Today we’d like to introduce you to Jared Cattoor.
Hi Jared, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
My musical story begins when I was 16 and a half years old. My friend was playing guitar and I asked him to show me one little riff that I thought was humorous. I only wanted to learn this one riff to play as a joke sometimes. My friend tried showing me the riff but it was very hard for me to play. So he showed me an even easier one which everyone learns first… Smoke on the water. I was immediately bitten by the music bug. I played that riff over and over and over trying to get it right. I played it so much at my friends house that he let me borrow his guitar so I could go home and get it perfect. I played it the whole car ride home.
For 6 months I was practicing on my friends Walmart guitar at my house. My parents noticed that I just didn’t stop playing so they decided to gift me a acoustic guitar for my 17th birthday.
I went to my friend Andrew Stevens house and his amazing father Howard Stephen was trying to give us a music lesson. I was humiliated so bad that day but I immediately went home and started searching for music teachers. 2 weeks after my 17th birthday I started music lessons and never looked back. That day with Howard set me on a never ending journey. RIP.
Andrew Steven and I started playing in the loop every Sunday at the drum circles and everywhere we could. We were always on the street with guitars or at music festivals or in parks.
My Senior Year of high School I joined jazz band which was pretty crazy because everybody else in jazz band had been playing music their whole life. The very last day of my Junior Year I begged the jazz band instructor to be in jazz band the following year. He refused 100%. The first day of Senior Year I walked directly into his office before doing anything else and I brought a guitar. I practiced all summer and I begged him to let me in and give me a chance. He really did not want to but he agreed that I would take lessons with the best jazz guitar teacher in the area and we would give me a shot. That guitar teacher at the time was Steve Leslie who is a wonderful musician and Berkeley graduate.
Thank God I did good enough to be allowed to stay in jazz band for the whole year.
Shortly after that Andrew Steven and I started the band Rhyme or Reason. Andy was the music writer and the main frontman. At the same time I started studying music at St Louis community college. After my first year there I ended up switching to university Missouri of Saint Louis.
My opera friend Brandon Smith invited me to go to orientation with him just to see the school. By the time I left I accidentally enrolled into university of Missouri St Louis jazz program. My parents were very mad but I was determined to make it work.
I had been working at Mozingo music for a year so. Shortly after that I moved in with Andrew Stephen and his brother Matt Steven. We had a house in Collinsville Illinois that was dedicated as our own band house. We played all the major venues in St Louis and the major college towns in the state of Missouri with our band rhyme or Reason.
We were all teaching and working together at lacefield music in shiloh Illinois. I stopped school for a while because I basically finished my bachelor’s degree and had enough students and gigs to be a professional full-time musician. I did all the music classes first and skipped the gen ed’s.
However after not studying in college for a year or so I had the urge to continue my education but I needed something much more creative. The standard music education system in America deals with classical music and jazz only. so I sought out the best contemporary music schools in America and the world. I narrowed it down to three schools. Berkeley, Belmont and Nashville or Musicians Institute in Los Angeles. I visited two of the schools but then I quickly chose musicians institute due to the perfect weather and atmosphere that totally matched my vibe.
Musician’s Institute was originally known as G.I.T. Guitar Institute of Technology. It was the first contemporary guitar conservatory in the world. So many of the greatest fusion guitarists either went there as a student or was a teacher there. Joe pass was one of the first teachers there for example. I took lessons with so many world famous musicians and that completely elevated my game to a whole other level.
I Studied with Paul Gilbert, Scott Henderson, Dean Brown and many more legends…
While I was at Musicians Institute I ended up meeting a girl named Anna Yanova. She is a singer from Bulgaria. We very quickly fell in love and started living with each other. We had a residency at the House of Blues in Hollywood and we were playing at CBS studios with a famous actress Diane cannon on a pilot television show called God’s parties. We were also working with Eye Level Entertainment and PSI seminars. Mostly we were playing private events and struggling to pay our rent.
We ended up getting married at CBS studios with the famous actress Diane cannon as our officiant. She gave the greatest wedding speech I have ever heard. Sadly only my mother was there out of anyone in both of our families. Nonetheless it was a beautiful wedding and it was filmed live at CBS studios in 2013.
Then we recorded Anna’s first album titled Up! Add Andrew Stevens studio 8 fold studios. But after this we created our band called Two Cities One World. The name represents my home in St Louis Missouri and her home Sofia, Bulgaria.
Shortly after I graduated Musicians Institute. The incredible Herbie Hancock was my keynote speaker! That’s definitely one of the coolest things that has ever happened to me. Alice Cooper was the keynote speaker for Anna.
Anna and I decided we would move back to Saint Louis and continue our music career there since I had already been playing there for so many years.
We were moving back to St Louis and we were only there for two weeks before we went to Bulgaria for my first time. Anna’s mother is a celebrity in Bulgaria and she had an opportunity to be on the reality TV show called Big brother. Actually it’s called VIP brother and it’s with Bulgarian celebrities. She did not like that show or want to be on it but she asked the network if she could bring us along with her because she knew that was the only way to get us to Bulgaria. I only want to do go there if I had work and she created it for us by getting us on the TV show.
So we moved to St Louis from Los Angeles for two weeks and then hopped on a plane to go to Bulgaria for 90 days and return… However Anna’s travel documents were sent to the wrong address by US immigration and they refused to resend it to the correct address. So we got stuck in Bulgaria for three years waiting for US immigration. After a year and a half of waiting and thinking we were coming back each month I had to get more serious and start working more. But there we were gigging all over the country and we were on television and radio often for our original music.
So we really developed our career as Two Cities One World in Bulgaria after being on the television show. It was an extreme culture shock for me but a great blessing. I’m so happy to have seen such a different way of life.
Finally after 3 years we were allowed to return to the United States and we moved back for six years in St Louis. However we were touring in the summer time in Bulgaria still since we had a good career going with our band.
Two Cities One World is a band name but also our lifestyle. We try to mix music and art that represent and contain the emotion and soul of each place. Since we created our band our goal is always to be authentic artists and to create the music that comes naturally to us and that we love. We never tried to fit into any box from the industry. We just want to promote authentic art because we believe by being your authentic true self the world will go the way it was intended.
Most of society is being tricked into spending time doing things that do not reflect their most authentic desires. We have always recognized that and we strive to stay authentic to ourselves and in return inspiring others to do the same. When we created our band we did a dedicated ourselves to staying authentic to who we were and true to art as a whole. Also understanding responsible Media. We understand how much Media influences society. So with our words and our images we purposefully give positive and powerful messages to free them minds and hearts of all who coming contact with us. Are bands mission statement is to “enlighten the planet through the power of music.”
Through our process as artists in Two Cities One World we managed to release one EP, 2 full length albums and some live albums as well.
Anna and I then decided it was our time to have children. Our first son Jade it is now almost seven years old. There’s definitely slowed our process down and making our music but Jade is the greatest piece of art we have ever created. We also have our second son Yan who is almost three now.
We are training these little guys like the Wooten Brothers were trained and Jacob Collier and others like Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. All of these people have been playing since birth or their parents are musicians. I noticed while being at musicians institute with 500 other guitar players that the greatest musicians are always the ones who start at the youngest age and have musical influences around. Mozart’s father was a classical pianist for example. It’s not surprising that he became so great because that was normal life for him as a child. He wasn’t so much smarter than everyone else, it was just normal life. The same with the others I mentioned. But like Victor Wooten says what does the world need with another great musician? What the world needs is great people. So we do our best as parents to teach these kids to be a little bit more loving, caring and smarter than us. In my opinion that is the purpose of parenting and evolution. Each generation should become a little bit better than the last. Better meaning more compassionate, more caring more considerate and open to making the world a better place by action and leadership.
So now after a long break of being parents and moving across the world many times we are back in creation mode. Living in the beautiful mountains of Bulgaria with a home studio. We are teaching and performing a lot. But we recently became music promoters as well through our music festival Lunen Festival. Moon Music festival in english.
It was always a dream of ours to create our own music festival and to bring artists from St Louis to Bulgaria and artists from Bulgaria to St Louis. In 2025 we created our first music festival in Bulgaria in the beautiful Rila mountain. Beli iskar is the location.
Creating the festival was something we had always wanted to do but this time it actually happened by accident.
Anna and I just wanted to do a small concert on this beautiful lookout at a cliff in Beli Iskar. We asked the mayor and he told us to talk to the National Park. The decline because it was a bit dangerous for people to be sitting on this trail. It’s really only a place to stop for 10 minutes while hiking. Also we are not allowed to have amplification in the National Forest.
So we decided another location that Anna’s parents used to have a festival at. This has always been our dream location for our Festival. At first we thought we would just do a small concert there.. but then we thought why not invite our musical friends to perform as well. And then we thought why not just make a festival? We asked the mayor of the village and with three weeks after he said yes we created our first music festival hosting 10 bands in one day.
Lunan Festival is the name of our Festival. In English it’s moon music festival. On September 7th 2025 there is a full blood moon and lunar eclipse. So we did it on that day as we are in the mountains with a huge open sky to view this incredible moon.
This year we are doing it August 28th 29th and the 30th. There were once again be a full moon and lunar eclipse on August 28th. We have the Australian world famous musician dub FX headlining that evening. And for 3 days we have extremely high quality Bulgarian bands who have very well known and incredible musicians. We are providing a wide range of styles for maximum cultural exchange.
My goal is that next year in 2027 I will bring some St Louis artists to preform. I would like Katara, Justin ra, Ryan marques, Bernard Terry and many other bands. But I will start with my close friends to bring.
I consider myself an ambassador for St Louis and I’m excited to start sharing a cultural exchange between Bulgaria and Saint Louis.
Music education is lacking dramatically in world music. At least in any college in Missouri. Maybe the percussionists get some world music it but almost no one else. This is why I studied in Musicians Institute in California. The study literally over 100 genres at school. This is a very practical.
But I learned so much from traveling and playing in different parts of the world with many musicians who are not even schooled musicians. Balkan music is so different from anything we have in America. The time of signatures and the melodies are completely different. Also the main modality is coming from the harmonic minor instead of the major sound.
I think a lot of the problems in St Louis would be eliminated if more people traveled. So I would love to give people an opportunity to leave the country and to get a completely different viewpoint on life and music. Things don’t have to be the way they are. Things can be anyway you want to create them. But when you see completely different lifestyles and understand there’s a completely different mindset you will be able to reshape your as much easier.
So these are the last parts of my story. We became music promoters under our festival. First we brought the wold famous guitarist Stanley Jordan and now we’re bringing the world famous Victor Wooten and the Wooten Brothers to Bulgaria! And we are preparing to create an amazing cultural exchange at our festival in August. The famous Australian Dub FX is coming and many other highly skilled Bulgarian bands will play.
Then I’m planning to create this bridge for St Louis musicians. Next year it’s very important that I get the artist from Saint Louis to travel here. I need support from the St Louis community. We will have a cultural exchange and the completely different music education that you can’t get in USA. Both things will make people smarter and mentally stronger.
All in all I’m so grateful for my entire musical journey and all of the people in Saint Louis who have ever supported me in any way. My body is not in St Louis now but my soul and my music will always be there.
I would also like to say most of our success from Two Cities One world has come from the spiritual community in St Louis. Shout out to all the people from the rhyme or Reason days, CSL and the whole spiritual community and our family and friends.
We love you!
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
1. Being in an original band has tons of challenges. It’s got to be one of the hardest things to do. We have to wear so many hats it’s insane. I am the composer, I book, organize and pay for their rehearsals, do all of the visuals for all promotions, shoot the videos and edit them, book the gigs, market and promote the gigs, create the merch, design the websites, make the charts and prepare my musicians… The list goes on and on.
So much work to simply get people to go to a concert. But concerts are the most fun thing in the world for us. However most musicians are out there complaining and all they have to do is take a gig, practice a little bit, show up and play. And really that is a lot of work. We should really be getting 500 to a thousand dollars to do any gig.
But it’s all about numbers and bringing people. If people don’t come there’s no money. However we have to pay our musicians no matter what. So we do 50 times more work for every gig than our musicians and they get paid and we don’t. And then they’re not happy that it’s enough money but we just worked for two months every single day for example on one gig. So it’s a really hard business. Most musicians don’t want to promote at all.
And the end the payoff is still well worth it. However being parents and creating original music and taking care of everyone is a very large task that most people don’t understand. It’s a lot easier to just play in a cover band. But we want to give art to the world so we make it our duty to push through no matter how hard it is.
2. The other part of our challenges is immigration being a international couple. Everyone thinks you get married and immigration is easy. It’s extremely hard for everyone and takes many years. I’ve been to the immigration office about 12 times this year so far. Very inconvenient oftentimes without getting seen because there’s too many people and I have to leave to pick up my kids and drive one and a half hours away.
As I said before Anna was not allowed to return to the USA for three years because US immigration was absolutely horrible. Everybody knows it right now. Now is the worst it’s ever been. Thank God we did this before all of The terror.
So we’ve been dealing with immigration stuff on both parts of the world for 13 years straight. We thought getting married would make it easier. But it makes it way more complicated and challenging. Half of our family is in different parts of the world. Half or our things are in different parts of the world. And we’re constantly having to deal with immigration.
And even though it’s a giant challenge once again for us it’s worth it. Just make sure you really love someone if you want to marry international people haha.
3. The third and last challenge as an original artist is giving people truth, authenticity and something wholesome that touches the heart and soul. Pop cultures constantly spitting out sexual content to sell whatever they are selling. For so many years way too many people who call themselves “artists” just showed new depict pictures and sold more music. This is happening in all businesses of the world. However this stuff is destroying art and turning it into simplified addictive trash that doesn’t have a soul or direct the community to be better. So again too many people have been tricked into liking artists for example whom I mean nothing but maybe they liked their sexual pictures that got them to click on the video.
This has been happening for a long time now but it is a serious challenge as people who want to give something honest and artful. Because people would rather click on a thumbnail of a sexual picture then one of art. So the views go there…
Slowly buy surely we will manage to create the positive impact that we are giving. More and more we give our art. Even as I write this now I am a ground up music festival in Italy hosted by one of our favorite bands in the world Snarky Puppy. All the people who come here love art and are honest, raw people.
So as we face these challenges we will continue to visualize the world we would love to create as individuals and as influencers of our children and all the people are around us.
I would like to encourage all the artists to just keep pushing every day. Put content out every single day. Create more than you consume. And do it from that place in your heart where you know the ultimate truth.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
The first album Anna and I created together was her original songs titled up. This album was recorded half in Los Angeles at musicians institute and half in St Louis with Andrew Steven at eightfold studios. That album was the first produced album at eightfold studios.
After that when we became a band together as Two Cities One World we recorded our first ep titled together. This was also recorded and produced an eight-fold studios
We then recorded our first full length album called Let The Whole World Disappear. This was half recorded at Pacific Studios in Sofia Bulgaria and half at 8 Fold Studios in St Louis with Andrew Steven
Then we recorded a live EP at Bulgarian National Radio where the orchestra records.
Recorded The Things We Love again half at Pacific studios and Bulgaria and half in STL with Andrew Steven.
Andrew was the co-producer of all of our albums and he put an incredible magic touch on everything as he always does.
Then our work we created two beautiful children. Now they are almost three and seven and it’s time for us to release a new album. Stay tuned!
Lastly I created a very special music program called Kung Fu Music Lessons. It basically models martial arts structure in schools and also Shaolin Kung Fu and their training methods. The program is on our contemporary music college education and has many other creative aspects of developing the artists as well. It is a holistic program. Everyone is a student, teacher, artist and performer. I teach online and in person. Groups and private lessons. Soon I will create a real Music School in the mountains of Bulgaria for people to live and to play every day for eight hours minimum. Then I will book them gigs on the weekends.
Is there something surprising that you feel even people who know you might not know about?
Something surprising about me is that I used to break dance before playing music. This has a dramatic impact on the types of music I like and the rhythms that I love. From 12 to 17 I was break dancing. I want a small contest at South Broadway athletic Club when I was 17. I could not believe I beat my friends who were better than me. But that night I give some special flavor that the judges liked.
Also I have been skateboarding since I was 13. Currently I’m involved with the Jeff White memorial skatepark project in Pacific Mo. My friend John Felts, the White family and mayor Steve Meyers started this project. 5 years of fundraising and now it’s almost finished being built! It was amazing to see the community come together and to see what could be accomplished. The community raised $130,000. Then we got the rest of the money for a grant that put us up to almost 500,000!
It just shows you that when you want change you must get the community together and make it. Anything is possible.
Lastly I love billiards. Such a great way to relax the mind.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://TwoCItiesOneWorld.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/twocitiesoneworld/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/twocitiesoneworld
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClRBAoO6YWdbvq4Ij52h9xw
- Other: https://twocitiesoneworld.bandcamp.com
