Would you say your sexual preference has hindered or helped your career in music?

That is really hard to say, sometimes I would say it has - especially with the Italian men because they were not able to get into my panties when they found out I was gay maybe there interest may have waned.

So I take it that that hindered your career because the Italian men could not sleep with you?

Yes that hindered it.

Then of course after being in the business for so many years, ( I lived there for 15 years) my reputation grew, I don’t think that it was a hindrance anymore because everybody knew…and people honored me for my talent and abilities

What would you say to a young up and coming lesbian/bi-sexual artist who feels like she is not as accepted because of her sexuality.

Wow, that’s a really good question I would say to them…be yourself no matter what, don’t allow other people’s judgment run your life. Don’t allow people’s validation or invalidation of you dictate who you are. Just be you no matter what, and when it seems no one is paying attention you got to really love yourself even more to choose what works for you.

Are you currently in a relationship with a woman?

Yes!

How does she feel about you being on the road so much?

I believe that she knows that I would not make a choice that would purposely hurt her in that sense. I may talk to people, flirt with people, but I would not put my dirty laundry in her face.

I travel a lot so I’m away for long periods of time, she knows that I am going to go out and, I’m not going to limit my life because she’s not there and she also knows that I am going to call her almost every day on Skype and see her face and let her know how much I care for her and keep a connection. But she knows that that’s my life and it makes me happy and she wants to see me happy, as I would like for her to be happy.

So what would you tell someone who was in your shoes and trying to maintain a healthy relationship?

In any relationship, each person has to be their own person, they have to live a life that is conducive to creating what makes them happy, and whatever creates their joy. The time that you guys spend together has to be quality time, and the time that you spend apart has to be quality time for yourself, so enjoy the time you have for creating your own life doing the things that you love to do, and your partner should do the same. When you get together there is more to talk about (laughing). But if you get caught up in resenting that the person isn’t there, then you’re going to create even greater stress for the relationship. Not all relationships are meant to be together 24/7, not all relationships are meant to be a day to day thing and maybe in the end if you look at it from a different point of view you’ll see that having those moments apart really helps you to appreciate your partner a lot more so that when you finally do get together you can enjoy that time even more.

What’s next for Karen Jones, where do you see yourself in the next 2-3 years?

In 2-3 years I see myself as continuing to create my show in terms of my singing. I’m adding more things to my life. I think that any artist should continue to add and ask the question “what else is possible, what else can I add to what I do”? So I’m in the process of working on a blog that I am creating a whole website for. Within that blog I’m going to show some other artistic things I have been working on which includes; a whole new style called “video poetry” I write a lot of poetry as well. I also plan to add this poetry to my show so I create a whole other dimension to how I express my eclectic nature. So these are some things that I am working on now and hopefully watch them grow and become a strong influence in the lesbian, black, and all of the communities, you know the cross over communities…international as well.

Where can our readers find your video poetry?

You can check it out at Facebook I have about four video poems up on this site and I did everything for them, I wrote the music, I selected the fonts, I took the photographs, I’m in them, I think there is one shoot of me in all of them and I edited them. So it’s like an all me production.

Where can I readers find your music?

They can find it on my website, they can check out some of my jazz stuff and I think there are some links that will send them to some other stuff that I’ve done which is more pop dance music. I did a lot of dance music when I lived in Italy.

Is there anything we didn’t cover that you may want to share with our readers?

I think that it is very important for people, especially lesbians to be yourself…it’s really important that they work on themselves and bettering themselves. The other business that I have is that I work with a company called Access Consciousness (the source of ultimate change) and it’s something I’ve been doing for eight years. I’ve facilitated and started it in several countries in my travels, I’m in Italy, Korea. Everywhere I go I bring it with me and I share it with people and it’s about just being more conscious and aware of what’s going on around you, and that includes most of all what’s going on inside of you. It’s something that I teach, it is something that I facilitate, if anyone ever wants to know anything about it they can write to me directly kajwords at yahoo.com and I can tell them more about it, especially when you are feeling lost or you’re feeling moody or you always want to fight someone, or always want to prove something to someone especially about being gay. Write to me and I will get in touch with them.