Country star Hunter Hayes bringing musical journey to Rohnert Park

The life story of country-rock-blues superstar Hunter Hayes, who turns 25 in a few weeks, reads like a dream that’s too good to be true.

Born in Louisiana, he picked up the toy accordion when he was 2, made appearances on TV by 4 and was given his first guitar by actor Robert Duvall at 6. The next year, at 7, he was invited to perform at the White House.

By 2011, at the ripe age of 20, Hayes was opening for a Taylor Swift tour. Later that year, he released his first, self-titled album and launched his first headlining tour. Then the self-confessed guitar geek started amassing instruments.

“That was always a dream of mine,” Hayes confessed in a phone interview from his home in Nashville. “To go on the road and play a show and get more guitars ... At one point, there were 20 guitars. My mom walked backstage and said, ‘Why do you need all these guitars?’”

When Hayes walks onstage at the Green Music Center’s Weill Hall this Sunday with his band, there will only be three guitars, all the same model, only tuned slightly differently. Thanks to Mom, Hayes decided to design his own custom instrument in collaboration with the well-known manufacturer, Music Man. The instrument incorporates bits and pieces of all of the guitars he’s ever loved.

“It’s not even the sound, it’s about how it makes you play,” he said of his new hybrid guitar. “It feels like all the guitars I’ve ever played.”

While writing the musical notes comes naturally to Hayes, the songwriter has to work harder at creating meaningful lyrics, spinning stories out of the deepest places of his 20-something soul.

“The records that shape my life, that I go back to, are the ones with messages,” he said. “Right now I’m obsessed with the songs of Jon Bellion. He’s just really good at writing incredibly introspective, deep and incredibly vulnerable songs about figuring out life.”

Hayes was pretty much a hit right out of the song-writing gate. “Wanted,” released to radio in 2012, became his first No. 1 single and made him the youngest solo male act to top Billboard’s Hot Country song list. He went on to appear as the opening act for Carrie Underwood’s “Blown Away Tour” later that year.

In 2013, Hayes was one of five country singers to win CMT Artist of the Year award and was nominated for three Grammys, becoming the youngest male country artist to be nominated in all three of those categories, including Best New Artist. Hayes went on to perform “Invisible,” the lead single from his second album, “Storyline” (2014), at the 56th annual Grammy Awards.

His third and most unusual album, “The 21 Project,” was released in 2015 as a watershed project for the young artist, who was ready to take some risks.

“Last summer, we broke the pattern a little bit and tried some new things,” he said. “The entire industry is changing rapidly, and I want to find ways to embrace it, and I want to learn from the fans what the next version of releasing music would be.”

With “The 21 Project,” Hayes released seven songs, one at a time. Then he created a limited edition, three-disc collection, with each disc featuring the seven songs produced in different ways: in the studio, as an acoustic re-invention and as a live recording. Tracks include Hayes’ most recent Top 20 single, “21.”

“It was a blast,” he said. “I kept calling it my art project.”

While spending time in the studio can often be lonely and challenging, Hayes said he is looking forward to heading out on the road this month, because he often sits down with fans to chat.

“My fans are incredibly positive and uplifting,” he said. “I feel that they love music just as much as I do ... they get deep on the lyrics and the meaning of things. They know every word. Sometimes more than I do.”

To get into the song-writing groove, Hayes gets up and has a cup of coffee, then heads into the studio to bounce ideas off a couple of other songwriters. He has learned to enjoy the creative process of pouring his soul out.

“I really love the back-and-forth dialogue with another songwriter, and their perspective always shines a light on what you’re doing,” he said. “You want it to be a conversation anyway ... so when it is one, you put a lot more into the song.”

This year, Hayes has been spending more time in the studio while recording for his new project, a full-length studio album. A new single from the album is expected out soon.

“It’s not just a record, it’s a journey,” Hayes said. “Everybody goes through ups and downs in their 20s, and that’s what this record has been for me.”

Staff writer Diane Peterson can be reached at 521-5287 or diane.peterson@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @dianepete56.