.
It's kind of in the cuts in Memphis. It's really a historic and a legendary place. I played there (July 18), which was awesome. It was really low key, only about 15 people were there."
With traveling, writing and recording music already under his belt, Rusty J hopes to conquer the world, or at least Memphis, with his new The Beale Street Boys music, which he hopes to release soon.
"I'm trying to live my life in the moment," he said. "But, ultimately, my goal in life is to remain faithful to my morals and always do the best that I can in all aspects of my life."
To check out more of Rusty J's sound, head over to his official website, www.rustified.com where you can download a free song if you enter your name and email address. Rusty J also has an official Twitter account and an official Facebook account that features more of his journey in Memphis.
