How The Funeral Portrait’s Lee Jennings Learned to Sing

Our guest on this episode of How I Learned to sing is Lee Jennings of The Funeral Portrait.

The frontman takes us back to his childhood, how he first fell in love with singing, support from his family and the challenges touring presents for a singer.

How Lee Jennings Began Singing + Early Influences

When Lee Jennings was about 13 years old, hearing Evanescence‘s Amy Lee on the radio changed his life.

“She had this classical voice. Very operatic,” he describes, noting that he was active in musical theater and choir at the time.

The theatricality of Lee’s voice was instantly appealing to Jennings, who then began to wonder, “Is this my first crush?” He even got a fanboy moment in after performing at the Aftershock festival and told her how much she influenced him. He recalls, “She was like, ‘I don’t hear that often. It’s so cool to hear that from you guys.’ So it was a big special moment last year hearing that from her.”

School didn’t come naturally for Jennings and, fortunately, his choir teacher recognized his potential and encouraged his mom to get him proper voice lessons.

It was a turning point for Jennings, who was a bit of an outcast in the school’s social hierarchy. “I finally found the one thing at school that made me feel comfortable and made me want to keep going to school because, for me, I never wanted to be there,” he continues. “I was tired of getting made fun of. I was basically six feet tall in elementary school. So, like, of course all the bullies picked on me, you know?”

His family was supportive of his talent and encouraged it. The car was a popular place to sing and he has warm memories of his mom driving around, listening to Blondie, Billy Idol and Queen. As he discovered his own music, such as Evanescence and The Used, he found his true calling with music.

the funeral portrait at sonic temple 2025

Danny Wimmer Presents / @Devilman

Lee Jennings on Starting Bands

As a teenager in the MySpace era, Jennings dabbled in all sorts of bands, from electronic grindcore to “full on grindcore” and a “super scenecore band.” He has a local group called Make me Believe that got popular in northern Atlanta and he worked at a 200-capacity venue as well. From ages 14 to 21, he was booking a lot of bands, including Circa Survive.

When it came to forming The Funeral Portrait with his best friend, it was “just a joke.” He never intended for it to become as serious as it did, especially considering they were playing along to drum beats they had programmed.

While recording his own music, Jennings also began recording other local bands and eventually built a studio at his house with help from his grandfather.

How Lee Jennings Maintains His Voice on Tour

Touring is always particularly difficult for singers. So many factors before and after a show can be damaging to the voice and what works for one singer may not necessarily help another. It’s all about knowing and trusting your voice and body, recognizing the signs they’re giving you.

Since he’s had classical training, Jennings says he’s only lost his voice twice in 10 years of touring.

To prepare for a show, he says, “I definitely warm it up. I definitely make sure I’m drinking a lot of water. I do some stretches because I do a lot of high kicks up onstage — I’m a big mover.”

Dive further into Jennings’ journey as a singer from a kid through the present day and watch the full episode of How I Learned to Sing below.