Rising Newmarket indie pop singer gets big boost from RBC music program

For 22-year-old singer songwriter Kennen, music has always been his dream and now he's making a career out of it. 

The young performer, also known as Ken Gao, taught himself how to produce music when he was just 12 years old. He said he watched YouTube tutorials and took advantage of the technology available to him. 

“I remember being in elementary school and just playing around with GarageBand loops in the school computer lab,” he said. 

Kennen grew up in Waterloo, but moved to Newmarket in 2021 during the pandemic because he has family here. 

After years of putting together tracks for others, Kennen began singing his own songs in 2020. 

"In 2020, I decided to give it a shot, singing over the stuff that I would produce and I found that performing indie pop was a really great match for me,” he said. 

His big break came from the song Timothée Chalamet from his EP Kennen's Cassettes, released in 2021. The song has more than 1.2 million listens on Spotify. 

“It’s based on a real story… I had a crush that looked like Timothée Chalemet. I decided to write about, I thought it was just something fun, something that I wouldn’t have been able to prepare as a producer and send a demo to another artist, I knew I was the one who had to sing this,” he said. 

While the song was monumental for Kennen realizing he wanted to share his own message as an artist, it was also a big success. 

Timothée Chalamet is an actor who was trending online at the time of the release. Kennen said it was picked up by Spotify's Discover Weekly list and quickly became popular. 

“I guess they liked it,” he laughed. 

He has more than 57,000 monthly listeners on Spotify and another track from the same EP called 1 2 365 4 Me also has more than one million listens. 

In November 2021, Kennen performed his first show at El Mocambo, an entertainment venue in Toronto.

“I was definitely nervous going into it, I felt like I did not rehearse enough,” he said. 

He drew inspiration from videos of artists on stage he watched growing up. 

“I wanted it to be fun and I think it wasn’t perfect but I was trying to have fun on stage,” he said. 

Now the next achievement for Kennen is that he has been named as a featured artist in the First Up program, helping to further accelerate his career. 

“I’ve just started with First Up with RBCxMusic and it’s already been so helpful,” he said. “Networking and getting performance opportunities can be a challenge for musicians, especially in light of the pandemic, but this program helps musicians reach those goals of growth.”

Kennen is one of 19 artists chosen out of hundreds of applicants from across Canada. 

The program provides performance opportunities, financial stipends, promotional support, and mentorship and networking opportunities for up-and-coming artists. It was started in May 2020 and since then has supported more than 150 artists from across Canada. 

“We are thrilled to see how far First Up with RBCxMusic has evolved over the last two years,” said Shannon Cole, vice-president of brand marketing at RBC. “The range of talent across this country is exceptional. As live performances are returning, we recognize the increasing need to keep the program alive and continue to support up-and-coming artists.”

In terms of what's next for the rising star, Kennen said he wants to continue doing live shows and he plans on releasing his EP called Art Class this summer, having already started dropping tracks from it. 

“If you like indie pop and fun stuff, it’s perfect for you,” he said.