Meet Brady Leffler

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Brady Leffler a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Brady, we are so happy that our community is going to have a chance to learn more about you, your story and hopefully even take in some of the lessons you’ve learned along the way. Let’s start with self-care – what do you do for self-care and has it had any impact on your effectiveness?

I discovered running at the age of 17 and it has forever changed my life for the better. Yoga entered my life and has been an ongoing practice for about 6 years. It’s one of the few things that can truly slow me down. Both of these practices are meditative for me and have more benefits than I likely realize. I try to get out of town or go camping by myself when I can. Very healthy journeys to unplug from the hustle of Los Angeles.

Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?

I am an LA artist that juggles a few different career paths, like many, and have worked hard over many years to intertwine these into my own little sustainable ecosystem. These three pillars are food, beverage, and music. I moved here in 2008 as a touring musician, as this was certainly one of two major hubs for that industry. To make ends meet in between gigs and touring, I did what I always had and got a couple jobs working in bars and restaurants. These jobs are flexible and abundant, especially in a city like Los Angeles full of young entertainment industry folks. I spent the better part of a decade intertwined within those three pillars of work and grew them over time until I took a larger leap with one of the beverage companies I was contracting with in 2017. I quit the restaurant/bar, and went full time taking a position of head of product development and R&D with the world’s leading Kombucha producer here in LA. Unfortunately that meant putting the live music work on pause, which was heart-breaking, but I thought that I was a big boy now and needed to make these tough responsible decisions to get to where I and society needed me to be. While that did work out for me for a couple years, it ended up starving my creative spirit over time, and I needed out. After 5 years of working in the corporate world, I found my exit strategy and went back to freelance independent contract work, which allowed me to build my own little business+brand. I was inspired by the creative pop-up restaurants spawned out of the pandemic, and I created a mobile pizzeria called Hi-Fi Pizza Pi in the beginning of 2022. My goal was independence! I no longer wanted to work for someone else which would dictate what I did and how I did it. I needed control over my own life. I found out through trial and error that I’m much better suited to do things my own way, which doesn’t necessarily click with everyone else’s, especially in a corporate structure. Happy to say that things progressed pretty quickly once I broke out of the corporate chains and all of my endeavors began to slowly but surely thrive. Within a year I had an active business, sustainable contract work, and was even playing music again. I was able to do things on my own timeline, and my world felt aligned once again! By the end of 2023 I was hitting record sales numbers month after month with my business, and even did my most successful tour to date playing live with the All-American Rejects. 2024 has been all about continuing the success of my three pillars in food, bev, and music, and honing the sustainability of them within my own little world. I’ve luckily found wonderful pals, cooks, musicians and warriors to team up with in all endeavors, and has been a lovely reminder that we all need a little help from our friends in this world 😉

I have some incredible upcoming opportunities to share. Later this month I’ll be playing keys with Eric Burdon & The Animals at the FOOL IN LOVE Festival here in LA outstide of SOFI Stadium. I’ll also be playing Keys and Guitar with The All-American Rejects in Canada for the ALL YOUR FRIENDS festival. Beginning in September we’ll be taking over the food program at the most incredible new(ish) music venue here in LA, the Bellwether in DTLA, with Hi-Fi Pizza Pi. I’m bottling my 2023 harvest red and white wines at the moment and preparing for 2024’s harvest, as well as continuing to craft small-batch Kombucha, and working on developing a top-secret functional canned NA beverage behind the scenes 😉 My plate is full, and I like it that way!

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

I learned a lot from the “Mixology” wave around 2010 and beyond, which I applied to my beverage brewing and developing work. That was a wonderful burst of creativity and innovation within the beverage industry, and really helped to expand the public’s palates. The revival of fermented foods, thanks to the rise of Kombucha, was instrumental in getting me to where I am today. I’m 14 years into that world, and continue to be be amazed with the power of fermentation which transforms foods and beverages into something more unique, complex, less toxic, more nutrient rich, in most cases more delicious, and of course FUN. The key ingredient and cornerstone of my Hi-Fi business is a 208-year old sourdough culture I acquired 5 years ago. The final secret weapon that fuels me in ALL of my endeavors is sobriety. I gave up alcohol in 2022 and my life has turned into something I never even thought possible. I’ve unlocked superpowers I had no idea existed. I’m realizing my true potential as a young adult, powering forward with no regrets, and focusing on being present within the journey. Trust yourself kids, bet on yourself. Unlock your powers. Love and Art are what matter most. LFG!

One of our goals is to help like-minded folks with similar goals connect and so before we go we want to ask if you are looking to partner or collab with others – and if so, what would make the ideal collaborator or partner?

I’m looking for hard-working gig-based people that want to earn extra money and work with me sporadically on super fun pop-up events with Hi-Fi Pizza Pi. We often do music festivals, night markets, food festivals, street fairs, wineries and all sorts of private events between LA and Santa Barbara counties and beyond. I often hire on musicians or young cats in entertainment who of course need extra gigs between gigs! I’ve definitely been there, so I try to provide the kind of gig that I needed when I was fresh off the boat. If you’ve got experience in bars and restaurants, you’re perfect. You need some taste of the fast-paced, intense, sense-of-urgency tidal wave of LA food service to “get it” and be able to flow. I do my best to provide top pay, and a fun environment full of fun and educational knowledge and experiences within our little mobile business concept. Heavy emphasis on foodie culture, wine and music.

Contact Info:

Image Credits

Cameron Jordan, Elizabeth Wiltshire

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