Pediatricians recommend young children be exposed to music at a young age as listening to music can help increase motor skills, emotional regulation and social and academic development. When Jaymz Dence’s parents spun Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin and the Doors, they kickstarted a sonic development that would inspire Dence long past childhood. 

“When I was a little kid, my mom and dad, they would pull on all these great albums, the Beatles, Bob Dylan,” said Jaymz Dence, lead guitarist, band leader and songwriter for Solid Ghost.

Dence’s early exposure to playing music was not in alignment with the music he was fascinated by as a kid.

“I knew, as soon as I saw someone playing guitar, I knew I really wanted to do that, but I wasn’t able to quite go right to it from the start. Like a lot of little kids, when the band started up in school, I jumped at that. I didn’t even have the option to play guitar,” he said. 

The trombone and the trumpet were the genesis of Dence’s music career, neither of which gripped him as the guitar had.

“I almost quit music, but I had a really great music teacher, he encouraged me not to quit, but to try a different instrument,” Dence said. 

Though Dence would not get his chance at guitar until years later, a brief foray into the drums brought him closer to his dream. The same music teacher who encouraged him to stay in music sold him his first guitar.

“My band teacher knew I wanted to play guitar, and he sold me an old beater acoustic for $20, and now I’ve been playing guitar since 1992,” Dence said.

His performance history on the Palouse started with the well-known regional cover band The Kingpins. Through his involvement in the Moscow music scene, he assembled his current band. Accompanied by his two bandmates, Steve Farr playing bass and Philip ‘Dusty’ Fletcher on the drums, Solid Ghost plays shows across the Palouse, from performances in Moscow bars to local sobriety events. 

Solid Ghost describes their music as “instrumental rock and blues with influences of psychedelia and old school metal, with subtle hints of ambient and world music also swirls in the smoky haze.” 

Dence’s early music fandom has strong influences on his band’s current work, and on the spirit of his live performance, but he and his band prefer the serenity of the Palouse music scene over the international rockstar lifestyle. 

While Dence and Solid Ghost enjoy writing, recording and performing, they are happy sticking to local audiences and venues.   

“I like coming home,” Dence said. “I like coming home to my house a lot. I play a lot of shows, and I love doing this regionally.”

After the Main Street construction ended, the City of Pullman and the Chamber of Commerce reintroduced long-standing events like the Music on Main concert series and introduced new ones like the Starlight and farmers’ markets. All of these events feature local, live musicians who have different histories in music, but who share a passion for the Palouse community and for sharing their music with all of us. 

At Solid Ghosts Music on Main performance, children swirled and danced among walkers with dogs who paused to take in the music, people pulled up chairs from the square or had brought their own and residents of the adjacent apartment building cheered with the crowd after each song from their open windows. 

The following week, a German folk band took to Pine Street Plaza. Ranging in age from college students to retirees, and in experience level from classically trained to amateur musicians, the quirky, bouncy rhythm of German folk music garnered a similar crowd to Solid Ghost, where dog walkers befriended each other at the demand of their furry friends and others sat listening to the music while sketching or reading. 

Matt Zook, director of the Community Band of the Palouse and member of Auf Gehts, was happy to see the small crowd gathered to experience his lederhosen-clad ensemble.

“It’s an opportunity to bring people together where a lot of the icky stuff we’re dealing with in life is not an issue. That stuff doesn’t have anything to do with being able to sit together in a beautiful place and have an artistic experience together,” Zook said. 

Zook is always looking for members to join the Community Band of the Palouse, and encourages musicians of all levels to try it out. This is a spirit that Dence and Zook share. 

“I didn’t think I would be any good at playing the guitar, I just really wanted to do it, but I think when you love something enough, you’ll sit down and put in the time,” Dence said. 

When a community sits down and puts the time into supporting local artists, magic happens. When local art is supported and encouraged, communities blend, individuals interact and the community becomes more whole. On the Palouse, the music community is far from fractured. 

Check out Solid Ghost on Bandcamp or visit their website at solidghostband.com, and visit their website, palouseband.org, for more information on the Community Band of the Palouse live concert.