This Emergency Physician Wants to Give Traverse City a Window into the Music Industry

Want to learn the ins and outs of the music industry from professionals who have played with the likes of Taylor Swift, Dua Lipa, Miley Cyrus, and Prince? Jacob Ramseyer, a local emergency medical physician with deep musical roots, is inviting the Traverse City community to do just that next month, with a free master class at the City Opera House.

Growing up in Traverse City, Ramseyer thought he’d make a career out of music. He sang in Chorale and Men of Note at Central High School, and played tuba in the school’s orchestra and symphony band. After graduating in 2001, he enrolled in the Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University, studying jazz guitar and taking “basically any gig that I could get” in the city. He also spent his college summers perfoming with the Schussy Cats, a one-time seasonal fixture at Ivan’s Café at Shanty Creek Resort.

“For a few years, I pretty much made my living playing music; I was at least scraping by,” Ramseyer says. Before long, though, reality reared its ugly head. “I found myself at a crossroads, because I felt like I needed something a little bit more robust to pay the bills. A lot of the people that I played music with were going back to school and getting teaching certificates, and then teaching music at local elementary schools.”

The allure a steady paycheck ultimately sent Ramseyer back to college, but not for a teaching degree.

“I started taking pre-med classes, and ended up loving it. The next thing I knew, I was in med school,” he says. “I trained in emergency medicine, and eventually moved back to northern Michigan, where I work in multiple hospitals across the Munson system.”

For years, Ramseyer thought the performing arts chapter of his life was over. As it turned out, though, music wasn’t done with him yet.

“I lost my dad in 2012, when I was in medical school, and honestly neglected the grief and the loss,” Ramseyer tells The Ticker. “It wasn’t until 10 years later, when I turned 40 and realized I had now spent a quarter of my life without him, that I saw I hadn’t really come to grips with losing him. I started realizing that time wasn’t going to fix it, and that I needed to do the work to get through that grief.”

For Ramseyer, doing the work involved picking up the guitar and writing songs. One of the first people ever to hear those songs was fellow Schussy Cats alumnus Justin Avery, a northern Michigan native who now serves as an American Idol arranger and keyboardist for the band Chicago. Ramseyer had reconnected with Avery during COVID-19 and started taking voice lessons with him, and Avery was supportive of his new songwriting exploits.

“Justin said to me, ‘When are we going to record these songs?’ And my response was, ‘I don't know. I hadn't really considered it.’ I thought I was writing just for writing’s sake,” Ramseyer says.

With Avery as producer, Ramseyer turned the songs about his dad into his debut album, Leave It All Behind. And thanks to Avery’s industry connections, the album ended up featuring a band of experienced touring and session musicians.

“These guys’ resumes are just insane,” Ramseyer says of his studio band. “They have played with everyone from Andra Day to Dua Lipa to Prince to Taylor Swift. They are just crazy talented people.”

When it came to planning an album release show in Traverse City, Ramseyer wanted to recapture the magic of those studio sessions. “I wanted to bring those guys here and play with them again,” he says. “But I also wanted to recreate that same kind of environment for the audience, and to offer an opportunity that would make these A-list players accessible to our community.”

That thought process led to Heart Sleeve, described as a two-day event at the City Opera House “celebrating songwriting, storytelling, and live performance.” The event will kick off at 4:30pm on Thursday, November 19 with “Learn It,” a free-to-the-public master class where attendees will get to ask Ramseyer and his backing band questions about songwriting and the music industry.

Ramseyer will follow the class with two concerts: “Feel It” on November 19, described as an “intimate storyteller experience” featuring acoustic performances of his songs; and “Hear It” the following evening, featuring the full band.

While he’s excited to celebrate the release of his new album, Ramseyer says he’s even more thrilled at the prospect of opening a window between Traverse City and the professional music industry. In particular, he's hoping to reach aspiring young artists in the region, and is even offering free concert tickets to high school and college students who attend the master class.

 “My goal is to have this to be as accessible as possible,” Ramseyer says. “Getting this wealth of knowledge and skill set into one room in Traverse City, and having the event be free and open to the public, was really a priority. And when I brought that idea up to the musicians, they were so enthusiastic about it. Even more than playing the shows, they all had the reaction of wanting to come here and teach. So, any question that students or community members want to ask about music, be it about writing, arranging, performing, recording, engineering, production, doing world tours, or even playing on television shows, these guys are ready to answer.”