Contest bolsters Las Vegas musician

It began with modestly lit video footage of an empty bed, a pair of guitars leaning against the mattress, and it has yet to end.

Anthony Salari enters the frame, alone, clutching a six-string, singing as if his heart's in a vice.

Little did Salari know at the time that the off-the-cuff clip, shot with a single camera, would catalyze his first big break in the music business.

"I was just surfing around on YouTube one night, and through a video I was watching, I saw something that said 'contest for musicians' or something along those lines," Salari recalls, sipping a Guinness in shades on the patio of the Triple George Grill on a recent Wednesday afternoon. "I thought, 'Oh, that looks cool.' "

And so Salari entered the contest, submitting an amateur video he had made earlier.

And then he forgot about it.

"A few months down the line I got an e-mail that said, 'Congratulations, you're our winner,' " he says. "I thought it was spam or something. I neglected to open it at first."

But eventually he did, only to learn that he had taken top honors in the "Say You Wanna Play" competition put on by National Association of Music Merchants.

In addition to free music lessons from AJ's Music and Vintage Guitars in Henderson, Salari earned a chance to perform at the annual NAMM convention, held in January in Anaheim, Calif., which is the largest music industry trade show in the world and a big opportunity for a young musician, putting him in front of scads of industry professionals.

He's already started fielding calls from entertainment attorneys eager to watch him play.

It all couldn't have happened at a better time for Salari, who moved to Vegas from Bullhead City, Ariz., to pursue his dreams as a singer-songwriter, but found himself at a crossroads after his father, who served as his manager, passed away unexpectedly.

"Not only did it kind of put a hold on everything, it made me re-evaluate my life a little bit," the 24-year-old says. "It makes you just not want to really do anything. That kind of set me back awhile."

But his big win re-invigorated Salari, and justifiably so: He's a promising talent, whose mostly acoustic-based tunes ride high on his poised, pleading voice and emotive, open-book lyrics that hold little back.

"I need to be real. I can't talk about things that I don't know about," Salari says. "I can't try to make up a story and put myself into it."

Nor does he have to.

The guy's already living in a fairy tale these days.

"When I won that contest, it was the first solidifying moment where I felt like, 'I can really do this,' " Salari explains. "Ultimately, after these things happening, I've decided, 'I'm just going to do it.' "

Contact reporter Jason Bracelin at jbracelin@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0476.