Singing her song
Violet Clare talks music, creativity and balance

In her Wrigleyville apartment on a frigid winter afternoon, Violet Clare sits on her bed playing the guitar and practicing her set.
Tonight, she'll play a show at Fallen Log in Lincoln Park. She'll take the stage with her guitar and a smile, overcome her nerves and sing for the crowd. But right now, she's preparing in her space. She's calm.
“I think I’ve got the sounds down, I’m a bit shaky on the one I haven’t memorized. … For context I wrote it two days ago, but I really want to play it” Clare said as she finished playing through her setlist.
A DePaul English major, Violet Clare's full name is Violet Clare Bowdle, but she adopted "Clare" for her stage name. Originally from Grand Rapids, Michigan, Clare moved to Chicago to pursue music and attend college.
Clare started playing music at a young age. When she was little, she'd write songs on a ukulele and play them for her family. Clare's dad, Brian Bowdle, whom she called a "huge audiophile," supported her through her journey.
Bowdle himself grew up in a family of musicians and helped Clare discover new artists as well as acquire instruments and recording gear over the years to support her passion.
“Music has always been a central part of my life, and I’ve tried to ‘pay it forward’ with Violet,” Bowdle said.
Violet Clare does her makeup in her Wrigleyville apartment before her show at Fallen Log on Thursday, Feb. 20, 2025. Clare said she sometimes struggles to manage school with a music career, but that she tries to keep things in balance. Credit: Annie Koziel/The DePaulia
Violet Clare does her makeup in her Wrigleyville apartment before her show at Fallen Log on Thursday, Feb. 20, 2025. Clare said she sometimes struggles to manage school with a music career, but that she tries to keep things in balance. Credit: Annie Koziel/The DePaulia
Clare released her first EP, "Running Clockwise," in 2022, and her most recent single, "Infant of a Soldier," in February 2025. She is currently working on a new EP — like most of her music, it's recorded in her room, self-written and self-produced.
"It's very cathartic for me," Clare said of songwriting. "It's very quick; it's just like writing in a diary."Clare’s dad affirms that she has always been a natural lyricist, which he “hardly finds surprising” given her lifelong love of literature and beautiful voice, he said.
Clare’s boyfriend, Giovanni Wubbena, who plays a supporting role in her creative and production process, said Clare “is a writer first and foremost, so all of her songs just kind of come out of her.”
“Just the other day, I was taking a nap, and she was playing the guitar and doing something I’ve never heard before,” Wubbena said. “I kind of started to wake up and I was like, ‘What? What is this?’ And she’s like ‘Yeah, I just wrote a new song.’ It happened in like 15 minutes, she wrote this whole new song, and it sounds f---ing amazing.”
Having seen her development as a musician long-term, Bowdle said what’s struck him the most “is the growing sophistication of her melodies, her arrangements, and her instrumental technique.”
In addition to music creation, Clare also handles all the logistics of being a musician. She schedules shows, plans set lists and even makes and sells her own merch.
“She brings everyone together, forms the whole bill … which is really cool. Not a lot of musicians do that as well. She kind of is both a promoter, organizer and musician, which is f---ing crazy,” Wubbena said.
Violet Clare performs a set at age 17. Though she'd been writing music for years at this point, Clare started performing more regularly once she turned 17 and started to get more comfortable on a stage, which include finding ways to cope with stage fright. Credit: Provided/Violet Bowdle
Violet Clare performs a set at age 17. Though she'd been writing music for years at this point, Clare started performing more regularly once she turned 17 and started to get more comfortable on a stage, which include finding ways to cope with stage fright. Credit: Provided/Violet Bowdle
Clare's guitar sits on her bed in her apartment in Wrigleyville on Thursday, Feb. 20, 2025, as she prepares her equipment for the night's performance. This guitar is one of many instruments Clare owns, though she initially started writing music on ukulele. Credit: Annie Koziel/The DePaulia
Clare's guitar sits on her bed in her apartment in Wrigleyville on Thursday, Feb. 20, 2025, as she prepares her equipment for the night's performance. This guitar is one of many instruments Clare owns, though she initially started writing music on ukulele. Credit: Annie Koziel/The DePaulia
At Fallen Log that night, a few months back, Clare cheered on her fellow musicians before taking the stage to perform old songs and unreleased ones, plus a few covers.
She said performing is "the most nerve-racking part" of the process, but also that it's rewarding to share her work with others. Wubbena said he’s noticed her overcoming that nervousness as she’s grown throughout her career.
“I really, really, really want her to believe in herself, her performance abilities, her ‘interestingness’ as a person and her as art,” Wubbena said. “One thing that’s so wonderful about live music is watching a person just absorbed in it and feeling the art and letting it come out of you as well.”
In the immediate future, Clare’s goals are to perform more, release a professional-quality EP and open for bands at bigger venues.
"I said this to a friend a few days ago: that life is just like one big burger, and you just have to take it one bite at a time," Clare said. "And that's like me with music. I can't really see what's at the end of the burger, but I'm working on it right now."