By the time Hunter was almost 2, he was picking up everything and making an instrument out of it. When his grandmother gave him a toy accordion for his second birthday Hunter immediately began picking up Cajun songs by ear from the radio.
When 7 years old, Hunter was invited to perform for President Bill Clinton for a White House lawn party.
Hunter co-wrote every song and played every instrument found on his eponymous debut album. Just how many instruments did he play? "On the record," he told Billboard magazine, "we counted 30. I learned a lot of stuff on the spot. I don't consider myself to be a professional on all of them, but it's that process that I took when I was young, and doing all the demos by myself. It all took on a new meaning when we started this record, and I just kept with it. I'm really glad we did. It allowed a lot of myself to come out on the record."
Hunter's #1 hit "
Wanted" made him the youngest solo male act to top Billboard's Country Songs charts, surpassing the record previously held by Johnny Rodriguez, who topped the chart in 1973 with "You Always Come Back to Hurting Me."
Hunter spoke to the May 2013 issue of Esquire about sticking to his Country roots. "Every demo I do has a mandolin or resonator on it - some element of the bluegrass or classic country world that I grew up listening to and that first drew me in," he said. "And then I always try to find somewhere for a bluesy guitar sound, because that's also what I love. Musically, I'm always finding my way home."
A former child prodigy, Hunter was given his first guitar by actor Robert Duvall at the age of six.
Hunter Hayes broke the Guinness World Record for the most concerts played in multiple cities in one day in an effort to raise awareness to end child hunger. It also coincided with the release of the Nashville star's Storyline album. Beginning on May 9, 2014 with a performance on Good Morning America in New York, the singer played ten shows in ten cities in 24 hours, breaking the Flaming Lips' record of eight shows over the same period.
Despite playing over 30 instruments, Hunter Hayes has never been able to get to grips with the violin. "We have never gotten along," he told Billboard magazine. "It would be different if I picked it up, I sucked at it, and I didn't care. I could let it go. But I want to play it. I want it in my music so bad. I want to design a string section and I want to play the double-stop kind of stuff. But I've never really gotten along with it."
Hunter Hayes designed his tour bus from scratch. He told
Travel + Leisure: "I knew exactly what I wanted. I sent them the floor plan and the finishes. So we built this farmhouse bus, chesterfield-style leather couches, white shiplap walls, lighting is very specific."