'American Idol' Winner Chayce Beckham on His Growing Country Music Career: 'I’m Just a Little Fish in a Big Pond Working My Way Up'

Winning American Idol was life changing for Chayce Beckham, who won the fourth season (season 19) that aired on ABC. He was able to quit his job as a heavy machinery operator, move to Nashville, and begin making music his career.

“Getting to tour, play shows, and meet fans is probably for me the funnest thing that I get to do,” the 26-year-old from Apple Valley, Calif, tells Parade.com in this exclusive interview. “I love writing songs, recording, and the process of getting really excited about music before you release it. The whole thing of putting it together and shooting videos, I love the excitement that builds. And then when you release a song and fans finally get to hear it, it’s a lot of fun. The whole process is really enjoyable for me compared to jobs I’ve had in the past.”

Happily, Chayce has had an impressive track record since winning American Idol, the first artist to do so with an original song, the semi-autobiographical “23,” so there is little chance that there will be more forklifts in his immediate future. His debut EP, Doin It Right, soared to No. 1 on iTunes’ All Genre and Country charts, and today he is releasing a new single, the heart-wrenching “Keeping Me Up All Night.”

“It’s a song that talks about what it feels like whenever someone has left your life and that feeling of anxiety or separation anxiety you get whenever someone’s not there for you anymore,” he says. “When I listen to it, it’s cool because I feel like it could touch on so many different subjects for people, whether it’s somebody that left you by choice or someone that left you because they didn’t have a choice, or maybe someone who passed away. It’s about being stuck inside your head, not being able to sleep, and just that feeling of missing that person.”

Related: Exclusive First Listen! American Idol Champ Chayce Beckham Takes His Mom’s Words to Heart With 'Tell Me Twice'

A little more than a year into his growing country music career, Chayce is grateful for the opportunities that have presented themselves so far, like touring with Jimmie Allen and taking his duet with Lindsey Ell to country radio and getting to learn the ropes on how that works.

“I’m trying to push my music as much as I can without setting super high unrealistic expectations,” he says. “But I realize where I want to go, and I take baby steps to get there. If this is a song that ends up on the radio, if the fans really like it, then so be it. But I guess that you let the music speak for itself in that case and, hopefully, I can release music, if not this song, then other songs that will connect with a large amount of people. My goal as an artist is just to try to get a message across to as many people as I can.”

During our chat, Chayce also talked about the surprises that have come with his new career, like the business side of things and collaborating on writing songs, touring with Jimmie Allen and Luke Combs, keeping in touch with his friends from Idol, especially judge Luke Bryan, and more.

You’ve now had a little more than a year since your American Idol win. At what point after Idol did you realize you might be able to make music your career?

Well, I got kind of thrown into everything that you would expect as far as coming to Nashville, writing songs, recording, and touring. It’s just been an ongoing train that hasn’t stopped. I don’t know if it ever really clicked for me; it’s just been what I wanted to do for a really long time. It’s like once you get to doing it, you have no plans of stopping.

Since this is all new to you, do some things surprise you about a music career? What have you learned that you didn’t know before?

Just a lot about the financial side of things, the business side, and how much it costs to constantly be running around playing shows and touring. It’s definitely a lot more money than I ever anticipated, how much it would cost to do it and pay everybody. It’s a learning curve as far as going from being an employee your whole life and then you’re in charge of your own enterprise. So, that would be the biggest change for me. I’ve been writing songs and singing for a long time but figuring out the business side of things was definitely something I didn’t expect.

Are you finding it easier to write or harder to write than you thought?

The way I see it is I’ll never know everything there is to know about songwriting, so I’ll just be constantly learning and evolving as a writer. I have a lot of fun doing that and experimenting with different things, learning different things from different people, adding new tools to my toolbox and implementing those in other songs. What I think is cool is when you pay attention to an artist over time, you can see the development of their sound or their writing or whether you do concept albums or stuff like that.

So, I think it’s something that I’m always going to be learning and always going to be taking in as much as I can. I’ve done so many different types of music. I did rap when I was in high school, reggae, rock, and now country music. I grew up on country music and I fell back into writing these kinds of songs. So, I don’t know, I want to blend everything in some of these songs and experiment and try to push the boundaries a little bit and have fun with it.

Related: American Idol Winner Chayce Beckham Reveals the Advice From Katy Perry That Helped Him Win

Isn’t it more collaborative now then when you were just sitting in your room doing it yourself?

Yeah, I have a really good group of people here in Nashville that I enjoy writing with. It was something that I had to wrap my head around at first but now it’s kind of therapeutic, and I really enjoy getting to do it. Because I know these guys now and they know me, we get together and we joke around and have fun writing songs. It’s crazy. We’re like, “This is our job?” So, it’s a cool experience now and I’ve gotten a lot of great songs out of it.

I think the major difference is I’ve always had ideas for songs, but I’ve never been able to finish them. So, by bringing in a team of other writers to help me out, I have a lot more of these completed ideas as opposed to just, “Oh, this could be a really great song,” in my head. It might take me five years to ever find the words to put behind that concept, but I could bring it up to a couple of my buddies and we might figure it out that day. So, that’s the cool part about it.

I love that process of writing songs with my friends, and then getting the demos for them. Listening to them, you get excited. I remember when we got the demo for “Keeping Me Up All Night”, we were all just like, “Yeah, this is great.” So, I’m excited to release it now. That was recorded a while ago. We recorded it early this year.

You toured with Jimmie Allen and you have a tour with Luke Combs coming up, but you also have your own tour coming up. Is that more nerve wracking because you must sell tickets on your own? They’re not coming to see somebody else that you open for.

Well, I’ve done quite a few of my own tours, I did one last year. I’ve toured the country about twice now since I’ve been off Idol, and it’s definitely a mix between sometimes you go play shows and you’re the headliner, sometimes I’m opening for Jimmie or I’m opening for someone else. There’s a little bit less pressure when you’re the opener. It’s just like, “Yeah, I’m here to support,” but when it’s your show, yeah.

It kind of varies. We’ve definitely gone to some places where we didn’t have great ticket sales because these people haven’t heard my music, or they don’t know who I am. We’ve been to some places where you show up and there’s not a lot of people there, and then we’ve played some places where we show up and we can’t believe how many people there have come to see us play. So really, it’s a humbling experience and it’s a big blessing, too, because it just reminds you.

I grew up playing in bars and I’m very used to playing for five, ten, 15, or 20 people. So, if I show up and there’s not that many people there to see me, I don’t get my feelings hurt. I’m just like, “Hey, I got 200 people here that might think that this was a kickass show and they’re going to bring their friends next time.” I look forward to going back to those places and building my relationship with those fans and that community because that’s a challenge.

As opposed to going some places, where I know I’ll go and it’s just going to be electric. I know when I go there that’s how it’s going to be. But it’s cool when you go to a place where you’re not expecting a big crowd, and maybe last time there wasn’t that many, but you showed up this time and there’s a thousand. And then you come back next time and there’s two. It’s kind of a cool thing. I’m just a little fish in a big pond working my way up.

The year that you won American Idol, Grace Kintsler and Willie Spence were very talented people. Do you stay in touch with them, or maybe some other people from the show?

We all follow each other and keep in touch. I’ve kept in touch with Willie this past year, Grace too, a lot of people from the show, like my good friends, Hunter Metts and Graham DeFranco. There’s a lot of people that I met on the show. I was just with that whole team basically, and Casey Bishop was there and a bunch of people from this last past season, too. It’s cool. It’s like one big family, everybody from prior seasons or the most recent seasons all get together still. We just did a writers’ round here in Nashville and Ruben Studdard was there. That was pretty cool. So yeah, everybody from the Idol family, we all keep in touch and love on each other.

What about the judges? Are you in touch with Luke Bryan, Katy Perry, or Lionel Richie at all?

Yes. I’ve kind of made it to where Luke can’t get rid of me, he’s stuck with me now, and I’m sure he regrets ever making that decision. He’s got me pretty much all tied up in all of his stuff, we have the same manager. I don’t see Luke too much because he’s always touring or doing stuff, but we’ve kept in touch and he’s been a good mentor to me after the show. I’ve seen Katy a couple times. I’ve seen Lionel a couple times after the show. So yeah, everybody’s been really cool to me. But, yeah, Luke, he’s stuck with me now.

Next, American Idol Announces its Judges and Host for Season 6 on ABC and How to Audition