Who the heck is Brotha James?
A Musical Master with a mission of helping you and your family channel your full potential
If you’re new to FamBundance, you might be asking why the leader of our family-focused community is a tall, bearded, vegan musician with no kids. Is he really the best person to be leading our families?
Well, we know he is, and we’ll tell you why!
His Story
Brotha James’ real name is actually Jeremy Reisig (ask him when you see him where the name Brotha James comes from – he loves to tell the story!)
Jeremy grew up in the small, 1,500-person town of Elk Rapids, Michigan with a loving mom and dad and his brother Sean. He was always excited about the adventure of life, and loved to play drums on the pots and pans in the kitchen while singing (pretty badly, according to some) — you might say he always had dreams of being an entertainer!
Throughout his life growing up, family was always a top priority for the Reisigs, with family dinners every night, and vacations spent visiting grandparents in Illinois, Texas or Florida.
A Focus on Sports
Through his high school career, Jeremy’s focus shifted to sports, where he played baseball, basketball, football, and soccer, as well as focusing on other activities like ice skating, wakeboarding, snowboarding, biking, and playing frisbee!
He was an All-State baseball player, and even won a State Soccer Championship! Jeremy went to college to play baseball, but unfortunately tore his rotator cuff in the first year.
A Musician is Born
After his injury prevented him from participating in sports, Jeremy shifted his focus when he started selling Cutco cutlery at the age of 19. He quickly excelled up the ranks of salespeople, becoming the top rep in the country for 2002, 2004, and 2005!
Although he was very successful in his sales career, he never felt fulfilled, and shifted his focus again in 2006 back to music, joining a 7-piece funk band that was touring the nation, called FUNKTION, in which his brother Sean was the band’s drummer. Jeremy’s role was managing the band, booking them at venues across the nation and handling their needs as a team as they toured the country. As Jeremy describes it, “It was like running a team… a really chaotic situation!”
Back to Business
Realizing the need to increase his income, Jeremy began focusing on Cutco again in 2010, where he helped to pioneer the Cutco Realtor Program, turning a Forever Guaranteed one-time purchase of the Cutco product into a consumable closing gift that was purchased over and over again!
Between 2012 and 2015, he built a business with a guaranteed horizontal income of $72,000 for two years, that would slowly taper off, and then continue to remain stable.
Building a Brand
Again, Jeremy wanted to get back to his musical passions, and with a guaranteed income behind him, he decided to start the Brotha James brand. He learned how to sing, play guitar, and use electronic instruments to do what’s called “looping” while playing live shows!
With his new persona as Brotha James, Jeremy spent the next 3 years touring the country, playing over 100 shows a year in bars, clubs, other venues, and festivals!
Musical Facilitator Extraordinaire
Deciding he wanted to use his music to make an impact in the lives of others, Brotha James created a category called Musical Facilitator, and is now traveling North America as a well-known, highly-respected, and well-paid musician — a goal he set for himself back in 2011!
Brotha James played many events, including a few that the FamBundance founder Mike McCarthy attended. In May of 2016, Mike hired brotha James to play at the first FamBundance event taking place in his backyard, and he has played and facilitated at every GoBundance and FamBundance event since!
“Along the way I’ve had so many opportunities to connect with other human beings and see the love and and the light that lives inside of each and every one of us. It’s not always easy to remain in a place where we see the light and love within ourselves and sometimes the love that comes from others is just what we need to move through our own challenges.”
