Varsity Hi

Over the years, the rapper and producer’s approach to living has aided him well, as evidenced by his solid list of credentials. Truthfully, the talented beatsmith and rapper’s voyage into hip-hop isn’t that uncommon. Varsity Hi, born Jarvon Holmes, started rapping over instrumentals at 14 with a friend (Strategy), and eventually started mixing records together to make his own beats, using his father’s (a former DJ) turntables. The thing that does make his journey interesting is where it started—in Rapid City, South Dakota. 

“My dad was in the Air Force,” he explains, adding that Rapid City’s population was just 50,000. “The music scene was nonexistant. When we first started rapping, there weren’t a lot of other people doing it.” 

But that didn’t stop Varsity Hi, who always felt a calling toward hip-hop, despite leaving his hometown after graduating high school and attending the University of Maryland to pursue a degree in electrical engineering. That decision, however, didn’t pan out. Music was simply in his blood. 

“After the first year of college I decided that music would be my focus,” he remembers with a small chuckle. 

So he dropped out of school and went back to South Dakota where he purchased a keyboard and a sampler and started producing music. But after two years of being the resident producer for Rapid City’s small hip-hop scene, he decided it was time to pack up again, and returned to college, this time at Full Sail University in Florida. Keeping music his focus this go-around, he majored in recording engineering, a choice that in 2005, took him to Atlanta where he landed a gig at the Sound Lab recording studio. 

That fateful move became the turning point in his young career, when former Shady Records/Interscope rap artist, Bobby Creekwater, came through the doors to record in mega-producer, Lil Jon’s, studio. The two quickly formed a bond, and together began making music that would end up on every project Creek released between the years of 2008 and 2013, including the rapper’s acclaimed mixtapes, The Day It All Made Sense, Prevenge,Revenge, FUPM Is The Future, I Am From A Place. Varsity’s spaced-out, 808 heavy production was ethereal and wide-ranging in its scope, making it ripe for the picking since Creek was in the process of rebranding himself after leaving Shady Records. Focused strictly on making beats for the rapper, Varsity Hi’s rapping fell by the wayside. 

“I had ideas in my head, but never made songs,” he remembers, adding that he’s heavily influenced by Outkast because of the group’s ability to breakdown musical barriers and think outside of the box. 

In 2011, his father became very sick, another turning point in Varsity’s life and career. He returned to Florida in 2012 to spend time with his father who later passed away from terminal cancer, he has resided there ever since. It was after that emotional move that Varsity picked up the pen again, and began cultivating rhymes that spoke to his creativity and life experience. Now ready to release his solo debut EP, Cloud 9, Varsity is excited about the prospect of listeners hearing his audio vision. The ambitious song, “Must Be Vain,” is a bold declaration about loving yourself and having confidence, an ideology that Varsity is serious about embracing and spreading. 

“When people listen to my music, I want them to feel good,” he says, simply. “I really want to evoke that emotion. My general theme is to make people feel good and make people think about something.” 

With plans to release a second EP, tentatively titled Cloud 9.1, Varsity is all about seizing the moment, however they may come. 

“Why sit there and let things you pass by,” he questions. “What I’m trying to get across to my listeners is we got this life and we need to live it to the fullest. You can’t worry about what other people say. We need to take advantage of the time that we have.” 

At the end of the day, the world never stops turning, a reality that Varsity is fully aware of, and embraces. 

“If you have aspirations and dreams you need to act on it now,” he urges. “Don’t let anybody hold you back. Are you gonna listen to other people or are you gonna listen to yourself?”