Meet D. Arais | Musician & Educator

We had the good fortune of connecting with D. Arais and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi D., what led you to pursuing a creative path professionally?
Honestly, my whole life I’ve just been in love with music. I can’t pinpoint the exact moment or space I knew I wanted to do this. There are just way too many memories of the doors that have been opened for me by being in my creative space. As a child performing around the state to the adult around Atlanta and at college. I’ve been able to create opportunities for children in elementary and high schools to perform and express their creativity as well. It’s a beautiful cycle of life I’ve been in and I wouldn’t prefer to have it any other way. My mother always told me my gift would make room for me. She hasn’t been wrong yet. Even now, me pursuing this career has landed me on your magazine’s radar. I am insanely grateful for the opportunity.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
I’m really proud of my perseverance. There’s been times where I thought maybe this isn’t right and I should try something else but there was always someone telling me to keep going. It wasn’t easy. Often times as an artist you get caught up in the idea that it’s not happening fast enough or you want the success that others have and that’s not really beneficial. Those feelings set you up for a world of disappointment. You’ll never appreciate what you have when you’re constantly looking at others. That lesson taught me patience.

I’d like for people to know that it’s okay to be the tortoise in the race. A lot of us are rushing to a destination and don’t have the map of how to get there. It’s better to trust the journey so you can measure your success against your previous ones that way you never lose sight of how far you’ve come.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
I’m a nature boy at heart so anything we do is going to involve some walking, nature, and lots of food

Monday: Walking the belt line and touring the local eateries around there. Maybe bar hop a little bit. A good place to go would be The Curry House inside of the O4W Market. They have great food and isn’t too far from the belt line. If not there, a ways down the road the Intown Market and Deli has some great food as well.

Tuesday: Hiking at Cochran Mills Park. I like being in nature and typically my friends do too. There’s a nice water fall and swimming hole there too so if we wanted to do a picnic we most definitely could. After that we’d head to freshen up and go to Puttshack for some mini golf and drinks.

Wednesday: Depending on the time of day we could head over to Cloverland Ranch and do ATV and horseback riding. A ways up the road from the ranch is one of my favorite restaurants called The Loaded Mac. As the name suggests they have loaded Mac and cheese’s but they have lots of other options if you’re not a cheese person. Their spuds and nuggs are awesome and if you miss the thanksgiving food flavor they have a sweet potato sauce for your nuggets. Don’t knock it till you try it!

Thursday: Usually by this day we’re trying to figure something else out to do aside from what we’ve already done. If there’s not a concert going on in the city, we’ll be taking a trip outside the city to go to Amicalola Falls. It’s a quick little day trip. We go zip-lining and if we spend the night in the lodge there’s a beautiful view of the constellations.

Friday: We’ll leave Amicalola and head back into Atlanta and probably stop by Rosie’s or the Fork in the Road for some food. At night we’ll head to iLounge and see what event’s they have there. If we’re not feeling the lounge, we’ll go get some Jamaican food, grab a bottle of Cimarron and watch movies till we pass out.

Saturday: BBQ at the house with some friends. All day event. Grilling, drinking, playing some games. Having a good time with all our closest friends.

Sunday: Send them home with a care package.

Atlanta has so many cool places and so many interesting people it’s impossible to list all the things you would do in a week long trip because every time you walk outside, there’s something new to check out.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
This is going to be a list.
Shoutout to FlighOnTheWall LLC, responsible for the Fetch Tour
Trapset Entertainment, a really dope engineer who helped produce the With Love EP
RaeLouisBrand: My stylist
Lena Grossi: @visualsbylena Videographer and Photographer for “Call Me” Video.
@Shutter.kyd: Photographer
prodbyvluxx: Producer of some new things to come
SoulfoodATL: @soulfoodatl Granted many performance opportunities around the city
L.A.M.E. Voices: Collective of creatives in Albany, Georgia who built a platform to promote culture, community, & consciousness.
Platinum Sounds Recording Studio: The very first studio I recorded any music in. The place where it all started.

Website: https://araisent.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/d.arais/

Twitter: https://x.com/i/flow/login?redirect_after_login=%2Fd_arais

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DjMathis

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@D_Arais

Other: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/d-arais/1437584315


https://tidal.com/browse/artist/10401350

Image Credits
Lena Grossi
Sydney